Lorene Scafaria talks 'Coherence'

Alex Biese

Over the last few years, Lorene Scafaria has been making a name for herself in Hollywood telling stories of her own design. The Rahway-born, Holmdel-raised filmmaker wrote the 2008 comedy "Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist" and wrote and directed the 2012 Steve Carell apocalypse comedy "Seeking a Friend for the End of the World."

But, she said, she had a few reasons for taking an acting gig in the independent science fiction drama "Coherence," now playing in select cinemas and available for instant streaming and high-definition downloads starting Aug. 5.

First, there was the appeal of working on the debut feature film by James Ward Byrkit, a filmmaker and artist who had previously worked on "Rango" (2011) and the first three "Pirates of the Caribbean" pictures.

"I was just drawn to Jim, really," said Scafaria. "I thought he was such a genius, and he has such an incredible mind for storytelling. He basically called me up and said he had shot some kind of experimental film before with seven friends and his wife, who was in it, and did I want to play the part that his wife had played, because she was, I think, eight or nine months pregnant at the time."

Then, there was the matter of her "Coherence" co-star. The close-quarters film centers on eight friends, a dinner party and the reality-warping effects of an astronomical anomaly. Scafaria plays one of the hosts of the dinner party, along with her husband, played by Nicholas Brendon, best known for his work as the wise-cracking Xander on Joss Whedon's class television series "Buffy the Vampire Slayer."

"I've been a lifelong 'Buffy' fan and had a little trading card of Xander in my Saturn in the '90s," Scafaria revealed. "And so, when Jim said I got to play Nicholas' wife, I said, 'I'm in.' So, with the combination of Jim being this weird genius and getting to do something like that, it just sounded so fun. I had no expectations and really just went in to have a good time with people. And we really had such a good time. It was so much fun. It was hard, but it was fun."

Scafaria and Byrkit kept his close-knit cast generally in the dark about the numerous twists, turns and surprises contained in the film's 89 inventive minutes, giving the ensemble plenty of room to improvise.

"We, as actors, really didn't know what was going on," she said. "Honestly, I've only seen the film once, and I was blown away, because we were only privy to what we had to know for the scenes, and my character takes a nap for a while. So, I really didn't even understand what the film was about until I saw it.

"My boyfriend described it as 'Inception' meets 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?' which I suppose is a pretty great combination for that very reason, that it really does feel like regular people having a dinner party, and then this happens. I just thought (Byrkit) captured the reality of that so well. And, it certainly helped that we truly didn't know what was coming next, so I was scared. When there would be a bag on the window, we would jump. So, the fear is real, and so was the fun that we had in the beginning of it before the (stuff) hit the fan."


INFO: 89 minutes, not rated

WHERE/WHEN: Now playing in select theaters; available for instant streaming and HD downloads starting Aug. 5.

ON THE WEB: http://coherencethemovie.com