Hildy Goody (Sigourney Weaver) is a successful New England real estate agent with a talent for Pinot Noir that affects her family. She has cared for them all her adult life, avoiding her inner demons. Things change for Hildy when her family no longer wants her around her grandchild unless she stops drinking, her grip on the competitive real estate market loosens and she rekindles an old flame with another local entrepreneur (Kevin Kline) .
the good house explores human struggles through themes of addiction, ageism and more, intertwined with a light touch of humor to balance. Although Hildy goes through many undesirable circumstances in her life, whether it be her addiction or its previous catalysts, she remains smart, funny and charming.
“We felt like that story of older women and their whole lives, their jobs, their families and their romance, their relationships with themselves just wasn’t something we’ve seen very often,” he said. Maya Forbes. “And it was funny. The book was funny,” she added, referring to Ann Leary’s novel of the same name.
“It has our favorite premise, which is a very well-developed, unreliable narrator. That’s where all the juice is, in what’s true and what’s not. Ann Leary did a great job creating this character, and so reading the book immediately gave us a great idea for a movie,” said Wally Wolodarsky.
When Forbes or Wolodarsky have a good idea for making movies, it’s true, as both have built up quite remarkable resumes in the industry. Infinite polar beardirected by Forbes and starring Mark Ruffalo and Zoe Saldana, previously premiered on sundance rave reviews, of which Wolodarsky produced. He also has experience writing for shows such as The Simpsonsand their lists can go on and on and be bolstered by their latest.
The good house film and novel
“We’ve really tried to be faithful,” Wolodarsky said of how close the film is to the book. “We really liked the book, so we did our best for it.”
“And the book had a lot, I think 10 years ago, or something like that a long time ago, but it had a lot of fans. So you just had to peel away and focus on the Hildy story. It’s a challenge because we’re only staying from her point of view, so things that happen to other characters, those weren’t part of the story the way we told it,” Forbes added.
They went on to note how Leary behaved as an interested reader and provided them with her thoughts, enabling good conversations and insights that inspired the script’s subsequent drafts.
She would talk about classical music of the day and rock ‘n’ roll of the night. That was kind of her mode,” said Forbes, who relates Hildy well in her novel and in the script as if, like classical music, she’s put together day and night, breaking open a bottle or Pinot Noir or sneaky vodka. , doing things she can’t remember, more akin to the rhythm of rock n’ roll. But this behavior, combined with her ability to break through the fourth wall and spread secrets, makes us support her even more.
“I think she has a lot of desks. She’s a person who struggles to really make something of herself and her life, and we always like characters who reach for something, who really strive or go in the direction, who are not reactive but react and go for things, said Wolodarsky.
“What we also really liked about her is that the things that helped her survive and move forward in life, the coping mechanisms are no longer working. The things that have made her so strong are also the things that hold her back a little bit… and that’s an interesting crossroads,” Forbes added.
It’s at this crossroads where we can really get inside her head as she breaks through the fourth wall, which makes her all the more interesting as a storyteller, despite how unreliable she is at times.
“We see that as kind of sitting at a bar with someone, and they tell you their side of the story. You feel like, “God, those kids of yours, it seems like they don’t understand you or they don’t seem to care if you’re happy.” You hear that story. So the movie is really about denial. It was a nice way to start with her thinking, ‘Yeah, Hildy. Upright. Everyone is on your case.’ And then you slowly start catching up: ‘Wait a minute!’ That’s something that we feel like we’ve experienced in our own lives with people that it’s slowly sinking in, or you’re in the awkward position of whether you have a problem or not,” Forbes says.
“We just experienced the story as we experienced life. It’s a lot of funny things, a lot of tragic things, and you can never have one without the other,” Wolodarsky added.
Character-driven filmmaking & endless polar bear
“We always start with character, always, with every project, and the plot comes from that character and where we want to see them go,” Wolodarsky explained how they decide which projects to take on. That, and always wanting to be a little funny, because they both got into the world of comedy.
This is true based on their previous work, especially if you look at a story like Infinite polar bear where the story unfolds from a complex character who suffers from bipolar disorder and takes full responsibility for his children while his wife attends graduate school.
“Infinite polar bear is based on my growth and my father. That came from telling stories to my kids… our kids never knew him, I told them bedtime stories, and that’s more or less where it started. I realized I wanted them to understand him and my kind of very unusual upbringing, and it just evolved from there… Infinite polar bear is the truth, but it’s not exactly what happened. So, making the plot, because you’re working with these really young actors and if I really told the real story, it’ll unfold over many years, but movies just aren’t like that. Things had to sort of get compressed and condensed and a new story had to come out of some version of the truth,” Forbes explained.
A process that also lent itself to catharsis, as Forbes continued, saying it deepened her connection to her mother and herself.
“It was very cathartic for me with my mother, and for her. When she read the script, she understood in a new way the pressure my sister and I had been under. When I wrote the script, I understood what she had to do in a new way. It really created a lot of empathy between us… it took a few years to get it made… but even if I couldn’t have made the script, I would have just been so happy to have written it, and for me and my mom to see each other,” Forbes said.
Maya Forbes and Wally Wolodarsky currently have a couple of different projects in the works, but confirmed they’ve adapted a book called “Worst Case Scenario” and hope to have it together next summer.