"The Hating Game" is such a fun romantic comedy. What drew you to the movie?
I got the script when I was on vacation last year with my family. And Lucy [Hale] was already attached. And so this first read-through, I was able to imagine the whole thing with Lucy and I doing it together. And being friends with her even before we did "Fantasy Island," I was able to fill in all the unknowns that usually come with a script that gets sent my way. And I just fell in love with Josh right from the beginning. This misunderstood character, this deep character in the middle of a romantic comedy.
He's somebody who has put up a lot of walls because he's been hurt and heartbroken. And a work environment is not usually a place where we like to rock the boat too much. And so he's doing this dance of falling in love with someone, but also protecting himself at the same time. And he's doing a terrible job of it. And instead of admitting how he feels, it's all these games. And this is their biggest problem, is that they're not telling each other how they feel. They're not telling each other the truth really until the end of the movie. And even then, you can see that they're still playing with each other, that this will probably be an ongoing part of their relationship.
It really reminded me of old school rom-coms with Cary Grant, the bickering back and forth.
We were certainly trying to capture a bit of that banter. Lucy and I kind of have that in real life. Not that we're fighting, but certainly we can keep up with one another. And it's why we're friends.
