At Midnight is a bi-cultural love story from Paramount+ with heart, humor, and sweeping romance. The film stars Diego Boneta as Alejandro and Monica Barbaro as Sophie Wilder, who meet when Wilder’s work as an actress on a superhero franchise brings her to a boutique beachfront hotel managed by Alejandro. Directed by Jonah Feingold and boasting a screenplay written by Feingold, Maria Hinojos, and Giovanni Porta, At Midnight‘s relatable story and use of Mexico as a character in its protagonists’ budding relationship sets it apart from other romantic comedies while displaying all the timeless hallmarks of the genre.
While much of what makes At Midnight such an enjoyable and re-watchable romantic comedy is the chemistry between the film’s lead actors, Diego Boneta’s contributions extend beyond his performance as an actor. Boneta also produced the film, helping to both get it off the ground and shape it into what it eventually became. At Midnight is only the second major project produced by Boneta, the first being the hit musical show Luis Miguel: The Series, in which he also stars.
Diego Boneta spoke with Screen Rant about how At Midnight came to be.
Diego Boneta on At Midnight
Screen Rant: You’re a producer on this movie as well as an actor. I would love to hear about how this came together and what made you want to be a part of it, both with the development process as well as on camera.
Diego Boneta: It’s kind of a crazy story. It goes back to 2018 after the first season of Luis Miguel, which is the first project that I produced. I had a general meeting with Paramount, thinking that they were going to pitch me projects to act in, but the first thing they asked me was what was next on my producing slate. I panicked and I lied, saying that I had a great rom-com in the vein of Notting Hill, because it’s one of my favorite rom-coms, set in Mexico. [I said], “It’s a bi-cultural love story between an actress and a guy who lives in Mexico.” I told them I would have the script ready for them in a week.
I left the meeting, I called my producing partners – they wanted to kill me – and they met at my house. We were probably up until, like, four or five in the morning, coming up with a movie idea. We were just brainstorming like crazy. We came up with a one-pager, [which] we sent to a writer friend of ours who was house sitting at the time. We told him, “Giovanni, we’ll get you as many espressos as you need, [but] we need this in a week.” He delivered a great script, Paramount bought it, and we started developing it shortly after.
Many different writers came on board, filmmakers [too]; there were so many drafts of the script. It wasn’t until we met Jonah Feingold, our director… he really made it his own, and took it to the next level. We watched his film Dating and New York; we all loved [it]. We thought it was a rom-com that was very fresh; we hadn’t seen anything like it. Jonah wanted to use the fact that – he’s like, “I’ve never seen a Hollywood rom-com shot in Mexico.” Cities play such a big role in these rom-coms. Midnight in Paris, Sleepless in Seattle – you see these movies, and you want to go there.
There are all these stories that have to do with Narcos, and drugs, and drug trafficking coming out of Mexico. Being Mexican, [I know] that’s not everything Mexico has to offer. Mexico is so much more than that.
Jonah and I were like, “We have to do chemistry reads.” Jonah really, really pushed on that, and he said the most important thing is the chemistry between the two leading roles. We met and read with many very talented actresses, but it wasn’t until we met Monica, who blew us away, that we were like, “Wow, this is it.” Monica came in so passionate about the story, [and] the character, [and had] so many great ideas.
We all went down to Mexico City [and] spent a week there. I wanted to show them the beauty of Mexico City, and the restaurants, and the art, and the nightlife, and the people, and Jonah polished the script. He really did an incredible job; he wanted it to have a bit of a magical realism feel to it – a bit of a fairy tale, but also a nod and an ode to classic 90s rom-coms.
[Then], we just proceeded to cast the movie. We were very lucky [in] getting great actors: Anders Holm, Whitney Cummings, Casey Thomas Brown who was with me in Father of the Bride, [and] Cat Cohen. Then, [we were lucky in] getting a great team of producers. This is the first movie that I produced under my production company. I wanted to be the least-experienced person on set. We met with Fred Berger, who produced La La Land; he came on board, which was amazing. I also invited Michel Franco, who’s an incredible Mexican filmmaker who directed me in Nuevo orden, which won the Venice Film Festival in 2020. He also produced this, so it was almost like the best of Mexico and the best of Hollywood.
About At Midnight
A charming romantic comedy, AT MIDNIGHT centers around Alejandro (Diego Boneta, “Father of the Bride”), an ambitious hotel manager, and Sophie (Monica Barbaro, TOP GUN: MAVERICK), a movie star navigating the politics of Hollywood. He’s focused on opening his own boutique hotel. She’s trying to focus on shooting her new superhero film, “Super Society 3,” in hopes of getting her own spinoff, but catches her co-star (and boyfriend!) Adam (Anders Holm, HOW TO BE SINGLE) cheating. Fate strikes when the shoot brings them all to Alejandro’s hotel in Mexico. Despite their radically different lives, Alejandro and Sophie begin to secretly meet At Midnight …
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At Midnight will be released on Paramount+ on February 10th.