Rose Byrne and Chris O'Dowd sound off on "Juliet, Naked" and the celebrity rumor mill
Rose Byrne and Chris O'Dowd star in new romantic comedy "Juliet, Naked." The two play Annie and Duncan, respectively, who are in a passionless relationship made worse by Duncan's fanatic obsession with reclusive singer-songwriter Tucker Crowe, played by Ethan Hawke. Things take a turn, though, when the washed up rocker enters their lives. Byrne and O'Dowd talked to CBS News about the movie and what it's like to be on the other side of fandom.
In the film, Tucker Crowe's fans have no real clue where he lives or what he does, but Duncan knows every rumor and fan theory about the musician. As actors, Byrne and O'Dowd have seen their fair share of false rumors about themselves.
Byrne says that for her, the strangest rumor she saw was a fake claim about her name on IMDb.
"I remember it used to say on IMDb that my name was Rose Judith Esther Byrne and that was so weird because that's not my name, and someone had just made it up," she reveals. "That was a very weird feeling." In fact, the actress clears up, her real name is Mary Rose Byrne.
O'Dowd's most memorable rumor is much stranger, but it does contain some truth to it.
"There was a rumor going around for a while that I had a 100,000 chocolate bar wrappers," he says, before revealing: "To be fair, I did have 1,000 chocolate bar wrappers."
The actor, whose father was a graphic designer, says he became "obsessed with the design" of Yorkie bar wrappers and plastered them all over his bedroom walls. He says of his makeshift wallpaper, "[It was] kind of Warhollian, I suppose." He joked, "This was the year before last," before admitting that his candy wrapper habit peaked when he was a teenager.
While the two claim that they've never encountered overzealous fans themselves -- O'Dowd says, "People are generally apathetic" -- the two also said that they had their own celebrity idols when they were young. Byrne said she was obsessed with Kylie Minogue as a child and went to several of her concerts.
"I made my dad take me and I had her covering my whole wall, except for one poster, which was 'Dead Poets Society,'" she says. ("Dead Poets Society" also starred Hawke.)
As for O'Dowd, his teenage obsession was the band Oasis, but he says he's not too hopeful the Gallagher brothers will reunite.
"I think they just really hated each other eventually, but they got quite nasty," he says of a potential Oasis reunion. "I can't see it happening."
"Juliet, Naked" hits theaters Friday.
