DIABLO CODY
DIABLO CODY: SHE WENT FROM STRIPPER TO HOLLYWOOD A-LISTER. NOW THE WOMAN BEHIND JUNO IS REINVENTING THE RULES
Some guys have all the luck; some guys have all the pain. Some guys get all the break; some guys do nothing but complain. True, Rod Stewart, true–but sometimes the one having all the luck and getting all the breaks isn’t some guy, but a girl. A girl like Diablo Cody. A Midwestern girl who started a blog and wrote a book about being a stripper and then appeared on a talk show after Letterman read it… And then a Hollywood agent read her blog and asked for a script, which was made into a movie- Juno, 2007’s bittersweet comedy about teen pregnancy, starring Ellen Page and Michael Cera. Now she has multiple projects up and coing: There’s a Showtime series, The United States of Tara, produced by a certain Steven Spielberg, a horror flick (Jennifer’s Body) and a college sex comedy for girls called Girly Style. We spoke with Cody about her newfound fame, the joy of Ellen Page adn why cinema needs more weenies.
Hi, this is Broek from Anthem, is this Diablo?
My real name is Brook.
I know. I’m actually calling you on behalf of all the Brooks of the world to ask you why you turned your back on us.
That’s awesome–it’s like a Brook-on-Broek throwdown. No one had to drudge up that detail. I never turn my back on the Brook.
You really seem to be hitting the jackpot. How are you coming through?
Lucky me. I’d like to credit it to my own genius. But...I really think I’ve been very fortunate.
What’s up next?
Time and a Half which is my twenties hipster identity comedy. I wrote that one a couple years ago. I’ve been extremely buy. [Then] Jennifer’s Body. I’m producing it and I wrote it, and I am just thrilled because horror is my favorite genre. So this is, for me, sort of a turning point. We have Megan Fox for Jennifer’s Body, and she’s just the femme fatale of the millenium. I’m very excited about that because this character is lecherous, evil, and sexy. We have Toni Colette doing The United States of Tara–couldn’t get any better than that. I would like to work with Ellen [Page] again, selfishly–because Ellen could do a soup commercial and you’d cry.
Are you writing your characters any differently now?
In the case of Juno, I didn’t know what I was doing. I can talk more intelligently about what I’ve written since because I was doing it more consciously as a working screenwriter. Juno was really this crazy whim. I had no idea it was going to be produced, and that I was going to be a writer. It was very unconscious and very free. I have so much trouble answering questions about how I wrote it because really, I had nothing to lose and I just went for it. Whereas now, perhaps I should think about Jungian psychology. I am totally trapped now. [Laughs] No, I’m not–I still try not to overthink things.
Since people liked Juno so much, did you have this feeling of ‘I better hit the ground running’?
All of a sudden people wanted to hear more from me. And I’m no dummy–I didn’t want to go back to my old job. I thought to myself, ‘I better get going.’ Luckily, I sort of suppressed a lot of my creative instincts for so long that I had all these movies inside me. I wish I was as prolific as a year ago or two years ago because all of a sudden the whole year has sort of been consumed by Juno. I want to get back to that place where I am just writing frantically.
You get a fair amount of attention for your strong female roles. How do you start writing–with a character in mind or with a particular situation?
I think about dialogue first. If I think of a line, I’ll try to think of a scene I can insert that into. And I’m also interested in relationships. Romance is interesting to me. To me, the central theme in Juno was not the pregnancy but the relationship between Juno (Page) and Paulie (Cera).
The movie made me miss high school. It made me nostalgic for those days because I had a friend like that...He even looked like Michael Cera.
So did my boyfriend! And it’s funny because how many women have or had a Paulie Bleeker in their life? To me it’s a good thing. Teenage guys in cinema are typically very aggressive and very...kind of gross and horny. They’re little Axe body spray dudes. In reality, so many of us knew seet, sensitive geeks in high school who just kissed our feet. So let’s get some weenies in movies. Honestly, I’m a fan of the weenies. I always say it’s a good thing I didn’t know Michael Cera was going to play Paulie Bleeker because then it would have been Paulie Bleeker: The Movie.
Are you conscious of the background details when you’re inventing your characters?
I’m a little bit obsessive about that kind of thing. I have scavenged so many of those details from my own life. To me that is a movie. I noticed the things I love about film are the smallest details. The shoes a character wears, their body language, the kind of car that they drive–I put that stuff into scripts. And I guess that some people would consider that directing on the page.
What about your work is resonating most with people?
People ask me questions about maturity a lot. “Why did I write about teenagers being more mature than adults? Do I think it’s a reflection on society?’ Yes, I do. I, myself, I’m very mature. So I have a lot of angst related to that topic.
The more I think about it, it’s institutionalized sexism because men who are immature are celebrated. They’re seen as clowns and entertainers and comedians. And women who are immature are seen as crazy. So let people think I am a loose cannon. Fair enough. I can’t help it that I don’t have a penis that instantly makes my behavior acceptable.
Which sort of brings up my next question...Girls–totally not funny, right?
Oh no, they’re not funny at all They just listen to Christopher Hitchens. [Laughs] yeah, I have a major problem with that, and I think the whole “girls aren’t funny” think has entered the dialogue lately because there are so many women proving that wrong. It’s making certain people nervous.
You know what aggravates the hell out of me? I have done interesting press. I got on Letterman without [the] aid of a publicist because he read my book. When I did Letterman, suddenly all these assholes on the Internet are like, “This girl’s done nothing; she must have a hell of a publicist.’ And I wanted to track down each and every one of them and be like, ‘I don’t even have one!’ But it’s impossible for people to understand that women can do things on their own merit. Drives me crazy. That is one thing that is frustrating to me: [This idea] that I’m this calculating person who really play the press and has cultivated this persona...but I ain’t. I’m Forrest Gump. I’m in all these places by accident.
You won a Hollywood Film Festival award. How are you wrapping your head around the buzz?
I have this picture of Jason Reitman handing me that award. It makes me laugh becuase first of all, it’s funny seeing myself dressed up at an awards podium receiving an award. Secondly, I just look like a total doofus. I am so bad at these public-appearance things, but Jason is so composed and so perfectly Jason-like. In this photo he has the most wonderful, sincere, camera-ready expression, and I’m like, ’Man, you suck. You’re so cool all the time. Here I am, Captain Overbite.’
But I hope more of that stuff happens–awards are cool. They give you freedom, and that’s all I want.
Hi, this is Broek from Anthem, is this Diablo?
My real name is Brook.
I know. I’m actually calling you on behalf of all the Brooks of the world to ask you why you turned your back on us.
That’s awesome–it’s like a Brook-on-Broek throwdown. No one had to drudge up that detail. I never turn my back on the Brook.
You really seem to be hitting the jackpot. How are you coming through?
Lucky me. I’d like to credit it to my own genius. But...I really think I’ve been very fortunate.
What’s up next?
Time and a Half which is my twenties hipster identity comedy. I wrote that one a couple years ago. I’ve been extremely buy. [Then] Jennifer’s Body. I’m producing it and I wrote it, and I am just thrilled because horror is my favorite genre. So this is, for me, sort of a turning point. We have Megan Fox for Jennifer’s Body, and she’s just the femme fatale of the millenium. I’m very excited about that because this character is lecherous, evil, and sexy. We have Toni Colette doing The United States of Tara–couldn’t get any better than that. I would like to work with Ellen [Page] again, selfishly–because Ellen could do a soup commercial and you’d cry.
Are you writing your characters any differently now?
In the case of Juno, I didn’t know what I was doing. I can talk more intelligently about what I’ve written since because I was doing it more consciously as a working screenwriter. Juno was really this crazy whim. I had no idea it was going to be produced, and that I was going to be a writer. It was very unconscious and very free. I have so much trouble answering questions about how I wrote it because really, I had nothing to lose and I just went for it. Whereas now, perhaps I should think about Jungian psychology. I am totally trapped now. [Laughs] No, I’m not–I still try not to overthink things.
Since people liked Juno so much, did you have this feeling of ‘I better hit the ground running’?
All of a sudden people wanted to hear more from me. And I’m no dummy–I didn’t want to go back to my old job. I thought to myself, ‘I better get going.’ Luckily, I sort of suppressed a lot of my creative instincts for so long that I had all these movies inside me. I wish I was as prolific as a year ago or two years ago because all of a sudden the whole year has sort of been consumed by Juno. I want to get back to that place where I am just writing frantically.
You get a fair amount of attention for your strong female roles. How do you start writing–with a character in mind or with a particular situation?
I think about dialogue first. If I think of a line, I’ll try to think of a scene I can insert that into. And I’m also interested in relationships. Romance is interesting to me. To me, the central theme in Juno was not the pregnancy but the relationship between Juno (Page) and Paulie (Cera).
The movie made me miss high school. It made me nostalgic for those days because I had a friend like that...He even looked like Michael Cera.
So did my boyfriend! And it’s funny because how many women have or had a Paulie Bleeker in their life? To me it’s a good thing. Teenage guys in cinema are typically very aggressive and very...kind of gross and horny. They’re little Axe body spray dudes. In reality, so many of us knew seet, sensitive geeks in high school who just kissed our feet. So let’s get some weenies in movies. Honestly, I’m a fan of the weenies. I always say it’s a good thing I didn’t know Michael Cera was going to play Paulie Bleeker because then it would have been Paulie Bleeker: The Movie.
Are you conscious of the background details when you’re inventing your characters?
I’m a little bit obsessive about that kind of thing. I have scavenged so many of those details from my own life. To me that is a movie. I noticed the things I love about film are the smallest details. The shoes a character wears, their body language, the kind of car that they drive–I put that stuff into scripts. And I guess that some people would consider that directing on the page.
What about your work is resonating most with people?
People ask me questions about maturity a lot. “Why did I write about teenagers being more mature than adults? Do I think it’s a reflection on society?’ Yes, I do. I, myself, I’m very mature. So I have a lot of angst related to that topic.
The more I think about it, it’s institutionalized sexism because men who are immature are celebrated. They’re seen as clowns and entertainers and comedians. And women who are immature are seen as crazy. So let people think I am a loose cannon. Fair enough. I can’t help it that I don’t have a penis that instantly makes my behavior acceptable.
Which sort of brings up my next question...Girls–totally not funny, right?
Oh no, they’re not funny at all They just listen to Christopher Hitchens. [Laughs] yeah, I have a major problem with that, and I think the whole “girls aren’t funny” think has entered the dialogue lately because there are so many women proving that wrong. It’s making certain people nervous.
You know what aggravates the hell out of me? I have done interesting press. I got on Letterman without [the] aid of a publicist because he read my book. When I did Letterman, suddenly all these assholes on the Internet are like, “This girl’s done nothing; she must have a hell of a publicist.’ And I wanted to track down each and every one of them and be like, ‘I don’t even have one!’ But it’s impossible for people to understand that women can do things on their own merit. Drives me crazy. That is one thing that is frustrating to me: [This idea] that I’m this calculating person who really play the press and has cultivated this persona...but I ain’t. I’m Forrest Gump. I’m in all these places by accident.
You won a Hollywood Film Festival award. How are you wrapping your head around the buzz?
I have this picture of Jason Reitman handing me that award. It makes me laugh becuase first of all, it’s funny seeing myself dressed up at an awards podium receiving an award. Secondly, I just look like a total doofus. I am so bad at these public-appearance things, but Jason is so composed and so perfectly Jason-like. In this photo he has the most wonderful, sincere, camera-ready expression, and I’m like, ’Man, you suck. You’re so cool all the time. Here I am, Captain Overbite.’
But I hope more of that stuff happens–awards are cool. They give you freedom, and that’s all I want.