Sitting down with Leslye Headland is like swigging an espresso shot, especially when you do it in the thick of the sleepless Sundance Film Festival. She barrels toward you with the zeal of someone who couldn’t possibly have anywhere else in the world to be. And she didn’t: Her latest film, “Sleeping with Other People,” had its world premiere on Saturday night of the fest, marking Headland’s second Sundance debut after the 2012 comedy “Bachelorette.”
By Sunday morning, the buzz in Park City, Utah, has christened this the year of Sexy Sundance. “The Bronze,” “The Overnight,” “The D Train,” “I Am Michael” and “The Diary of a Teenage Girl” not only contained sex scenes that swayed between increasing levels of humor and eroticism, but each, in its own way, was a movie about sex. If the title alone doesn’t make “Sleeping with Other People” an obvious addition to the Sexy Sundance catalogue, consider this: In its standout scene, Jason Sudeikis instructs Alison Brie about proper masturbation techniques using an empty green-tea bottle.
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“Can I just be honest? I couldn’t get through it,” she said when asked how she feels about E.L. James’ novel. “I really was so ready to like it and be excited, and I was like, ‘This just isn’t sexy. It’s just not sexy.’ I was so intrigued by why people were loving it and I just didn’t find it as emotionally stimulating as I thought it was going to be.”
What “Sleeping with Other People” boasts that — according to Headland — something like “Fifty Shades” doesn’t, is an intimacy not tied exclusively to the removal of clothes. “I think the reason that scene really resonates with people is not just because it’s super funny and super button-pushing and crazy, but I think it’s also because it’s this weird analogy or visualization of him teaching her about herself, which is really what intimacy is. You know what I mean? That’s actually what intimacy is: into you, you see me. Your partner teaches you about yourself, and so it’s this ridiculous thing — or the wedding dress in ‘Bachelorette.’ But I think people connect to it because it is emotional. It ultimately is an emotional scene. That’s how I directed it and that’s how they played it.”
