TORONTO - A playful note at the end of "A Serious Man" affirms: "No Jews were harmed in the making of this motion picture."
Actress Sari Lennick, however, did sacrifice her long blond hair and Richard Kind, his waistline and vanity.
Michael Stuhlbarg, meanwhile, had to learn advanced physics, including a paradox about "Schrodinger's cat." The actor worked with a professor at Bridgewater State College in Massachusetts to master the complex classroom lessons he must recite, with ease, on film.
"I would say, 'You want to go out?' " Kind recalled, and Stuhlbarg would respond, "No, I got to go home, I gotta study. ... He's voracious about doing homework for his character."
Kind says he prepares for roles, but he's a piker next to Tony Award nominee Stuhlbarg, who portrays a physics professor named Larry Gopnik at a Midwestern university whose life suddenly is under siege in 1967.
His wife, Judith (Lennick), announces she's fallen in love with a pompous acquaintance, his unemployed brother (Kind) shows no signs of vacating their couch, his son is more interested in "F-Troop" and pot than preparing for his bar mitzvah, and his teenage daughter is none too happy, either.
The trio sat down together during the Toronto International Film Festival where the Coen brothers movie had its world premiere. Kind provided the ready laughs, Lennick the sizzle and Stuhlbarg the studious observations.
Lennick, for one, looked like a younger, hipper, thinner version of her character. For the movie, she lost 13 inches of her long blond hair, the remainder of which was dyed a deep brown.
She moved to Minneapolis three years ago, had a baby and says, "I was a little chunkier because I had spent my first winter in Minnesota drinking beer to stay warm, so I was a little fuller-figured, and then once I found out I got the part, of course I didn't run to hit the gym, I actually just kept drinking beer because I thought the bigger the waistline, the more Gopnik," her character's last name.
Kind, meanwhile, took to heart the genteel suggestion from filmmakers Joel and Ethan Coen that he avoid the gym and not drop any weight.
In fact, he since has lost 24 pounds, which leads him to observe about a swimming scene: "There is a still (photo) of me coming out of the water. Which, if you're wise, you'll take that still and put it on your refrigerator," as diet incentive and a caution against future figures.
Stuhlbarg, nominated for a Tony for "Pillowman," had become friends with Frances McDormand after working with her at Lincoln Center. McDormand's husband, Joel Coen, subsequently saw him in a number of plays.
"Originally, I came in to read for the husband, in the parable at the beginning of the movie, who speaks Yiddish, and I learned the scene in Yiddish, hired a tutor and did that and it went very well.
"They laughed a lot, which made me very happy but at that time, they weren't sure if they wanted to go with an actor who could fake it or someone who actually spoke it fluently, and they decided, wisely, to go with people who spoke it fluently," Stuhlbarg recounted.
Months passed and he was called back to read for the roles of Larry and his brother, Arthur. He learned three scenes for each character. "I did them all and they laughed a lot and made me very happy."
More time passed and then, five to six weeks before shooting was to start, they called and said, "We'll put you out of your misery; you're playing Larry."
Kind ended up as Arthur, which proved to be a richer role than one he had coveted in "Burn After Reading." He jokes, "That's the movie that I wanted. I didn't know 'Serious Man.' I didn't know. Who knew it would be so good?"
Lennick, in a purposely theatrical voice adds, "Who knew it would be a masterpiece of the American cinema?" But she could have lived without the, uh, pointy foundation garments.
"I actually was not here in the '60s. What connected for me more than that was the cultural framework and now, being a Minnesotan -- I'd actually lived in Minnesota for two years already when we started shooting and I'd married someone originally from Minneapolis," says Lennick, a Miami native.
Kind, the oldest of the trio at almost 53, has friends whose parents' living rooms today resemble the 1967 version occupied by the Gopniks. The tchotchkes on set were reminiscent of decorations in Stuhlbarg's childhood home.
In these days of quickie categorizations, "A Serious Man" spills over several genres. "There's a fantasy aspect of it, there is a comic aspect of it, there is the pathos of it, as well," said Stuhlbarg.
Lennick provides this correct capsule: "It's a guy whose life is falling apart who's searching for answers."
Barbara Vancheri can be reached at bvancheri(at)post-gazette.com. For more stories visit scrippsnews.com
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