‘Broken Hearts’ performance inspiration
Writer-director Krinsky based role on her life before becoming a TV writer for ‘Gossip Girl,’ ‘Grey’s Anatomy,’ and ‘90210’
Geraldine Viswanathan fell in love when she read the screenplay for “The Broken Hearts Gallery.”
Not with Max or Nick, the male love interests in the romantic comedy the Australian actress had been offered, but with Lucy Gulliver, the character she’d play.
“I just wanted to be her/ be her best friend,” Viswanathan says. “I thought she was just so unapologetically herself.
“And she wears her heart on her sleeve, and that’s a really brave thing to do, and inspires the people around her to be their best selves,” she says.
“I really was just drawn to her and really wanted to experience living in that person’s shoes. I was just like, ‘Who is this magical creature?’”
In “The Broken Hearts Gallery,” Lucy is a 20-something art gallery intern in New York City. She shares a place with BFFs Amanda (Molly Gordon) and Nadine (Phillipa Soo), who tease her for her quirky obsession as a curator of odds and ends saved from romances long finished.
When her relationship with Max (Utkarsh Ambudkar) blows up in a drunken and very public display, she gets fired by gallery owner Eva Wolff (Bernadette Peters). Then she works to pull herself together.
After a mandatory romcom meet-cute, she befriends Nick (Dacre Montgomery), a handsome if struggling hotelier, and convinces him to let her use his balcony as the gallery of the movie’s title and a place for anyone to cast off the past-their-expiration mementos of lost loves.
“I feel like Lucy is similar to who I am on my best days,” Viswanathan says of her character’s openhearted, can-do nature. “To be so open and to feel emotion so strong and loudly, I think that’s a really brave thing to do in such an at times dark and confusing world.
“I think we adjust and find ways of balancing ourselves and dimming our light a little bit,” she says. “And I think it’s just so cool that Lucy is just relentless in her expression of herself.”
“The Broken Hearts Gallery” is the 25-year-old actress’s biggest role in a relatively young career. She starred earlier this year in the HBO movie “Bad Education” with Hugh Jackman and Allison Janney. Two years earlier she made her initial splash in the U.S. market as one of the three teen leads in the comedy “Blockers.”
To play Lucy, Viswanathan says she drew on her long-running love — and knowledge — of romantic comedies.
“I think my main inspiration was ‘Bridget Jones’ Diary,’” she says. “That’s personally my favorite romantic comedy, and I think for Lucy as a character she was kind of a signpost for me.
“And then I think for the dynamic with Nick, and their banter, I feel like we were inspired by ‘When Harry Met Sally,’” Viswanathan says.
“I’ve watched so many in my lifetime, and I’m sure all of them have probably influenced my approach and experience of this movie, but those were the two that I kind of kept coming back to, and that Natalie and I would talk about at length.”
Writer-director Natalie Krinsky also served as a role model for Lucy’s character, her screenplay based loosely on her own mid20s life experiences before she made it as a writer on shows such as “Gossip Girl,” “Grey’s Anatomy,” and “90210.”
“I drew a lot of inspiration from Natalie, who is just the chicest, funniest, most outrageous woman,” Viswanathan says. “I feel like I drew upon her sense of humor a little bit for Lucy, to try something new to kind of meld both our instincts together.”
Lucy’s plot-driving personality trait — the saving of physical reminders of the past — was relatable, Viswanathan says, though her experience isn’t quite as extreme.
“There are so many moments that I’ve cherished and wanted to capture in some way,” she says. “And sometimes when photos aren’t appropriate or enough, I do hold onto physical mementos.
“I mean, I have several shoe boxes under my bed just from good times,” Viswanathan says. “I keep every letter, every birthday card. Anything written to me I feel like I hold onto and have a very hard time letting go of because I love revisiting those reminders.”
That said, she does believe it’s good to recognize, as Lucy ultimately does, that a time comes when it’s right to let such things go.
“It’s nice if you have that moment of reflection and reminder, but I think with this situation it gets out of hand, and then gets in the way of her moving forward,” Viswanathan says. “I think it’s important for one to let go and to trust yourself and to trust that those memories did happen.
“They’re there, and they’ll always have a place in you and be a part of you, but you need to make space and be present for new memories. It’s that balance that’s important.”
The camaraderie on set made the off-screen filming as fun and happy as what ends up on screen, Viswanathan says.
The actresses who played her two best friends — Phillipa Soo, a Tony nominee for her role as Eliza Hamilton in “Hamilton,” and Molly Gordon, whose work includes the movie “Booksmart” and TV series “Animal Kingdom” — formed a tight trio off-camera, too, she says.
“We got along so instantly and I really appreciated those girls in my life, too,” Viswanathan says. “I feel lucky with them because we didn’t do a chemistry read or anything. It really just worked out that we just instantly loved each other.”
And Krinsky, making her directorial debut, also fostered a warm, encouraging environment throughout the production.
“She was so humble in her approach,” Viswanathan
says. “Early on in the process she sat me down and was like, ‘Listen, this is just the two of us, we’re in this together, and your opinion is as valuable as mine.’ That really opened the floor for collaboration.
“I think in a comedy that that really really has a huge impact on the movie and the feeling of the movie,” she says. “We got to bring our own ideas and our own jokes and our own thoughts. We were really heard and listened to.
“The environment just was really special. It was amazing.”
“I just wanted to be her/be her best friend. I thought she was just so unapologetically herself. And she wears her heart on her sleeve, and that’s a really brave thing to do, and inspires the people around her to be their best selves.” — Geraldine Viswanathan