The Notebook is 15 years old today. Which means it’s been making me ugly cry for 15 years.
Seriously, every second scene in that film makes me sob like a baby. And every other scene makes my relationship feel inadequate because Noah and Ally set the bar high.
Like, what guy builds an entire house for their ex-girlfriend, writer her letters every day and dies alongside her because he can’t bare to live without her?
But there’s one fact about The Notebook that shakes me to my core every time: the romantic chemistry between Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams is a lie. The pair hated each other.
And I don’t just mean they would greet each other with a handshake instead of a hug, I mean full on hatred.
“Ryan’s doing a scene with Rachel and he says, Would you take her out of here and bring in another actress to read off camera with me?’” the film’s director, Nick Cassavetes shared with VH-1.
“I said, ‘What?’ Then he says, ‘I can’t. I can’t do it with her. I’m just not getting anything from this.’”
Things got so bad that Nick held an impromptu therapy session for the co-stars.
“We went into a room with a producer, they started screaming and yelling at each other,” the film’s director, he remembered.
“I walked out … I smoked a cigarette and everybody came out like, “All right let’s do this.” And it got better after that, you know? They had it out.”
I just have one question: how the hell does that kind of hatred translate to insane romantic and sexual on screen chemistry?
Joey Tribbiani has the answer- just stay with me here.
There’s a Friends episode when Chandler’s dating an actress and becomes worried that she’s having an affair with a costar because they have major chemistry on stage.
You would assume major acting chemistry = major real life chemistry. But we know, thanks to Rachel and Ryan, that that ain’t always true. Joey knew it too.
He explained to Chandler that if there’s chemistry on stage they’re definitely not having IRL sex, but if there is no chemistry on stage then the actors are definitely having an affaIr and that’s used up all the chemistry.
So there you have it: Joey cracked the secret to The Notebook’s success before The Notebook was even around.
The best part is that his explanation checks out even after the movie was released. Ryan and Rachel went on to date (don’t ask questions, there is no logic to their relationship) and haven’t starred in a movie together since.
Their real life sexual ~relations~ robbed them of their on screen chemistry. Joey’s wins again.
Someone get Nicholas Sparks and Joey Tribbiani in a room together, stat.