Ashton Kutcher

In preparation for playing two book lovers in 'Your Place or Mine,' Ashton Kutcher and Reese Witherspoon were given reading assignments.

And sometimes that brings you to realizing you shouldn't be a people pleaser, which is 27 Dresses. That idea that it's people going through something and sometimes that brings you to a zoo. We didn't have a lot of runway between the walkway and the end of the stage. In terms of rediscovering each other, the ember is also this dream of what they were going to be when they first met when they were in their 20s. But I think all of the movies, including Prada and Crazy Ex, always come down to the human emotion and what is underneath that. What you choose to do when you first enter the world is probably the purest form of your aspiration. Because it's about adults, because it's grown up, because it has scale, it felt really right for it to be the first movie I directed. ALINE BROSH MCKENNA: I went to New York to work on a movie and I needed a place to stay that was relatively inexpensive. Adds McKenna to EW: "I didn't know that Ashton would read all of the books I gave him. The other great thing about having been a showrunner was the years that I spent working so closely with actors and having my creative partner being an actor. One of them had an inscription to someone named Peter, so I decided that was Peter's book that she had kept when he moved." "With Reese, I gave her a bunch of books that I felt like Debbie had collected over the years — some first editions, some beat-up paperbacks.

Reese Witherspoon, Ashton Kutcher and 'Your Place or Mine' director Aline Brosh McKenna discuss rom-com nostalgia and how the movie came to be.

“Coming out of the pandemic, when I read the script, like this is the movie I wanted to see,” Kutcher says. “I mean, there was a lot of romantic idealization — I don’t really feel like they got the chance to know each other. “I was like, ‘Woah!’ Because I thought that film was extraordinary, and that you were extraordinary in it. That much I can tell you.” “Over the years, I feel like it’s been hard — audiences are a little bit more cynical about [rom-coms],” she explains. Kutcher adds, “You get this sense that these two people have to be together and you become invested in their relationship and some functional imperfection keeps them apart. “I remember seeing you in ‘Punk’d,’ and I thought it was really funny. Luckily, “Your Place or Mine” writer and director Aline Brosh McKenna came into the picture to finally get them together. And then I loved ‘Butterfly Effect.’ I loved ‘No Strings Attached’ with Natalie,” Witherspoon says, turning to Kutcher to ask, “Did you do a movie where you were in a military uniform?” Based on Brosh McKenna’s real-life experience, “Your Place or Mine” follows Debbie (Witherspoon) and Peter (Kutcher), who are best friends and total opposites. “I think the first thing I saw you in was ‘Election,'” Kutcher adds. “He was carrying a little cooler,” Witherspoon recalls.

Ashton Kutcher got candid about the grooming and fitness he had to do to look 20 in his latest film.

Aline Brosh McKenna's ('The Devil Wears Prada') cross-country Netflix romcom shouldn't work given the leads' lack of sparks, yet has a strange charm.

Or if the characters were older — maybe that’d make it easier to buy into the idea that these two people are already so sure of what they want out of life, so experienced in the ritual of being let down by more titillating flings and affairs, that settling down with someone familiar might make noble sense. And Your Place or Mine is worth watching for that alone, this iron-willed commitment to the premise in full defiance of what the characters are actually giving us. Here she is, look at her go: showing up to her seminar with a backpack and new school supplies, practically huffing the scent of a newly-sharpened pencil, being all wide-eyed and adorably game for the joys of life, being completely absent of any kind of cynicism. When she and Williams’s publisher get to prattle their way through a handful of cute scenes, the movie finally lands on something: a counterargument. [romance](https://www.rollingstone.com/t/romance/) to watch! And then the backstories kick in and Your Place or Mine, which runs nearly two hours, gets distracted, pretending that it’s as worthwhile to watch Debbie chatting it up with Peter’s fab, New Yorkey ex as it is watching Peter try to play dad to Debbie’s perfectly well-adjusted teen. Your Place or Mine offers us a full-blown case for reverting back to the anodyne safety and security of the familiar, no matter the substantial downsides. When Your Place or Mine opens, Debbie and Peter get the split-screened, made-for-each-other visual gags familiar from old Doris Day and Rock Hudson comedies, those cutely twinned shots of each of them lying in bed reading at the same time, bathing at the same time, ritualistically in sync in ways neither of them fully realizes. Played, respectively, by [Reese Witherspoon](https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-country/kacey-musgraves-reese-witherspoon-talk-struggles-for-women-in-country-music-713278/) and [Ashton Kutcher](https://www.rollingstone.com/tv-movies/tv-movie-news/a-closer-look-at-ashton-kutcher-69773/), Debbie and Peter are long-time friends. Debbie’s headed to New York for a week-long seminar (she’s trying to abandon her love of the literary arts in favor of a more practical job that pays more), and it’s supposed to be an occasion for her and her bestie to reunite. Each of these people (one more than the other, owing to a certain unevenness at the heart of the movie) has to choose between the genuine but uncertain chemistry that enters their lives — a real, tactile, tingly sexual spark — or the chance to return to their shared, multi-decade past, to the person that they know will never leave them because they’ve always already been there. He lives in a steely Brooklyn apartment with a view of Manhattan that’s furnished with a stove he’s never used, cutlery that’s never been opened, and a despairing lack of tchotchkes — there is not so much as a photo of himself or anyone he loves in plain sight.

Starring in Your Place or Mine came with a bunch of reading materials for Ashton Kutcher and Reese Witherspoon.

She said, "I gave Ashton books that I thought Peter would have and would have read and have a point of view on." I'm running a company, and I have a full-time other job. I called her, and I said, 'I have three children. I read all of them. He said, "I'm not a very big fiction reader, I don't read a lot of fiction. She continued, "With Reese, I gave her a bunch of books that I felt like Debbie had collected over the years — some first editions, some beat-up paperbacks.

Ashton Kutcher say his rare inflammatory disease is a reason his red carpet photos may look awkward.

“She even emailed us last night,” Witherspoon said of Kunis. “If I stand next to her, I put my hands in my pockets, so there’s no chance that can be the rumor. “If I put my arm around her and was like, all friendly with her, I’d be having an affair with her. If blood flow is restricted, it can result in organ and tissue damage.” Making sure every photographer gets their shot “for like 20 minutes,” Kutcher continued, “Got it? “I don’t know who’s yelling my name, but I know there’s a lot of people yelling, going, ‘Reese, Ashton, over here, over here!