Michael Jacobs makes his directorial debut with the multi-generational romantic comedy Maybe I Do. Jacobs has had an important hand in shaping their childhood with Boy Meets World, My Two Dads, and Charles in Charge. His new film looks at love, happiness, and marriage from six different perspectives, with different opinions on how marriage can change a relationship forever.
Michelle (Emma Roberts) and Allen (Luke Bracey) have very different opinions about marriage. When she gives him an ultimatum about the future of their relationship, their parents step in to try and help. Setting up a dinner for their parents to meet for the first time Michelle’s parents, Howard (Richard Gere) and Grace (Diane Keaton) are shocked to discover that they already know Allen’s parents Monica (Susan Sarandon) and Sam (William H. Macy). Now, the parents scramble to secretly confront the troubles in their own marriages while trying to help Allen and Grace figure out what their future could look like.
Screen Rant spoke with Roberts and Bracey about their new romantic comedy, Maybe I Do. The actors explained how their characters’ upbringing impacted their perspectives on love and marriage, as well as what it was like working with Michael Jacobs on his feature directorial debut.
Emma Roberts & Luke Bracey On Maybe I Do
Screen Rant: What a fantastic film about love and all of its complications that does such a great job of balancing real moments with authentic moments from the heart. Emma, your character is very sure of what she wants, while Luke’s character is constantly questioning things. How do you think their upbringing shaped their relationship with love?
Emma Roberts: I think my character, Michelle, is a hopeless romantic because she feels like her parents have been together forever. She wants to be with someone forever and be able to be like, “We’ve been married for 30 years,” and that’s it. And I think it’s really, really sweet.
And I just love that as much as she wants to get married, what she wants even more is a definitive answer from her boyfriend. And that I think is part of the comedy in it, but also what makes her not just like a whiny girl that wants to get married, but someone that’s like, “I want commitment and I need to know now. And if you don’t know, then that’s my answer.” So there’s something that I thought was an interesting take on this kind of character that we may have seen before.
And Luke, how about yourself? How do you think Allen’s upbringing shaped his relationship with love?
Luke Bracey: I think his upbringing is the main factor. Allen loves Michelle so much, and he just can’t understand why he’d go and ruin it by marrying her. That’s all he knows is that if you get married suddenly you’re going to end up his parents, and that’s certainly nowhere anyone wants to be. So yeah, that’s his big hurdle to overcome and to realize that nothing is predetermined.
And I think that’s a fear that we all have, right? What we’ve seen is the way it is and the way it always will be. And so it’s a really big steep learning curve for Allen, I think. And his parents both have things to say about it that I think he takes note of both of them, but ultimately, I think, it’s really his journey of breaking free of both of his parents and their relationship too. So yeah, it’s a nice journey that Allen goes on, I think, and certainly not helped by his witnessing of his parents over the years.
Emma, what do you think Maybe I Do says about love, happiness, and marriage?
Emma Roberts: Is that all? Just a little light question for end of the day? Well, what I love about the movie is, I feel like it honestly shows so many perspectives where you’re going to watch the movie and be like, “Ugh, that’s so me, or that’s so my partner. Or, oh my God, that is so my parents.” And so I always love that, and I feel like that’s what makes going to the theater fun.
Like a movie you can take your sister to or your mom or your boyfriend or your girlfriend, and you guys are going to laugh after, maybe get in a little argument. But there’s something about the movie that it’s really grounded and real and heartfelt, but there’s also something that’s a little wish fulfillment, aspirational. It ends on a high. And I like that because I sometimes we want a happy ending.
Absolutely. I found myself looking at myself through the lens of each of your characters at different points of the film. Luke, Michael Jacobs created many shows that raised me from my childhood, like Charles in Charge, My Two Dads, Dinosaurs. And this is his feature directorial debut. What does his directing style add to Maybe I Do?
Luke Bracey: Yeah. Michael, he wrote and directed this and working with him on that, it was really fantastic to work with him because he has such a history and such an experience in just telling stories and knowing how to tell them the best way. And he gave Emma and I so many great, helpful hints in terms of not just performance, but what you need in the story and what you need in the scene. And so yes, it was like a little bit of a mini storytelling camp actually working with Michael.
Emma Roberts: Yeah. Some scenes felt like a workshop because, truly, he won’t stop until we get it right. And that’s what I loved at the end of the day where I’m like, “Wow, I feel like I actually got this right,” because he would not have let us stop if we didn’t.
Luke Bracey: And he really helped us to get to those points. And then also, he’s such an energetic and fun guy who loves telling stories, and it’s pretty infectious when you get a group of people who like telling stories together, it becomes a bit like playtime at school. So yeah, it was an absolute thrill working with Michael every day. I thought he did an amazing job, and it’s such an impressive story to tie together.
I think Emma was talking about it, you get all these different perspectives on love and these different relationships that involve six different people and then to tie them together in the way he does. I think it’s just really genius storytelling and yeah, it was absolute pleasure to go to work.
About Maybe I Do
Michelle wants to take her relationship with Allen to the next level, marriage, but he is hesitant. They decide to talk through what their future could look like together along with their parents, but much to everyone’s surprise the parents are already familiar with one another. As Allen and Michelle struggle to envision the same future their parents scramble to share their own opinions in the hopes of helping while trying to keep secrets in a hilarious take on love, marriage, and happiness.
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Maybe I Do will be in theaters on January 27.
