Friends with Money: interesting and insightful article

Post by **Hilary the Touched** » Mon Apr 03, 2006 5:23 pm

from the San Bernardino County Sun (http://www.sbsun.com/film/ci_3663831)

Ca$h & cachet
'Friends With Money' stars ponder the lives of haves, have-nots
By Bob Strauss, Film Writer

"Friends With Money" is about three female pals who live at various levels of economic and domestic comfort on the Westside of Los Angeles, and their fourth friend, who does not.

Nicole Holofcener's rueful, observant comedy, opening Friday, reflects its own topic in a number of ironic ways.

It's a low-budget independent film set where people who've made fortunes in the commercial movie industry live. The well-off women are played by Oscar winner Frances McDormand and multiple nominees Catherine Keener and Joan Cusack. Jennifer Aniston is the poor girl, which is funny when you consider that, as the actress who used to be one of TV's highly paid "Friends," she's probably got more money than her three distinguished co-stars combined.

Keener, who just last year clocked her first studio blockbuster ("The 40-Year-Old Virgin") after years of acclaimed work in indies such as "Being John Malkovich," "Capote" and Holofcener's two previous films, "Walking and Talking" and "Lovely and Amazing," explains how movie people's money can be a very relative matter.

"I've always been able to pay for health care and clothes and stuff like that; or my parents will for me when I need them," says the actress, who acknowledges that her paydays may seem like a fortune to you or me. "But working in independent movies a lot, you just make a very respectable living, comparatively. You don't make, like, a movie star's living or even an executive's living."

"It's a mistake for people to think that pay is tiered here," adds British actor Jason Isaacs. "There are only two tiers. A producer friend of mine hired me for a film once and just paid me peanuts. I asked him, 'What's going on here? It's kind of a nice part.' He said, 'Jase, you've gotta understand. There are two kinds of actors. There are those you have to pay because you need them in your film or people won't buy tickets, and then there's everybody else, and you're everybody else.'"

(the article continues)[/b]