Lights and cameras lined up to cover the action outside the Midnight Theatre in New York City on the evening of Tuesday, September 20, 2022. Photographers and journalists were all ready to get a glimpse of the cast and crew of Meet Cute, a time-travel romantic comedy streaming on Peacock. This movie stars Pete Davidson and Kaley Cuoco. It follows Sheila, a girl who discovers a time machine in a nail salon and uses it to continually fix elements of a date she had the previous night.
I attended the premiere and spoke with members of the cast and crew about the film. Director Alex Lehmann spoke about the movie, stating, “I think this movie works as a rom-com, and it also works as something that’s maybe a little emotionally deeper than a traditional rom-com, and it was really great that we got to do both. And it was really great that Peacock trusted us, and they said, ‘We want to see that movie.'” This is Lehmann’s first venture into the rom-com genre, having previously directed films such as Blue Jay, Paddleton, and Acidman earlier this year.
Actress and executive producer Kaley Cuoco commented on joining Meet Cute, stating, “We’ve seen so many movie scripts that are time-travel-related or romantic comedy, but this one just felt unique and different. I really loved our director Alex. I wanted to work with him. When I heard Pete was attached, I was like, ‘This is gonna have a quirky fun feel, and I knew it would be funny, that’s for sure. It just felt different. It’s a sweet film. It brings joy.” Cuoco is well-known for her role in the popular sitcom The Big Bang Theory, and she can currently be seen on the shows Harley Quinn and The Flight Attendant.
Pete Davidson arrived on the red carpet wearing a white hoodie and sunglasses, and he did not do interviews. However, I was able to speak with two more actors in the film, both of whom spoke highly about the film’s representation. Rock Kohli, who portrays Ammit, stated, “The immigrant experience, they come here, and they work so hard, and they’ve worked for so long. And at a certain point, they get a little jaded. So I’m a little sarcastic. That was a lot of fun. Just like, ‘I’m not here to please you, man. Come on. I’ve lived a life.’ So that was fun.”
Actress Deborah S. Craig, who portrays June, stated, “I loved from what Noga [Pnueli] wrote on the page that she was an interesting Asian-American character existing in New York City. You know, and we have a very diverse population here, and it’s not often represented, but this story does take place against the landscape of New York. So I wanted to make sure that I brought justice to her in that vein of representation, that she’s a fully realized human, and that we might look at our everyday Asian nail salon woman and wonder what their backstory is, what their life is like, and if they may have a time machine in the back.”
Costume designer Michelle J. Li spoke about her inspiration behind the fashion choices in this film. She states, “Our hero dress for Sheila…is a yellow gingham dress. I looked towards history in a lot of my initial research designs for costumes, and for this particular one, I was thinking a lot about Sheila’s journey as a character and how she jumps through every individual timeline thinking about, ‘Okay, is this one gonna work? Is this one gonna work?’ And so, in a way, she’s trying to find herself or find her way back home. And so, I realized that, and it brought me to Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz. And so, Dorothy’s dress in The Wizard of Oz is a gingham dress, and that is where I pulled that inspirational thread from to create Sheila’s yellow gingham dress.”
Meet Cute is now streaming on Peacock.
