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When filming "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" Brad Pitt and director David Fincher were already familiar with each other, having worked together making "Fight Club" and "Se7en." But there would be nothing routine about making "Benjamin Button," their most ambitious collaboration yet. CBS News producer Matt Lombardi spoke with Fincher about taking the film from first draft to the big screen.

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CBS News: When did you first get this script? When the first time you hear about the project and this concept?

David Fincher: Actually I read the … first, first draft of this script, which was in '92. And I think Steven Spielberg was making it at the time with Tom Cruise. And it was mostly as like writing sample. Somebody kind of gave it to me as, "This is one of the great unmade screenplays." Either it was they were trying to get it off the ground or it was being shuttered. And then it sat on the shelf for at least 10 years, probably, well, nine years, 2001 is when I read the latest incarnation of it.

CBS News: And it sat on the shelf, why?

Fincher: I think it was too expensive. I also think that, you know, initially, the idea was to have a series of hand offs from one actor to another and probably needing as many as five or six different people just to play Benjamin.

CBS News: So the time you actually start looking at it seriously to possibly direct it, is that still the idea that we'll have a succession of actors playing this part?

Fincher: It's hard for me to remember. I think that that was … the closely held, you know, belief that that was the way that it was going to be accomplished. But when I give it to Pitt, you know … the first words out of his mouth were, you know, "If I'm gonna play this guy, I'm gonna play … the whole thing." I understood that and I actually was sort of anticipating that that's what he would say.

CBS News: So, it wasn't this, "What, are you crazy, Brad? There's no way."

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Director David Fincher's latest film, "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," tells the story of a life lived while aging backwards. The tale, adapted from F. Scott Fitzgerald's short story of the same name, begins with a baby born with all of the wrinkles and arthritis of an 80-year-old man and follows his life as he grows into a semi-mobile senior, a middle-aged man and a strapping young adult. Brad Pitt plays Benjamin from the cradle to the grave – with more than a little help from some remarkable technology. Tonight on the Evening News, Katie Couric takes a behind-the-scenes look at how Pitt – er, at least Pitt from the neck up – went from elderly to infant … and everything in-between. Check out the clip after the jump to see Pitt demonstrating some of his, well, acting technique – and read on for an extended portion of our interview.

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Brad Pitt: This, you know … before, if you were attempting a film like this, you would have to plug in different actors or different ages … to … just to perform the thing. And … it always, I mean, becomes disjointed. Sometimes it connects, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes the actors kinda look alike. But they seldom have the same kind of personality, or verve, or even dignity.

And in this … we, for the first time, got an opportunity to play the character from childhood to death, from birth to old age, or, in my case, from old age, which was still young, to birth. And, we got to drive the performance all the way. It was an … incredible luxury. It'll become the norm. Right now, it's a luxury.

CBS News: But I understand you're saying that now, but I understand when you read the script, you said, "That's what I want. I want to play it all." And how did you?

Pitt: Well, you have to ...

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