The female filmmaker has a reunion with the cast members of her teen cult classic to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the 2000 movie adaptation of Jeffrey Eugenides' book.

• Jun 21, 2020

AceShowbiz - Director Sofia Coppola has reunited with "The Virgin Suicides" cast to honour the 20th anniversary of the teen cult classic.

The filmmaker was prompted to write the script for the 2000 film because she couldn't bear the thought of another moviemaker destroying the onscreen adaptation of the book - a fact she brought up during the reunion, hosted by Entertainment Weekly.

"I loved that book, and I heard they (Hollywood producers) were going to make a movie of it, and I hoped that they didn't mess it up - as that happens sometimes with books that you love," she recalled. "I just had an idea of how I thought they should make it into a movie, so I thought I would try to learn how to write a screenplay. I started working on one just as a kind of practice. I thought I would just do a few chapters."

Sofia eventually convinced the original producers to greenlight her script to make the low-budget movie, which marked her directorial debut and featured classic performances from stars Kirsten Dunst and Josh Hartnett.

During the chat Sofia revealed she claimed a wig Josh wore in character as the film's heartthrob Trip Fontaine as a trinket from the set.

"It's in my storage! It was probably not the best quality wig, but it worked," she noted while Josh chuckled reflecting on his experience filming scenes in the hairpiece. "I forgot about what a pain in the a** the wig was," he laughed.

Leading lady Kirsten, who shared a steamy kiss with Josh in the film, also had fond memories of the wig, particularly in the scene when her character jumped into Trip's car.

"The lights in the house would go off, and then I'd have to run out," Dunst recalled. "It was such a long-winded thing to get in the car, jump on Josh, his wig would fall off… Then I bit him once, I remember. It was just a mess."

Two decades after the release of "The Virgin Suicides", Josh insists the film still ranks as the best experience of his career.

"I think it was the beginning of me finding confidence as an adult," he said. "Everything's changed since then. It's been almost 22 years since we shot it. That's so many lifetimes; it's absolutely insane. It was a transformative experience for me, and I've always said if anyone cares to ask, it's probably my favourite filming experience."