For his latest film project, 1988 Upper St. Clair High School grad Stephen Chbosky, author of coming-of-age novel “Perks of Being a Wallflower” and writer/director of its film adaptation, looked to an actor from a rival high school to cast in “Nonnas,” streaming May 9 on Netflix (just in time for Mother’s Day).
Chbosky cast 1995 Mt. Lebanon High School grad Joe Manganiello as Bruno, the level-headed, business-minded best friend of dreamer Joe (Vince Vaughn), who, after his mother’s death, goes into debt opening an Italian restaurant where the chefs are all elderly Italian women, AKA Nonnas.
“I love teasing him about the fact that Mt. Lebanon never had busses, and he had to walk to school and I got to have the nice bus.,” Chbosky said in a virtual interview late last month over Zoom.
Manganiello said Chbosky asked him to read the “Nonnas” script with a Pittsburgh accent and then during production Chbosky would attempt to give Manganiello a serious note on performance before filming a scene.
“Stephen would come up to me before a take and he’d say, ‘Hey, I’ve got one note for you.’ And he’d lean in and say, ‘Go Blue Devils!’ And then he disappeared behind the monitors,” Manganiello said. “I wouldn’t do this for anybody else, but anytime we text each other, I always say, ‘Go Panthers,’ even though they’re (Mt. Lebanon’s) sworn enemy.”
Chbosky noted his sister went to Carnegie Mellon University, Manganiello’s alma mater.
“Every now and then Vince (Vaughn) would be, ‘Oh, you guys with the CMU,’” Chbosky recalled. “It was really fun to annoy everybody with that.”
“Nonnas” is a feel-good comedic drama based on an actual restaurant, Enoteca Maria, on Staten Island. Chbosky’s wife, screenwriter Liz Maccie (“Siren,” “Make It or Break It”), read an article about the restaurant whose chefs are Italian grandmas and later the article came up in a conversation with executives from the production company that had already bought the rights to make the story into a film.
“You have to let me pitch on this,” Maccie told the executives. “This is my family: (We’re) an Italian-American, Jersey family. I was fortunate enough to get to have this opportunity, and then I dragged (Chbosky) along with me.”
Chbosky describes “Nonnas” as “a love letter to my wife.
“I know a lot of the women who inspired some of the moments (in ‘Nonnas’),” Chbosky said. “I know what the houses were supposed to feel like, what the rooms were supposed to smell like, all those details. I married into all of them. … For her, writing it was a love letter to her family. So it’s almost like a home movie to us.”
Chbosky said his own background in Pittsburgh influenced the film.
“My Grandma Ann, I will never forget that kitchen in Duquesne,” Chbosky said. “I will never forget my other grandmother making the chicken paprikash and things like that. It wasn’t Italian, per se, but it’s those details and the memories that you have as a child. And Pittsburgh, as we both know, is a very proud place, very proud of its heritage and its traditions, as is every Italian American I have ever met in my life, so there’s a real kinship there.”
Manganiello said the Italian family backdrop was a “huge draw” for him.
“Because of my height, I don’t really get to play Italian very often,” Manganiello said. “If you line me up next to real Italians, I look like a mutant in the lineup. But I certainly grew up with Italian culture. I spent every summer growing up with my Sicilian family. So I understand how they talk to each other, how husbands and wives talk to each other. I understand how Italian buddies talk to each other. … Of course, you set up all of that so that you can then deliver the heart and really make people feel something at that right moment.”
As far as casting Manganiello, Chbosky said they’d never met before “Nonnas.”
“It’s like him and Mark Cuban, that’s the Mt. Lebanon connection, right?” Chbosky said. “When we met for what was a great first meeting, it’s always a little bit awkward when you meet an artist for the first time, even if you admire them. But within two minutes, it was nothing but Steelers. It all became about Pittsburgh. I loved working with him. I can’t wait to do it again.”
Manganiello praised Chbosky’s directing style.
“With Stephen, everything is from the heart and he really set the pace on set,” Manganiello said. “You were tethered to the heart of this film at all moments. … He’s a lovely director, a fantastic actors’ director, which is very rare in today’s world where most of the films and projects are these technological monstrosities, and the directors don’t know how to talk to actors. They’re over here worrying about all the technical aspects and the special effects. It was great to work with a director who really felt like a theater director.”
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Kept/canceled
NBC renewed “Chicago Med,” “Chicago Fire” and “Chicago P.D.”
Apple TV renewed “Trying” for a fifth season and “The Studio” for a second.
CBS canceled Queen Latifah’s “The Equalizer” after five seasons.
Nickelodeon canceled “Tyler Perry’s Young Dylan” after five seasons.
Apple TV comedy “Acapulco” will end with its fourth season, streaming July 23.
Fox canceled “Rescue Hi-Surf” after a single season.
Channel surfing
The proposed National Museum of Broadcasting in Pittsburgh, slated to be housed in a former bank building in Turtle Creek, announced the addition of two board members, retired KDKA-TV reporter Harold Hayes and University of Pittsburgh sports analyst Curtis Aiken. … Billy Bush will exit syndicated daily show “Extra” as its host in the fall.