If you're reading this, chances are you've seen Just Friends and know it's one of the most hilarious, underrated rom-coms of our time. (If you haven't seen the movie, rent it this weekend; you'll have zero regrets.) It stars Ryan Reynolds as Chris Brander, an overweight high-school loser who, after getting rejected by his beautiful best friend (Amy Smart), moves to LA, loses a ton of weight, and becomes a womanizing record exec. He returns to his childhood home when a flight with the ditzy, slightly insane pop star Samantha James (Anna Faris) goes awry, landing him in New Jersey for the first time in 10 years.
Cosmopolitan.com spoke to director Roger Kumble (writer/director of Cruel Intentions) about the 2005 movie (written by Adam "Tex" Davis). Herewith, eight facts you probably never knew:
1. It was shot in Saskatchewan, in freezing cold weather.
"We had very little money to make it, and this Canadian company agreed to do it, but we had to go make it Regina, Saskatchewan, in the middle of winter. We were like, 'We're gonna freeze.' But we went up there and it was the best experience I've ever had in my career. Because it was so cold, flights couldn't land — the studio didn't come up; they were very hands-off. And we would just workshop the movie. We would go to Ryan's place that he rented, and we'd read it and work on it. It was amazing, like having a little theater company."
2. Paris Hilton, who was supposedly an inspiration for the Samantha James character, actually auditioned for the part.
"We saw a lot of people because that was a really fun part. Paris Hilton came in. Which was, you know, weird. She was good! She came in and auditioned; she was good. [But] Anna Faris is comic genius. Paris was just starting out, trying to break into acting, and I think it would have been getting attention for the film for the wrong reasons. She was huge at the moment. She was very cool. And, in fact, I'd met her before and she named her cat Sebastian [after Ryan Phillippe's character in Cruel Intentions]. She told me that years before.
Anna and I, we got together and took what was on the page and kind of created Samantha James. She goes, 'Which [pop star] is she?' I go, 'All of them. We're putting them in a blender. And then dumbing them down. And that's you.'"
3. Roger co-wrote that terrible Samantha James song "Forgiveness."
"One of the greatest moments of my life. It was like my own Make-A-Wish … Usually I'd be like, 'You guys just do this song.' But I was in the high school band that broke up and was never able to do anything with that. So I was like, 'Nope, I'm getting involved.' The freedom to be like, 'Let's write some bad songs for Samantha.' It's basically bad Beatles. I wrote a couple of verses and I was able to sing background on it. All the voices at the end are pretty much me."
4. Anna really put whipped cream on her breasts to shoot this poster.
"She looked ridiculous."
5. The toothpaste scene came together on the spot.
"I remember when Ryan comes back to the house and she's drugged up, I said, 'Let's give her the Bugs Bunny headache thing and just shove toothpaste in her mouth.' If I wrote that joke into the script, they would have said, 'What are you doing?' It would never have read on the page. We just shot it and hoped for the best."
6. Yes, Alanis Morissette, who was dating Ryan at the time, visited the set. She also made a cameo.
"She had a brief scene that didn't make the cut. It was fun; she was great."
Note: She's featured on the DVD, in the deleted scenes:
Also, note: When looking for this deleted scene, I came across a video diary Ryan shot to promote Just Friends. It's bad quality, but it features a sweet moment between him and Alanis (at the 3:38 mark), so I felt compelled to share anyway.
7. Bradley Cooper almost played Chris Klein's character, Dusty Dinkleman.
"We were trying to cast a young actor, Bradley Cooper — I don't know what happened to him. He wanted to do it. But we couldn't get him out of Jack and Bobby because they couldn't guarantee the plane would take off because it was so cold. And then Chris Klein came up and read and was great. And he's so good-looking and hulky. It was like, 'How fun if we just ugly him up like Ryan?'"
8. It was Ryan's idea to lip-sync "I Swear."
"He knew the whole song. He's like, 'I think I should lip-sync.' And I was like, 'Yeah, let's do it.' [We got it in] one shot. That's all him.
I've always loved Ryan Reynolds. I loved him on, like, Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place. I knew him from an indie film called Coming Soon — I had been tracking him for years, because I was like, "This guy's so talented." And not because of Van Wilder — Van Wilder was great because we were able to finance the movie. He was bankable to that level. But there was some other stuff he did where I was like, 'This guy is comic genius.'"
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