There is a long, proud tradition of Shakespeare plays being reworked into romantic-comedy fodder, from 10 Things I Hate About You (loosely based on The Taming of the Shrew) to She’s the Man (Twelfth Night) and Get Over It (A Midsummer Night’s Dream). With Anyone But You, one of the buzziest—and, ahem, most chemistry-laden—films of the year, screenwriter Ilana Wolpert (High School Musical: The Musical: The Series) has added to that canon, adapting the 1623 comedy Much Ado About Nothing into something sexy and new.
As Anyone But You—which revolves around Sydney Sweeney’s Bea and Glen Powell’s Ben engaging in a high-stakes game of will-they-or-won’t-they at a friend’s destination wedding—hits theaters, Vogue spoke to Wolpert about penning the script, her love of the bard, Sweeney’s pivotal involvement in the film, and watching her dad bond with Powell’s dad at the premiere (adorable!).
Vogue: I know every Hollywood movie usually has a long journey behind it; how did this one start?
Ilana Wolpert: I mean, it’s so crazy, because I wrote it as a spec—which is to say, I wrote it for free with a producer who I met; we both had this idea that Much Ado About Nothing would make an amazing rom-com, and I basically started writing it during the pandemic. In early 2022, we had more producers attached and were talking about who we wanted to play the lead, and Sydney was at the top of the list. We were like, It’s such a shot in the dark, but we really hoped she wanted to do it because she would be so cool in a rom-com. This was before Season 2 of Euphoria came out, when her star was rising, but she hadn’t become as majorly famous as she is now. We sent it to her and got on Zoom with her, and she was like, “I’m doing this.” Once she said yes, things started moving really fast; she really produced the hell out of this movie and made it move forward despite all odds. She was the one who was like, “I met Glen Powell at the MTV Movie Awards, I’m going to call him and see if he wants to do it,” and he said yes! The script looked one way before it got to Sydney, obviously, and then it was rewritten after everyone was on board, and when we went into pre-production and when we were on location in Australia. But she was so passionate about the project from the get-go, and that’s the part of the journey that I loved the most.
What drew you to Much Ado About Nothing in particular?
Well, I was a theater major in college, so I was very much immersed in Shakespeare and was taking a lot of classes in Shakespeare, specifically because I kind of thought I’d go into academia and live in a library and study Shakespeare for my whole life. I wanted to work at the Globe, which I kind of still do. [Laughs.] I love that the play is this classic enemies-to-lovers thing that feels like a big ensemble piece; to me, it always felt like there were these two characters at the center, Beatrice and Benedick, and everyone just orbited around them and puppeteered them and it seemed so right for a rom-com. I had really wonderful producers who were like, “This is good, keep going,” and, you know, I love banter. I love how much character development there is in the play, where they go from denying one another and telling the world they would basically take anyone but each other to actually being together. There’s some quote I’m forgetting the exact wording of where Beatrice basically says, “I would rather do some impossible thing than hear a man say that he loves me,” and then she just comes so far. She loves this person, and to see them overcome their immense hatred and sparring felt so fun to watch and read.
Has there been anything that’s surprised you about the process of watching the film go to the big screen?
I mean, I’ve worked in TV for a while, but obviously making movies is nothing like TV. As a writer, you’re just not as much a part of the process as you are with TV, which makes sense because you’re not crafting a story that’s going on and on. And it’s not like I expected anything to change, really, but it’s so weird that yesterday I was sitting in my house, reading Fourth Wing, and people were texting me that they had gone and seen the movie and liked it. They’re like, “Don’t you feel amazing?” and I’m like, “Yeah, but I’m still sitting in my house reading Fourth Wing, which is what I would be doing anyway.” I guess it’s like turning 30; you think, Okay, my life’s going to change, I’m entering a new decade, and then it’s like, Okay, everything’s the same. The premiere was so cool and surreal, though; my girlfriend was able to be there, which was so nice, and my whole family came, which was amazing. I’ve never been on a red carpet before like that; we were missing a few people who couldn’t be there, but most of the cast was there, and everyone kind of got to celebrate together. It felt really nice to look over and, like, see my dad talking to Glen’s dad, and they’re hysterically laughing together. The premiere was so special and cool, and I just had a great time sharing it with family.
I’m sure you ve seen a million cuts of the movie, but what was it like to actually see it in a theater?
It was so weird and cool. I’m going to see it again tonight, and I’m sure it will feel even more surreal to, like, see the Nicole Kidman AMC ad play before the movie I wrote, while I’m just sitting there eating popcorn. [Laughs.]
This conversation has been edited and condensed.
