Atlanta gets some close-ups in rom-com “I Want You Back” on Amazon Prime

When he realized that Atlanta was going to be the shooting location for his next movie, I Want You Back, director Jason Orley was adamant about one matter up front. He did not want the city to fake for another.

“In romantic comedies you always feel the city you are in,” Orley says. “For me, getting to romanticize Atlanta in a way that it’s usually not — or treated like New York is treated in romantic comedies — was exciting.”

Atlanta-area locations are front and center in the new film, which bows on Amazon Prime on Friday. Jenny Slate and Charlie Day star as Emma and Peter, 30-somethings who get dumped by their partners Noah (Scott Eastwood) and Anne (Gina Rodriguez) on the same weekend. After a chance meeting, the two form an unlikely friendship and concoct a scheme to sabotage their exes’ new romantic interests and get them back in their lives. 

The producers were drawn to Atlanta as a film hub. “We were looking for a place that had a great setting and was a real city. and Atlanta was where all the arrows were pointing towards,” Orley says.

I Want You Back was not originally set locally, but he and the crew eventually realized it made sense to make Atlanta the movie’s setting as well. 

Orley and the cast and crew filmed from March until mid-May 2021. The director started prep in January last year, specifically getting here early to learn the area. As soon as the Atlanta conversation came up, the director went to the preliminary location scout, said he was not familiar with city and decided to get to know it.  

“I said, ‘Take me to all the places you never see in Atlanta, places that usually fake for New York, Los Angeles or Chicago.’ We went to Piedmont Park and diners and restaurants and Decatur Square and Midtown and downtown. I had never shot here before. I had friends who had spent a lot of time there as part of the industry and have been hearing all these great things about it. It’s becoming more common for people to spend months there working on shows.”  

That research came in handy as he improvised locations. Friends would recommend restaurants, and as he ate, he’d plan shooting locations. “Driving around, Decatur Square was one. (A) scene in the movie was supposed to take place in a mall, and I thought, why would I want it to be in a mall? I saw Decatur Square and said this is where it needs to be. There were a lot of scenes like that where we’d insert Atlanta into our story.” The Plaza Theatre also makes a memorable appearance, its vintage neon marquee glowing in vivid color in the night sky. 

Learning a new area wasn’t his only challenge. Orley’s resume includes the films Big Time Adolescence and It’s Complicated and TV series such as Modern Family and 1600 Penn, but this was the director’s first major film project during Covid.

When he held the first rehearsal in his Los Angeles back yard with Slate and Day, the two were masked and separated. The chemistry between the lead performers seemed genuine but Orley was still a little nervous about how it would transfer to the screen. It wasn’t until the cast was on location and tested and unmasked that he realized that Slate and Day were indeed in sync.

He credits Amazon with having strict Covid policies. “We were fortunate that they had the money to test everyone every day,” he says. “We were shut down a week but it didn’t feel like we weren’t going to be able to get back up.” When the crew started filming, vaccines had just started to roll out but by the time they were finished, everyone was vaccinated. 

While the crew had to sweat out some moments, he noticed that Atlanta never really shut down. He laughs, remembering the disconnect between his time on location, where everything seemed to be locked down, and traveling out on weekends and seeing the masses on the BeltLine or at various markets. Getting used to the weather was another adjustment. It was wintertime in March, with a cold season and barren trees, and two short months later it was sunny and leaves were near plentiful again. 

Just as important for Orley as making the setting seem realistic was ensuring there were no villains in the movie. The characters of Noah and Anne could be looked at unfavorably but he didn’t want that.

“It was hard. How do you like a guy who has just broken up with lovable Jenny Slate? We wanted to have these supporting characters around Emma and Peter with the same level of humanity. I did not think Gina would (be available), but she was game and brought something fresh to this character who could easily be unlikable. She makes you feel her pain and struggle.”

Orley is an unabashed fan of romantic comedies. Nancy Meyers was an early mentor, as were Nora Ephron, Rob Reiner and Gary Marshall. While he was at NYU, his friends were trying to emulate Martin Scorsese, but he was comfortable in his own lane making romantic comedies.  His own Top 10 movie list would always include films such as Annie Hall and When Harry Met Sally. 

His last film was the 2019 coming of age dramedy Big Time Adolescence (with frequent collaborator Pete Davidson) so when the lighter I Want You Back, written by Isaac Aptaker and Elizabeth Berger of Love, Simon and This Is Us fame, came his way, he pounced. It clicked the right buttons for him.

“I was looking for something like comfort food — predictable in a good way, at a time where life elsewhere had become unpredictable.”

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Jim Farmer covers theater and film for ArtsATL. A graduate of the University of Georgia, he has written about the arts for 30-plus years. Jim is the festival director of Out on Film, Atlanta’s LGBTQ film festival. He lives in Avondale Estates with his husband, Craig, and dog Douglas.