Jason Biggs Interview

JASON BIGGS

Jason Biggs has graduated with honours. The three-time star of the American Pie franchise may still be familiar as the High School pie guy, but that may be about to change. Having being chosen as the male lead opposite Christina Ricci in Woody Allen's new comedy Anything Else, his career looks to be branching out into new directions.

In the film, Biggs plays Jerry Falk, a young Manhattan writer who falls in love with the feisty Ricci, moves in with her and watches his life gradually fall apart. All of Allen's archetypal New York neuroses are there, and Biggs explains how he jumped at a role that most of his fellow actors would have killed to get. "Actually I did kill for it", jokes the 26-year-old American. "There were other people lined up, but sadly they are all now deceased".

So is Allen a secretive fan of the high school gross-out comedy? "I thought originally he had seen the whole first film, but it turned out he had only seen clips", says Biggs. "He said to me 'that's not my kind of movie'". Although he was thrilled to get the part, Biggs admits more than a few sleepless nights before he turned up for his first day's work. "It was very intimidating at first. I'm a big fan of his, and I was essentially playing a younger version of a character that Woody has played throughout his career and with that comes obvious pressures, further compounded by him being there and acting in scenes that he was also directing you in".

Biggs is open enough to admit the similarities between himself and his on-screen character. " I appreciate the comfort of a relationship, and the whole blinded-by-love thing is something I totally get. I know a lot about the general relationship woes people have."

Citing Crimes and Misdemeanours, Manhattan and Sleeper as among his own Allen highlights, the affable Biggs was surprised at Allen's relaxed way of working. Improvisation was positively encouraged and Biggs describes him as "loose. He wanted us to be as conversational as possible - he was very fussy about it. But for the scenes that he was in, he would come to set, ask which scene they were shooting, look through it for about a minute and be ready to go - whereas I would be up half the night trying to remember everything".