If you are a normal human being, The Holiday is one of your favourite Christmas movies and must be watched every year during the festive period.
There are so many amazing scenes – like when Amanda (Cameron Diaz) runs back to the house at the end of the movie and finds Graham (Jude Law) crying because he lost her? Or any scene with Iris (Kate Winslet) and Arthur (Eli Wallach). The iconic boob-graze by Miles (Jack Black)? Oh, and let’s not forget the phone call between Iris, Amanda and Graham.
Speaking of Christmas movies, were you a fan of Let It Snow? Because the GOAT team is seriously divided on it… Listen below:
But another of my favourite scenes from The Holiday would have to be when Amanda meets Graham’s kids Sophie (Miffy Englefield) and Olivia (Emma Pritchard) and he becomes Mr Napkin Head for everyone.
Now, Englefield is 20 years old and has revealed the scene was totally improvised.
Speaking to Vulture, the former child star spoke about what it was like working with The Holiday’s director Nancy Meyers, when she spoke about the scene.
She explained, “Nancy’s very, very clear. Her brain’s fantastic, honestly. The way that her mind works. But she almost lets you run with it, because she realizes you’re playing a child, so you’re going to be in that mind-set better than anyone else. She’d give a rough idea, but a lot of the things that she asked us to do, she would just ask us to improv them.
“So there’s a few lines and stuff in the film, like this bit in the Mr. Napkin Head scene, which everyone loves. There’s a bit when he’s getting the napkin on, and me and Cameron are just having a little chitchat. It was just complete improv — she wanted it to come across as natural as it could be. The direction she mostly gave us was, “What would you do in this situation?”
She added that Law’s line, “Smoking’s really bad for you,” was improvised, as were the lines about Amanda’s American accent, “Quite a lot of the little moments in that scene were just seeing how we acted together onscreen. We just did whatever came naturally, and I think that’s probably the loveliest part behind it.”
When asked which specific lines were improvised, Englefield responded, “With Mr. Napkin Head, when I say, ‘It’s so funny. You’ll fall off your chair it’s so funny.’ That was completely improv, that was a onetime thing I said. Never could reenact it, couldn’t remember what I said at the time, and they actually used it.”
She added, “And there’s a scene where me and Emma are asleep next to Jude in a bed, and he’s on the phone, and they just let us actually go to sleep — they left us in there for ten minutes, waited until we’d gone asleep and then started rolling.”
So cute! Watch the scene featuring Mr Napkin Head here:
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