"How surreal must this be for you?"
In the last month or so, as the hoopla surrounding the upcoming release of the movie Julie & Julia (based on both my memoir of the same name and Julia Child and Alex Prud'homme's My Life in France) has taken over my life, this has become the single question I am asked most often, now on a daily basis. My answer is, usually, "Yep. Pretty crazy." That seems the most diplomatic thing to say, not to mention the simplest. I'm not lying--it is surreal, the whole thing. But the truth is more complicated than what can be evoked by one overused adjective.
The truth is that I've had a movie made about me--or, rather, a version of me that's been made up by a very famous and accomplished person I've met only a handful of times--and I find the whole thing thrilling but also occasionally upsetting and hard to come to terms with. Clearly, one cannot complain about a movie based (in part, anyway) on one's very first book, at least not without coming off as hideously ungrateful. A movie written and directed by Nora Ephron. Starring Meryl Streep, for cripes' sake. There is no bad here. And I'm not--complaining, that is. In any way, shape, or form.
The "Julie Powell" of Julie & Julia: The Movie! has things to teach me, and the lessons are not all easy ones. That said, I have seen the movie six times now, and there are things about it that scare me a little. The "Julie Powell" of Julie & Julia: The Movie! has things to teach me, and the lessons are not all easy ones.