EXCLUSIVE: Deacon Phillippe (Motorheads), Nicole Bruner (High Potential), Luke Kirby (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel) and Judy Greer (In Memoriam) are part of a group of eight newcomers to Better Than the Movies, Netflix‘s film adaptation of the #1 New York Times bestseller by Lynn Painter that commenced production in Chicago today.
Others newly set include Claire Coffee (FBI), Ora Duplass (Their Town), Veronica Garrubbo (Love Language) and Kynlee Heiman (The Best Christmas Pageant Ever). Today’s eight join leads Beatrice Kitsos and David Iacono, whose castings we broke in July, two months after scooping the movie.
Better Than the Movies centers on Liz Buxbaum (Kitsos), whose obsession with rom-com movies proves very helpful when she schemes with her annoying but cute next-door neighbor (Iacono) to get the attention of her untouchable crush. Published by Simon & Schuster in 2021, the book is a love letter to romantic comedies that pays homage to classic romance tropes — fake relationship, enemies to lovers, boy next door — but spins them on their head in a new take on what happily ever after looks like.
Watch on Deadline
Phillippe plays the role of Michael Young, with Bruner as Jocelyn, Kirby as Brian Buxbaum, Greer as Helena, Coffee as Martha Buxbaum, Duplass as Laney Morgan, Garrubbo as Alex and Heiman as Young Liz.
A BookTok phenomenon, Better Than the Movies has appeared on the New York Times monthly YA paperback list for 44 consecutive months and its weekly YA hardcover list for 20 weeks.
The film’s director is Julia Hart, whose coming-of-age drama Don’t Say Good Luck has garnered 25.3M views in its first three weeks of reported numbers on Netflix. Rated 93% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, the film stars Sunny Sandler as a woman taking on the lead role in a high school theater production while grappling with the return of her mother’s (Melanie Lynskey) cancer.
Hart co-wrote and produced that film with husband and creative partner Jordan Horowitz through the duo’s Original Headquarters banner. The pair are also producing Better Than the Movies alongside Shauna Phelan and Melanie Krauss; script for the new project is by Heather Flanders and Hart & Horowitz.
Best known for roles in Prime Video’s Motorheads and Netflix’s Never Have I Ever, Phillippe will be seen coming up in the heist film 4 Kids Walk Into a Bank from Amazon MGM’s Orion. He is repped by CAA, LBI Entertainment, and Ziffren Brittenham.
Bruner has appeared on High Potential, On Call and The Bold and the Beautiful. Up next for her is a role in FX’s The Drop: A Snowfall Saga. She is repped by CESD and Brave Artists Management.
Best known for leading the Prime Video series The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and Étoile, from Amy Sherman-Palladino and Daniel Palladino, Kirby has most recently been seen starring alongside Jennifer Garner in the second season of Apple TV+’s The Last Thing He Told Me. He is repped by Gersh and GGA.
Coming off roles in the acclaimed indie comedy In Memoriam and Peacock series The Five Star Weekend, Greer can currently be seen on Apple TV+’s Stick, with upcoming roles in Netflix’s 13 Going on 30 Reboot, Ramin Bahrani’s Vegas: A Love Story and more. She is repped by CAA, Artists First and Toczek Suddleson.
Coffee is repped by Stewart Talent and Perennial Entertainment; Duplass by Gersh and Untitled; Garrubbo by Gray Talent Group and Canopy Media Partners; and Heiman by DDO, CESD and Mhair Zeitounian at Brave Artists Management.
