Ever walk in on a relative in an intimate moment and you really wish you hadn’t? Yeah, imagine that it’s your mother (Nicole Kidman) … with your former boss (Zac Efron). That’s the reality for Zara (Joey King) in A Family Affair, directed by Richard Lagravenese (Beautiful Creatures, P.S. I Love You). In the new trailer for the film, you can see Zara bear witness to that extremely awkward — and, unfortunately for her, painful — surprise. Upon seeing her boss and mother in bed together, Zara spins on the spot and collides directly with the wall.
It took quite a few takes to get the perfect doorframe collision on film. “I did it about three times, and then took a moment to watch those takes back and decided I needed to keep trying until it was perfect,” King tells Tudum. “The hit on the head wasn’t looking real enough to me.”
“She did it seven times and every time was on the money and just cracked us up,” director Lagravenese says. “We had to put foam wood in the door and on the frame, but she was game for it every time.”
So game for it, in fact, that King’s co-stars stuck around just for laughs. “Nicole and Zac were there watching me even when they were finished with their part of the scene,” King recalls. “They were filming me on their phones and cracking up.” Hey, the family that laughs together stays together.
Find out more about A Family Affair below, and remember to always knock.
A surprising romance kicks off comic consequences for a young woman, her mother, and her movie star boss as they face the complications of love, sex, and identity.
For Lagravenese, the story of the film was more familiar than you might think — and not because he used to work for a petulant action hero. “I saw in it a coming-of-age story for three different characters at three different stages of their lives,” Lagravenese says. “I was going through my own sort of transition into what Gail Sheehy called Second Adulthood, where after you’ve fulfilled all your expectations and you’ve been what you need to be for everyone else, and you’ve achieved something and children are grown and all that stuff, you get a chance of being who you are and the things that you lost along the way.”
Kidman’s character, Brooke, heads on a similar journey throughout the film, but she’s not alone. Her daughter will have to come of age in her own way, navigating her professional life as it begins to uncomfortably intersect with her personal one. “I love Zara’s constant frustration,” King says. “She cracks me up because she’s self-aware enough to know she’s an angsty adult but also has a great sense of humor and absolutely adores the people that drive her the craziest.” Of course, it’ll take a bit of time to get to that point of adoration and through all the crazy.
Get caught up in A Family Affair, now streaming on Netflix.
Check it out at the top of this article.
Screen icon Kidman stars as Brooke Harwood, Zara’s writer mother who falls into bed with movie star Chris Cole … who just happens to be Zara’s former boss.
Kidman and Efron previously costarred in The Paperboy, and have a long-running rapport. “We talked on the phone about this film,” Kidman said. “And we both said, ‘But I only want to do it with you.’ And when that gets said, you go, ‘OK, well then, this is kind of kismet, so that means we're in a good place.’ “
For King, the experience of working with Kidman was otherworldly. “Nicole is in this category in my mind where she’s like an angel who isn’t even the same species as me,” King says. “But meeting her and working with her just blew me away. She actually is an absolute angel, but so human and kind and giving. She’s an example of how you should treat people no matter who you are.”
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Efron plays moderately conceited movie star Chris Cole: Zara’s nightmare boss, the star of the blockbuster Icarus Rush franchise, and Brooke’s new paramour. Fun fact: A Family Affair isn’t the first time Efron and Kidman have found their characters in an entanglement on-screen. They actually played lovers in The Paperboy over a decade ago.
Far from their bickering on-screen personalities, King and Efron hit it off on the set of A Family Affair. “Joey King is one of the best actors that I’ve ever worked with, hands down,” Efron told Netflix. “It’s incredible to work with her because she’s really energetic and has such good instincts. The kind of stuff that she does on the fly is very specific and not at all typical. It’s surprising and comes naturally to her, and she’s really fun to improv and try new things with because she’s so reactive.”
The pair had something else in common — they’re both former child actors who have kept steadily working into adulthood. “We talked about a lot of stuff over the course of this shoot, that being one of them,” King says. “I’m so grateful to be able to meet and work with people who have had such a similar upbringing. Zac has seen a lot in his time in the industry so far, and he was generous enough to share some of those things and be a good friend.”
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King plays Zara, the harried assistant to Chris Cole who finds herself in a horribly awkward position when he falls in love with her mother.
As a former fan who grew up watching and loving Efron, King has nothing but glowing things to say about her experience finally working with him. “It’s always intimidating at first to work with someone who you’ve followed for so long,” she says. “But I had nothing to worry about truly. Zac is a golden retriever to be honest. He’s like the best hype man, every scene we did he was just the easiest person to bounce ideas off of because he was down to try anything and was always so supportive. I love that guy.”
And King found her own way into Zara’s plight as a harried employee. “Can I relate? I grew up with older sisters who bossed me around all the time!” she says. “They were my first go around with high-maintenance bosses.”
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YouTuber and actor Koshy plays Zara’s close friend, Eugenie.
Koshy rose to fame with her wacky sketch comedy work on YouTube. Though Lagravenese wasn’t familiar with Koshy when he cast her as Eugenie, he quickly became a fan.
“When I met her and followed up on her background, I was very impressed by her,” he says. “She's got such great energy and she’s so positive.” And Koshy followed through once filming started. “Her first scene she’s talking to [Zara] on the phone, and Joey was there saying the lines off- camera, and it was like they had an immediate friendship right away. I just believed everything she did.”
“Joey makes it so easy,” Koshy said about working with her on-screen best friend. “She's been in this for so long that watching her work and operate is not watching her work – it's watching her just play. She's a kid discovering new things and new tricks to do on the playground. She makes it fresh every single day.”
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Oscar winner Kathy Bates plays Leila, Brooke’s wisecracking mother-in-law and a voice of wisdom in Brooke and Zara’s lives.
“I think she’s one of the greatest actresses ever, and whenever I have a chance to work with her, I bring her up and say we want her,” Lagravenese (who previously worked with Bates on his 2007 film P.S. I Love You) says. “Anytime Kathy came on set, [the cast and crew] were blown away by how solid she was and everything she says you believed and her humor. And she also has great improvisational skills and comes up with a really great idea.”
Bates had her own reasons for wanting to participate in the film: a budding Zac Efron fandom. “He's immensely talented, and I was just so surprised at how real he is, how down-to-earth and almost unrecognizable,” she told Netflix. “We all had such a great time working together. It was like we had known each other for years, and that kind of connection and ease is, I find, very rare.”
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