He works with a lot of actors for a second, third time. This film finds him working with a lot of newcomers to his world, folks like Jesse Eisenbeg and Ellen Page. Did you three bond together?

Yeah. I mean Alec Baldwin who I acted with in this, he’d been in a Woody Allen movie before. He’s Alec Baldwin, so he’s suave and awesome as always. But I think without putting words in their mouth, I think Ellen, Jesse and I were nervous. We all had a little trepidation working for Woody. On the first day we were just wildly nervous. He’d walk over and give us direction and we’d be like, that’s Woody Allen and he just told us to do it better. That was really exciting and fun. It was nice to be together for that, otherwise it could have been an isolating experience.

It was amazing for us. It was a really fun shoot, and it’s a really funny script. It feels like vintage Woody, and that’s exciting. But also shooting in Rome was beautiful. And the Italian schedule is very laid back. We would have very long lunches. The driver who drove me, Jesse and Ellen was named Spartacus, which was a completely exciting name. And Spartacus would go out to lunch with us all the time, so it was the three of us and Spartacus, and we’d go to these restaurants in the middle of the day. It was so laid back. It was this dream job. I’ve never had more fun on a movie ever. If it had lasted all year I would have been very happy. I wish it was a television show [laughs].