Plus, all the details on bringing his Smurf collection to the big screen.
“Mostly because it just seemed such a remote possibility that it would ever happen.”
Parsons stars oppositePennyworth’sBen Aldridge as Kit.
Giovanni Rufino/2022 FOCUS FEATURES, Michael Ausiello/Instagram
But for Ausiello, the most out-of-body moments were watching Parsons put on his reporter hat.
“He wasn’t doing an impersonation of me,” Ausiello adds.
What was your initial reaction?
Linda Källérus / FOCUS FEATURES
Excitement, trepidation, all of the above?
MICHAEL AUSIELLO: All of the above.
It was the week the book came out.
Linda Källérus / FOCUS FEATURES
Jim was moderating this Q&A for me at Barnes & Noble.
I was feeling vulnerable and a little scared putting this book out into the world.
Does it feel a little full-circle?
You’ve spoken about how you’ve used television as a coping mechanism.
Those flashback scenes, it’s this younger soap-opera-obsessed version of me.
Thinking back to that kid being bullied in high school and feeling so codependent with my mom.
If that little kid only knew some of the exciting things that were to come.
It’s the best kind of full-circle moment.
Jim Parsons is playing a version of you.
What do you feel he captures well about you?
I’m glad you mentioned that Jim is playing aversionof me because that really is it in a nutshell.
He never set out to do an impersonation.
I never wanted him to do an impersonation.
It was always about him putting his own stamp on this role, and he did it beautifully.
Jim seemed much more open to putting himself out there in some really emotionally, grueling moments.
I often marveled at that.
What was it like seeing the movie come to life?
Was it harder than writing the book?
I would imagine reliving some of these moments were not the easiest days.
Writing the book was torture.
Because it came so soon after Kit had died.
I’m glad I did it.
But it wasn’t a pleasant experience.
It was isolating, it was lonely, it was hard.
The movie experience was the opposite of that.
Filmmaking is a collaborative experience.
That’s generally speaking.
Were there ever any moments or days where you had to step away because it was overwhelming?
I would say the hardest day emotionally for me was the day that we shot Kit’s death scene.
I know you gave Ben Aldridge access to a lot of Kit’s photographs and things.
Were there moments where you felt like he was channeling him?
Yes, there were moments.
Ben looks like Kit.
It’s eerie, but it’s also amazing.
We were deep in the editing stage.
I forget exactly how it all happened, but it was a conversation Michael and I had.
Ultimately it was his decision to use that one video clip.
You tweeted about that Smurf collection on screen being entirely yours.
How much of the set decoration or props are things that belong to you or Kit?
The Smurf collection was 100 percent mine.
Every piece of Smurf memorabilia you see on that set belongs to me.
And I’d just like to point out, that’s only a fraction of the overall collection.
That is not everything.
But there were a lot of pieces in Kit’s apartment set when we first meet him.
Many of the tchotchkes there are things that meant something to Kit, meant something to both of us.
It was amazing that the set dressers were really interested in adding that bit of authenticity to the environment.
It was a beautiful thing to see, particularly Kit’s art.
He was such an amazing photographer.
It was so nice to just walk through those sets and see his photography hanging on the walls.
And to see the producers and the cast and the crew fawning over them.
There were fights over who was going to take them home.
Everybody was just so in awe of his talent.
So that was David and Dan [Savage], the screenwriters, both of them.
That was their idea.
That’s how they pitched this movie.
Their version of this story was: Let’s lean into television.
They haven’t seen it.
I don’t think they are going to see it.
I’ve told them I respect and understand whatever decision they make.
This was their only son.
They’re still going through their own grief process.
I don’t think seeing the movie is going to be part of their grief or healing process.
But I visit them once a year.
I spend the day there.
I’ve been keeping them updated as the process of the movie unfolded.
I wanted them to hear it from me before they read about it anywhere else.
So they obviously are aware of it.
What was your reaction to learning Sally Field was going to play your mother-in-law?
To this day, I’m still in disbelief that Sally Field is in this movie.
I’ve seen this movie six times already.
What a privilege to have her be part of this story.
This story has a lot of emotional restraint and doesn’t veer into maudlin territory.
I am guessing that came from your voice and the way you tell your story on the page.
But was that something that was really important to you?
I’m not an overly sentimental person.
If anything, I tend to lean in the opposite direction.
But I knew when Michael came on board as the director, that we were of like mind there.
I knew that in many ways, we were speaking the same language.
Some of that is because he told me he had no interest in making an overly sappy movie.
He remained true to his word.
I had no interest in sugarcoating myself or my relationship and my story.
And Michael had no interest in doing that either.
I feel thatSpoiler Alertis both in equal measure.
Was that something you were conscious of, as a cultural critic?
Remarkably, I didn’t really focus or think about that too much.
I had this story to tell.
What do you think Kit would think of the movie?
