Eva Amurri Shares Behind-the-Scenes Secrets and 'Love Letter' to “Saved! ”in Celebration of Film's 20th Anniversary
The actress recalls taking on the role as she was bidding farewell to high school and embarking on her career
Richard Corkery/NY Daily News Archive via Getty
Eva Amurri, Mandy Moore and Jena Malone at the premiere of 'Saved' in 2004Eva Amurri is looking back on a special moment in her acting career.
The actress, 39, reflected on the making of Saved!, 20 years after the indie film's release. Though the anniversary was earlier this year, Amurri was inspired to discuss filming after finding mementos from the experience. Sharing never-before-seen photos on Instagram, she wrote about how much the film meant to her.
"The Muffin Shop Is Closed, but she kept receipts! ????????????????? Forgotten film from when we made Saved 20+ years ago is on the blog…plus a little love letter I wrote to the whole experience," she wrote.
In a blog on her website, Happily Eva After, Amurri recalled getting the role of Cassandra Edelstein at 16 despite "being a little different or 'green' in an industry."
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She also revealed that instead of Mandy Moore, Anne Hathaway was originally cast as Hilary Faye Stockard.
"This is so strange for me to think about now, because in my mind Mandy Moore IS that role, and made it iconic. People don’t realize that so many movies you know and love are like this! There are often entirely different casts attached when a movie is first being put together, which then changes based on funding or schedule availability of the actors!" she wrote.
Moore ultimately played Hilary Faye, best friend of main character Mary (Jena Malone) in the film, which follows Mary as she tries to "save" her boyfriend from being gay and ends up pregnant in the process. Mary-Louise Parker, Patrick Fugit, Macaulay Culkin and Heather Matarazzo also star in the film.
The cast originally was due to shoot in Miami but reconvened months later in Vancouver. Though she emancipated herself to work on the movie, Amurri said there was "one caveat with filming Saved!"
"Not only would I be working adult hours, but I also had to complete all of my high school assignments, and my college applications, in my free time while in Vancouver filming the movie," she revealed.
"I told my parents I could totally do this, no big deal. In reality, I look back on the experience and have NO idea how I pulled it off," the daughter of Susan Sarandon and Franco Amurri admitted.
Later, Amurri wrote, "I guess it’s a good thing that teenagers have endless energy, or else I probably wouldn’t have survived it! I also was just endlessly excited to be doing any of it at all. I would say that the experience of managing work responsibilities, school responsibilities, my own food, money, and health, and then also having fun and being a teenager was ultimately one of the most formative experiences of my entire life."
Amurri also recalled how costar Macaulay Culkin, her love interest in the film, put her "at ease."
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Macaulay Culkin, Jena Malone and Eva Amurri in 2004's 'Saved'"He is such a bundle of joy and light, he was so kind to me, funny, and a total homebody," she said. "He just had zero pretense at all. Our scenes together were so fun to shoot."
The mom of three admitted she's now thinking "it's almost time" to share the movie with her kids — daughter Marlowe Mae, 9, and sons Major James, 7, and Mateo Antoni, 4.
"It has a great message, and I love that so much of who I actually was at that time, and what I was experiencing, come through in the film. In lots of ways, it’s like a time capsule of my teen years. It’s strange to look back on one of the first experiences you had in a career and be able to wholeheartedly say it was the best, but it really was," she wrote.
"The work of it, the creativity of it, and the life of it. I think I hoped for the entire rest of my career that I would have an acting experience that would match it, but only a couple of projects ever came close. I’m so lucky that I got that little slice of time that I can keep with me forever."
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