The Heart of the Matter

Scott Orlin talks to director Bonnie Hunt on the set of her directorial debut Return to Me, a love story with a difference

Webster’s Dictionary defines fate as "the power or agency supposed to determine the outcome of events before they occur". But Hollywood’s definition of fate could well be ‘the opportunity to make a film where the premise might be a bit exaggerated but exudes romantic possibilities’. Such is the case with Return to Me. Bob Rueland (David Duchovny) is a successful Chicago-based architectural engineer happily married to Elizabeth (Joely Richardson). They appear to have it all: love, career and a sense of purpose. On the other side of town, meanwhile, Grace Briggs (Minnie Driver) is wondering if she will ever have the opportunity to fulfil her dreams of becoming an artist or even fall in love. Working as a waitress in her family’s restaurant, she counts every day as a blessing. Born with a defective heart, she is awaiting a transplant in order to merely survive. But tragedy strikes Bob when Elizabeth’s life is cut short in an car accident and Grace receives a life-infusing gift from a woman she never met. One year later, the grief-stricken Bob, who has refused to socialise, finally accepts a friend’s invitation to go out to dinner. At O’Reilly’s Italian Restaurant he meets a waitress named Grace and, yep, you guessed it, the two gravitate toward each other and begin a relationship. On a quiet street in the trendy Old Town section of Chicago, the Twin Anchors pub has been given a cosmetic Hollywood facelift to double as O’Reilly’s restaurant. Although its name and decor would seem to denote an Irish flavour, the restaurant deviates a bit from the norm due to the ethnically diverse ownership of Marty O’Reilly (Carroll O’Connor) and Angelo Pardipillo (Robert Loggia), Grace’s overtly protective grandfather and great uncle. In the scene due to be shot, Grace is about to have a life-changing moment when she takes the dinner order of a newly seated foursome. In one of those magic cinematic moments, she looks up from her pad and sees Bob. "Have we met before?" he asks. "I don’t think so," she responds. The die is cast. "I believe in romance and being in love," readily acknowledges David Duchovny, taking a break on set and sporting a cut nose from a recent basketball game. "But I am not so sure about fate. If something happens, then it’s very easy to say it was supposed to happen. But I do believe that we have energies and impulses around us that lead us in certain directions." Return to Me offers a new direction for the 39-year-old actor. A far cry from his breakthrough role as Agent Mulder in The X Files, the film promises to show a lighter side of his persona that most audiences have not yet seen. "People see Mulder in whatever I do," he admits. "I look like him and I sound like him, but I think I have a lot more to offer."
So comfortable in Mulder’s skin that he can admittedly act the
character in his sleep, Duchovny was a bit more apprehensive about taking on the role of Bob. "I haven’t done anything new in almost five years and so, to create a whole new character was quite nerve racking," he says. "I mean, it’s fun because it’s new, but it’s anything but relaxing because you don’t have a second chance in a movie. In TV, you get 22 chances with each subsequent episode. But with a movie, you get one chance."
"When I first saw The X Files and Mulder, I kept wondering where the rest of David was," says first-time director Bonnie Hunt. "He plays the kind of character that requires that everything is subtext, and so he doesn’t get to wear his heart on his sleeve. In this film, he’s on an emotional rollercoaster, and David hasn’t had the chance to really do that as an actor in a long time." Having worked with him on Beethoven and remaining friends with Duchovny since, Hunt recalls the funny man she knew then. "I wanted to get back to that David so, every morning on set, we give him an IV of pure caffeine to get him pumped up!"
Hunt, who co-starred in such hits as Jerry Maguire and Jumanji, is not only making her directorial debut with Return to Me but is also juggling the roles of co-screenwriter, producer and co-star, a challenge she feels more than adept at handling. "Look, I grew up as one of seven kids so I am used to team work," she laughs. When initially approached to direct the movie, she responded to the idea but not the script. The studio wanted to do a heart transplant story, but Hunt felt that the emphasis should be more in the vein of a love story. Along with Don Lake, she recrafted the script into a homage to her childhood and family, even going so far as to cast all her siblings in small roles, much to the chagrin of the unions.
The Screen Actors Guild threatened to fine her $5,000 for hiring non-union actors. "Now my big problem is that I can’t edit any one of them out," she laughs. As for the title, Return to Me refers to the Dean Martin song of the same name, which was her parent’s anniversary song. "This is my love letter to them," says Hunt.
Shying away from the ‘disease-of-the-week’ approach of some television movies, the director sees the film as an old-fashioned fairy tale. "It’s really about fate and spirituality and life," she says. "It’s not even a medical movie. It’s more of a ‘what if’ you found yourself in this kind of situation." Duchovny agrees: "I really believe it’s the most optimistic of movies. It’s a very simple story that just has this force to it. The only problem I see with it is that this guy can only fall in love with this one heart." As to that heart and the trauma that transplant patients go through, actress Minnie Driver spent time with several women in Los Angeles who have undergone the procedure. "The first thing you pick up," she notes, "is the gratitude and fear. They were so close to death that, when they got this new heart, they had a guilt about it. One day, they might get so depressed because they realise how they got this second chance."
The Academy Award-nominated actress reveals that she was initially squeamish about the concept. "I was like 90% of the people who wonder, ‘What if I am not really dead and they take my organs?’" she says. "It is the most common attitude that people have about it and I have to admit I felt the same way. It’s sort of like Rosemary’s Baby where something terrible could happen."
To alleviate some of her own fears, Driver spoke with numerous doctors at UCLA who opened her eyes to the true benefit of the procedure. "I know a woman who is one of five people alive because of a young man’s death. I am still a bit scared, but I have now become an organ donor because it’s the right thing to do." For Hunt, one of her greatest achievements in the film was luring actor Carroll O’Connor back to the screen after a 25-year absence. When she initially approached his representatives to send him the script, she was told, ‘Look, he’s rich and he doesn’t need to work’. However, she wrote O’Connor a letter saying how much of a fan she was and that, when she wrote the script, she just pictured him saying all of these words. He called to thank her but politely said that he wasn’t interested. She begged him to at least read the script. He agreed and, a few days later, called Hunt and asked to meet for dinner.
"It was amazing. We had this terrific meal and I just kept talking about how important an element he was to the film," she recalls. "At the end of the meal, he looked at me and said, ‘OK kid, it looks like I am doing your picture’." No one was more excited than Hunt’s mother, who insisted that her cameo be in the same scene as O’Connor’s. "It was hysterical," says the director. "She has this huge crush on him and, in the scene, he brings her a plate of food. ‘I think he should kiss me’, she says. ‘If I go to his restaurant all the time, he would know me so he should kiss me’. How do you argue with your mother, but I still said no. So, next take, Carroll walks over to her, grabs her face and kisses her right on the lips. It took 10 people to revive her."