In Abroad, Liane Balaban plays a reporter who, between deadlines, dates and dishes on London's infamous males.
Wearing neon-orange Louboutins was all it took for Liane Balaban to seduce reticent Londoners out of their shells. The Montreal-based actress was on the set of the movie Abroad when she noticed the stilettos’ magical effect. “They were like people magnets,” she recalls. “Strangers came out of the corners to chat about my shoes.” It was a new experience for the committed “flat-soled girl,” who had tried suggesting — unsuccessfully — that her character wear Marc Jacobs ballet slippers.
In the film, which is loosely based on Canadian writer Leah McLaren’s experiences living in London, Balaban plays a reporter who leaves Toronto to pursue her dreams in one of the world’s most competitive writing markets. Through connections (a Conrad Black-inspired character) at home, she lands a job at a racy, right-wing tabloid where she is assigned to its fluffy Post Femme section. The film — a Sex and the City-meets-Bridget Jones’s Diary comedic drama — airs March 14 on CBC, but if all goes to plan it will be picked up as a series. While it’s not a biopic of McLaren’s life, it does open with the brouhaha the Toronto Globe and Mail columnist ignited when she wrote that British men were “incomprehensible drunkards and first-date coke bingers.”
Read about Balaban's cinematic crushes on the next page ...
Behind the scenes video: Liane Balaban
