The Research Process: Angarano said he got ready by "talking with Alex [Steyermark, the director] a whole bunch of times. I’d played a cancer patient at one time for another film and I told Alex that I wanted to do something similar. I just wanted to talk with a doctor. The guy who is the medical consultant on the film, Dr. Michael Brescia and Alex, myself and Brian Stokes Mitchell, the guy who plays Dylan’s doctor in the film, we went to a hospice in the Bronx called Calvary Hospital that is specifically for cancer patients in the advance stages. We went there, walked around and talked for about five hours.
It was a great experience because this guy is a really hard-nosed, Brooklyn, street tough guy. He was looking through the script and he’s one of the leading oncologists in the country. He was reading it and he goes, ‘I love the script. It’s great but you have him on Coumadin here and that’s bulls**t. He can’t have that.’ He showed us what was medically accurate and told us about patients that he’s worked with that were having experiences similar to Dylan’s, seeing an afterlife and loved ones. It made me realize it wasn’t something fake. We’d be portraying real people in real situations and that’s where a lot of the stuff for me came together.”
Working with a Tight Shooting Schedule and a Limited Budget: “We had a twenty-five day shooting schedule,” said Angarano. “The schedule each day was four to six scenes. It was pretty hectic but Alex, as the ringleader, set the vibe and the tone was very relaxed and cheerful - almost.”
Mabrey enjoys working on films with short shooting schedules. “Sometimes I think that’s the best environment for gelling with the cast and getting on the same page because we don’t have our trailers to run off to and do our own thing. We have to be with each other, and during our breaks we’re hanging out. It was good. It was like effortless chemistry.”
What Teens May Get From This Movie: Angarano said, “I think because the movie is about a kid who is terminally ill, I think a lot of people would go to the movie thinking it’s about death. But it’s really about life, a very life-affirming movie. It’s looking at things from a different perspective. You see Dylan and his friends, they’re very normal kids and have a very normal sense of humor. They’re very relatable and I think people realize that it could happen to anyone. It could happen to someone close to you and you should realize that. I don’t think the movie shoves a message in your face. You can take whatever you want from it. Either how to deal with death or how to deal with life.”
Mabrey agreed. “What he said. No, basically, pretty much the same thing. It’s like there’s so many different things you can take away from this. You know, I thought when you said people will look at this in the beginning and think it’s about death, I think people might look at this in the beginning and think it’s about a kid who wants to bang a supermodel, or like a kid who smokes doobies because he’s got cancer. And if that is what attracts some people to it, like younger kids or whatever, awesome because then they’ll go in not expecting what it’s actually going to make them feel, which I think is nice.
I think it’s nice for young people to get a taste of what death is like. I didn’t have anyone close to me pass away until four or five years ago, which is a long time. I always thought I was very blessed to have that. And then when it did, it gave me some depth - not only as a human being, but as an actor. I’m sure everyone knows what disease and sickness and death does to a person and I think it’s nice to watch that. I think it’s a very realistic - what’s the word – portrayal of what that can be like. Because it’s funny and it’s sad at the same time. It’s like you’ve got to joke about it. You’ve got to have a sense of humor.”
Angarano added, “It’s only natural to joke about such an intense, grave situation.”
Sunny Mabrey on Being Cast as the Ultimate Supermodel: “It was definitely flattering. I was like, ‘I don’t know if I can pull that off…’ But, you know, I’ve modeled in the past. Supermodel I think is a stretch but, what attracted me to the character…is that she is not only this supermodel, but she’s got all of her own problems. And just the fact that she’s sort of a wounded bird and when they meet, it takes them a long time to actually come together, but when they do it’s like a realization for her that it’s like they’re both growing. He’s actually dying but growing at the same time, and I have a similar experience.”
Angarano summed it up: “They turn into two people who actually needed each other at that moment, at that time. They needed to depend on each other in different ways.”
