Now Jay Ellis is just somebody Alison Brie used to know in a new rom-com about regretting letting “the one” get away.
Brie co-wrote Prime Video romantic comedy “Somebody I Used to Know” with real-life husband, Dave Franco, who directs. The producing duo previously collaborated on the thriller “The Rental,” marking Franco’s directorial debut.
“Somebody I Used to Know” stars Brie as workaholic TV producer Ally, who returns to her hometown after losing her job and reconnects with her first love Sean (Jay Ellis). The only issue? Sean is engaged to the perfect woman, Cassidy (Kiersey Clemons), who reminds Ally of who she used to be…and who she could have perhaps become. Per the official logline, the film is an unconventional love story about three people who unexpectedly help each other re-discover who they really are, where they came from, and where they’re going.
Franco shared an Instagram video to mark the trailer debut for “Somebody I Used to Know,” which he said was inspired by classic ’80s and ’90s rom-coms.
“The whole thing just has us feeling nostalgic for when we first met, and we found an old voice recording from 10 years ago,” Franco shared alongside Brie. “This is a real recording of Alison expressing her love for me. I saved it in my phone as ‘Alison, drunk.’”
Brie previously told IndieWire that while co-writing the dark comedy “Spin Me Round,” she drew upon her dating experiences before meeting Franco. The less-than-ideal suitors Brie faced led to “Spin Me Round” exploring “the moments in my life where I’ve felt uncomfortable but couldn’t quite put my finger on why I was uncomfortable, so then I felt like it wasn’t really my place to speak up in the moment,” Brie said. “There’s nuance to those scenes, because a lot of them are based on stories that I’ve told about weird experiences with men that honestly have shifted in my own perspective even over the last few years. I’ll be like, ‘Listen to this funny story that I’ve been telling for a long time’ and then sort of going like, ‘I guess this is sort of a traumatic story. I guess this wasn’t so cool that time I went out with that guy who had been my teacher.’”
