Jason Biggs and Joel David Moore Are Playing Politics | Box Office Magazine

WEEK ZERO: Starbucks at 4th and Seneca > Tracy Leigh’s workday starts around 5:00 am. For the veteran barista and mother of four, it’s an ideal schedule allowing time for her two greatest joys: her kids and her acting. Despite the espresso machine’s sputter, she overhears an exchange between her coworker Emily and a customer …”Hey, you look kind of like-” says Emily. “Yeah, I get that all the time,” says the customer After a beat, Jason Biggs cops to being recognized. He’s in town shooting a film about radical Seattle politics called Grassroots, co-written and directed by Stephen Gyllenhaal, dad of Maggie and Jake. The cameras roll next week Tracy is embarrassed. She doesn’t recognize Biggs. “Yeah you do,” says Emily. “He’s the guy from American Pie” “The guy with the pie?!” remembers Leigh Imagining the scene in question, Leigh hands Biggs his coffee, blushes and looks up, right, anywhere but straight at him In Seattle, people read others’ coffee preferences like their astrological signs. Leigh will only reveal Biggs’ taste as concise and unpretentious.

WEEK ONE: 310 Mercer, Capitol Hill > I pull up to the set as Gyllenhaal steps off the curb, a cell phone glued to his ear. You can see where Jake and Maggie got their good looks The ramshackle two-story house standing in for the place Phil Campbell (Biggs) shares with his girlfriend Emily (Lauren Ambrose) looks like every joint I rented in college A lanky young man turns about and gives me his Teen Beat smile. It’s my buddy Nik Doner. I know him from the Seattle theater community. He’s waiting to start shooting. We talk and laugh and a PA walks up. “Oh God, I’m busted,” I think, “I’m laughing too loud-I’m a disruption and they’re going to throw me off the set!” They don’t. Maybe it’s the familiarity of the set, but I feel at home… Read the full article by Cole Hornaday at boxofficemagazine.com