And speaking of accents what about Isla Fisher?

Strong Australian accent. How about that.  Her accent was great and sometimes she would say to me, and she also does a beautiful American accent, but sometimes her accent would just sneak in a little bit and she would say I can fix that. She would know when it happened right away because she's really, really good.  I would say no don't because I really wanted a little kid like quality and when its slipped in you're not sure if you don't know she's Australian you don't know that's what you're hearing. It's just a nice lilt to her voice. I actually liked it.

What made you think that she was right for the role because you know her more of a comedic actress than anything else?

Yeah and I didn't think she was going to be right for the role when her name was first brought up.  Walter Parks brought her name up and knew her. It again, was based on her work and I thought about Wedding Crashers and I'm going really?  He said you should just meet her. She came into the room and she was completely different again than what I thought she was going to be. She played much younger and she had this child like quality and she was far more interesting, and a lot of women wanted to play that role, but she was way more interesting than anybody because she made some really specific choices and she wasn't the femme fatale which I didn't want. I wanted this girl to be dumb. But her secret is she's really smart, if that makes sense. She's gotten by on her sexuality and her physicality but the thing nobody knows is that she's smarter than she lets on. So at a certain point she has to wake up in the course of the movie. In order for her to wake up I need someone who can play the 1st part of the movie kind of with that childlike "let's set him up to rob a bank, that will be fun" then when that gun comes out of the bag it's like you know what this really isn't fun anymore. She could do that great.

What about Jeff?

Jeff.  I saw The Squid and the Whale and I keep saying there's an actor who just got born again, who just completely re-booted his career. He was so amazing in that movie and there are other people I've been thinking about and I've been thinking him as well but once I saw him in that movie I really had to have him because I knew he could do everything. He plays a reprehensible; just asshole in that movie and you still cannot take your eyes off him. That really did it for me. When I saw that I said let me get him on the heels of that. He's obviously in a place where he wants to try different things.

Can you comment on what you're working on right now? Are there any plans for any directing?

Well, I'd love to do it again if they let me.  I really would. I have to wait because I really again don't want to sacrifice my personal life.  It's a very hard thing on your life to go off and direct. It's really tough so what I'm going to write all this year. There's a western I wrote last year that I spent a couple of years working on that I'd really love to direct. Sadly, westerns are not in demand. I know they just made 3:10 to Yuma for $60 million bucks. We'll see how that goes over but I'd really love to make this movie. It may be like The Lookout or other scripts I've done then I'll just hold onto it and at some point I'll do it.  In the meantime, I'm writing a movie called 44 for Universal which is my mid-life crisis movie. It's basically about a guy running amuck the week before his 45th birthday. It's set in the world of automotive design. I'm working on that and I'm also adapting a novel for Paramount, a Jonathan Trouper novel. I don't know if you know his books called After Hailey which is about a 28 year old kid who falls in love with this beautiful 40 year old woman and she dies a year later and he's left to raise her 15 year old stoner delinquent son.  It's very funny, dark little book.

Can you talk about the western now that you wrote?

Sure.

Can you tell us what it's about?  Does it have a title?

It's called Godless, which will go over well in the red states I'm sure.  It is essentially the story of a wounded severely wounded outlaw who ends up in this mining town in New Mexico where all the able-bodied men have died in the mine. It's run all by women. He ends up on a ranch just outside of town with the 1 woman the other women have ostracized, who's nursing him back to health. What he realizes coming after him are his old--however you want to say it-- his gang members or however you want to say it--fellow outlaws laying waste to every town they come to and you realize they're coming here soon and it's really that's sort of the bare bones of the plot. It would be like me telling you The Lookout is about a guy who robs a bank. It's all about these characters and the relationships between all these people, and his relationship with the guy who’s coming for him.  It all comes to a head in the middle of this town full of women.

What year does it take place?

1888.