Emma Stone, Ryan Gosling’s Crazy, Stupid, Love Casting, Audition Detailed

Emma Stone‘s big move in her Crazy, Stupid, Love audition was to play it cool.

In fact, the movie’s directors, Glenn Ficarra and John Requa, picked the Bugonia star for the part of Ryan Gosling‘s love interest because Stone wasn’t thrown off by Gosling’s aura in her audition. 

“Emma came in and Ryan said a line and he flubbed the line. He was reading with her offscreen, and Emma just, without missing a beat, was like, ‘Oh, you’re killing this. You’re doing great,'” Ficarra told People in an interview published July 29. “She just flipped him the s–t right then and there, and we were all just like, ‘Okay, that’s it. That’s the person.'”

After the 37-year-old, then in her early 20s, instantly struck an easy rapport with the Notebook heartthrob, the directing team (also behind Whiskey Tango Foxtrot) wanted to “work with her desperately.”

“We did this whole day of actresses reading with Ryan, and a lot of them were really good,” Ficarra admitted. “But then, once Ryan stepped into the room, they sort of were a little shaken,” despite the Oscar nominee “just being himself.”