08/12/2026
Anna Kendrick on "Up in the Air" (2009): "I thought it was going to be a comedy. I didn't understand that it would be an awards contender at all. The script changed a lot while we were making it, because we were making it when the bubble burst. Layoffs meant something else by the time that we went into production. The idea of a man who fires people for a living went from hitman to genocidal maniac."
A large number of the people we see fired in the film are not actors, but people who were recently laid off. The filmmakers put out ads in St. Louis and Detroit posing as a documentary crew looking to document the effect of the recession. When people showed up, they were instructed to treat the camera like the person who fired them and respond as they did, or use the opportunity to say what they wished they had. A way to discern who are the actors, and who are the real people, is that the real people do not have dialogue with George Clooney or Kendrick, as they were shot separately. Director Jason Reitman did this intentionally, feeling that the real people would freak out Clooney and Kendrick.
Kendrick later claimed that she was financially insecure as a working actress when she made this movie, and that during the promotional tour her wardrobe was rented for her. Kendrick admitted that she felt bad about that, she thought it sent a misleading impression to young actresses.
For her performance in the film, Kendrick received nominations for the Golden Globe Award, the Screen Actors Guild Award, the Critics' Choice Movie Award, the British Academy Film Award, and the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.
"I'll tell you, the really humbling moment is the moment that you get home from the Golden Globes or the BAFTAs or the Oscars, and you sit on your bed, which is the same crappy IKEA bed you've had since you were 18, and you put on an old episode of 'Family Guy' and you have a frozen meal . . . and you're trying not to get macaroni and cheese on your thousand-dollar gown."
"I'm really glad that the Oscar stuff is over, to be perfectly honest. I mean, I am infinitely grateful - I'm so lucky - but it's been a really crazy year. You're constantly wearing clothes someone else picked out for you, delivering sound bites instead of real feelings, and walking into rooms full of people you don't know. I didn't become an actor for any of that, so it's been kind of a confusing time for me." (IMDb/Wikipedia)
Happy Birthday, Anna Kendrick!
