Caffeine And Nicotine

All of these people I knew except Cate [Blanchett] and Steve Coogan. But I had met Cate before and I really was a fan and wanted to work with her in some way--and still do in some other way. I would think up people I wanted to get together and then I would write a script. Generally, I didn't have the script idea quite down though sometimes I had the ideas.

What are you hoping viewers will get from the movie?

It was really done just for fun so there's no real meaning intended. I just hope people get a few laughs out of it ... but there's no intended message in the film other than: here we are, we're human beings, what are we doing here? I was just happy to get to work with such a strange variety of different people. The film celebrates variety and is an exercise for me in variation, which is a form I really love.

What kind of reaction have you gotten to it?

Well, Taylor Mead, who's in the last section, told me, "It's like 'My Dinner with Andre' but instead of one long boring dinner, it's eleven interesting coffee breaks." Not my words, but that was his analysis.

Why coffee and cigarettes?