How did Swimfan come to you? Originally, I think they had come to me wanting me to play Shiri’s character. I started acting when I was 12, and by the time I was 15, I was so frustrated with just being the cute girl next door. I wanted to see what else I could get cast doing. I got a couple little opportunities of like, Yes, thank you, please let me try something. And then Traffic. And then when they came to me with the sweet character again, I was like, Nooo. I remember meeting with director John Polson and being like, “I know how to play Madison, that’s what I want to do.” And then they were like, “Okay.”
Were you looking to play a femme-fatale villain, or were you uniquely drawn to Madison? No, it was more of the latter. To oversimplify, I was like, She’s so crazy. But like most crazy people, she doesn’t know that she’s crazy. I was like, She thinks she’s right at every stage of this story.
But she is actually really smart! She makes some choices that I’m amazed by even now. I never would have come up with planting her underwear in Ben’s car. Good job! Way to play the game!
Did you know Jesse or Shiri? All of you were relatively famous at the same time. Had your paths ever crossed? I don’t think so. You’re right, we all just came up right then, but I didn’t know them yet. I watched Bring It On for sure.
Filming for Swimfan was in New Jersey and New York. Can you talk about your first week on set? I don’t know if I’m remembering this wrong because of that idea that you always film the love scenes first, before you get a chance to discover that they don’t like each other. But I feel like that might have been near the top of the shoot. The pool stuff.
Wait, I have to tell you the best tidbit, which is that the wardrobe department fucked with Jason Ritter and told him he needed to get waxed because they were wearing Speedos. And he did. A pain he had never imagined! I think the guys were all actually training, and Jesse was like, All right, I am going to get super-lean for this because I’m going to be walking around in a Speedo all day.
But I was super-nervous about the love scene, because while it was certainly not my first, it was sensual in a way that was my first. And the previous scenes had been such a different vibe. I remember being to Jesse like, “Please help me understand if this is going well.” I had the sound department — on the first take when we start making out — play Marvin Gaye’s “Let’s Get It On” over the loudspeakers. I thought it was going to be hilarious, but it didn’t really play loudly enough. It was like … [Listens for music.] “Oh, okay. Let’s get on with it, fine.”
How many takes did the sex scene take? It must have taken the better part of a day. There were definitely setups that didn’t make the final cut. I specifically remember there was a close-up over him onto my face, and I think over me onto Jesse’s face. John Polson did us the courtesy of showing us the scene cut together, and it was so incredibly intimate, and I was just like, “I can’t handle that. Can you just make it about what’s happening, and not so much about what I’m experiencing?” He was completely on board — he was really nice about it.
That scene really is intimate — when she says, “Tell me you love me.” How did you handle the line delivery? I think the most important thing for me was trying to make it seem like it was not a red flag — trying to get what I needed, but not freak him out in the moment, because otherwise he just might call things off immediately. So I was like, Play it cool, play it cool, play it cool.
Some of your other line deliveries are cheekier. I’m thinking of Madison’s description of Amy as “so sweet and uncomplicated.”
Madison thought it was funny because she knew she was being awful. That was her: You’re making this easy for me. She was delighted in the game of it. That’s what carries through the whole time. Right up until the end, she’s like, I got this.
