Fans of contemporary romances like The Kissing Booth won't want to miss out on The Notebook
before it leaves Netflix on December 31st. The movie centers on the unlikely love story
of Ryan Gosling's Noah and Rachel McAdams' Allie, who, despite being from very different
parts of town, develop a connection with one another after a chance encounter — and a
bit of boldness on Noah's part.
Be sure to stock up on tissues and chocolates when you decide to click play on this beloved
romance. But before you do, here are a few other things you should know about The Notebook.
It's hard to imagine anyone besides Gosling and McAdams playing Noah and Allie, but the
cast list for the film was almost totally different. Back in 1998, Steven Spielberg
was initially attached to the adaptation of The Notebook and reportedly had an eye on
Tom Cruise to star as Noah for his version of the film. George Clooney also recently
revealed that he was in contention for the role once upon a time, telling audiences at
the virtual 64th BFI London Film Festival that he would've played young Noah, with Paul
Newman playing the older version.
Director Nick Cassavetes ultimately chose Gosling, of course, in part because he thought
Gosling was just kooky enough to be convincing as a believer of love at first sight. In a
behind-the-scenes interview from the film's set, Cassavetes said,
"I just thought he was just, sorry Ryan, but weird enough in certain respects that you
would believe that he could know that he could take one look at somebody and know that was
the person for them."
There were also several other actresses who auditioned for the role of Allie after Gosling
was cast. One such would-be-Allie was Britney Spears, who had previously worked with Gosling
when they were both kids on the Disney Channel's Mickey Mouse Club. Gosling later chatted with
Entertainment Tonight about her screen test:
"She was really good, actually. She did a really nice job."
Jessica Biel has also spoken up about her audition for the part, telling Elle Magazine
that she tried out for the role while she was in the midst of filming the 2003 slasher
flick, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. She said of the experience,
"I auditioned with Ryan Gosling in my trailer — covered in blood. Nick Cassavetes put
me through the wringer in an interesting, excitingly creative way."
McAdams wound up being the last actress to audition for the role of Allie, but her approach
also turned out to be the best. The actress was unknown to both Cassavetes and Gosling
at the time, but she blew them away with her performance. McAdams explained her initial
experience with the material in a behind-the-scenes feature for the film:
"I read the script the night before and bawled my eyes out. I'm surprised that I even got
up the next day. I was just wrecked by it."
Gosling was particularly impressed by the unshakable way she delivered her lines.
"Every girl wanted to talk about the scene and the character and all of these things,
and we talked about it just endlessly. But Rachel came in, and we were like, 'Do you
want to talk about it?' She was like, 'No.'"
McAdams described her final scene read as "electric," adding,
"It was just a feeling there. Everything fit. Everything worked. It was the best audition
experience I've ever had. And I just walked out of that room, and I was just in another
world. I just couldn't catch my breath."
Gosling later explained to ScreenSlam that what sold him on McAdams for the role was
her confidence, saying,
"She not only was very talented, but she had a lot of opinions, and she was going to fight
for those opinions. She wasn't going to be swayed or manipulated."
Before filming began on The Notebook, Gosling used some time to get into character by taking
up residence in Charleston, South Carolina for two months. There, he spent time as an
apprentice for a local cabinet maker to get into the mindset of the blue-collar worker
Noah Calhoun and build up the muscle he would need for the later portions of the movie.
In addition to bulking up, the experience allowed him to become as adept at woodworking
as his character, and that knowledge came into good use on the set. Gosling actually
built a couple of the chairs and a table for the movie himself.
One of The Notebook's most enduringly heart-swelling scenes almost didn't happen. The boat scene
was remarkable for its picture-perfect wilderness landscape and the hundreds of swans that surrounded
the couple in the swamp. However, Cassavetes revealed that he had to take matters into
his own hands to make that classic movie moment happen.
In an interview with Vh1, Cassavetes revealed that the studio was unable to secure an animal
handler who could deliver such a large amount of birds that could be trained for the scene.
So, instead of taking the scene out of the script, he became something of an avian trainer
in his off-time.
"[We] bought a bunch of hatchlings and just raised them as chicks and marched them out
to the lake every day and fed them out there. By the time the movie was shooting, they were
kind of grown, but they had been fed out there every day. So, when the studio came down to
see the scene [...] the guy marched them out there like the Pied Piper and they went out
on the lake."
"It's like a dream."
Another of The Notebook's most quotable scenes came in part thanks to Gosling's ad-libbing
skills. In a scene when Noah and Allie fight, he repeatedly demands to know one thing:
"What do you want? What do you want?" "It's not that simple." "What do you want?"
That line, which has gone on to be one of the movie's most famous, was not originally
in the script. The director told Vh1,
"There was a scene at the end where Ryan improvised, 'What do you want? What do you want?' And
it became one of the most iconic things from the film [that] wasn't in the script. He just
knew it."
Cassavetes went on to explain that he decided to go forward with Gosling's improvisation
because he recognized the power of the performances of Gosling and McAdams in that moment.
"Would you just stay with me?" "Stay with you? What for? We're already fighting." "Well,
that's what we do!"
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