While You Were Sleeping

Jon Turteltaub’s film started the other way round: the coma patient was a woman and the man fell for her. A development executive at Meg Ryan’s company asked why Ryan would want a part in which she is unconscious the whole time, so the writers flipped it. Co-writer Daniel G. Sullivan says a man beside a comatose woman played as predatory, the reverse as sweet. The new draft was nicknamed Coma Guy; the title changed once Disney bought it. Turteltaub met Demi Moore for the lead and came close to Nicole Kidman; producer Arthur Sarkissian could not see those names as a woman in a transit token booth. The script was set in New York and moved to Chicago on cost. Filming ran through an unseasonably warm autumn; the leaves would not drop, so fake snow was laid and the cast wore heavy coats in the heat. Cold arrived only in the last few weeks. At the 53rd Golden Globes Sandra Bullock was nominated for best actress in a comedy or musical; Nicole Kidman won for To Die For. A good fit if you want to watch Lucy try on belonging to a family rather than watch the lie unravel. Not for anyone who expects a misunderstanding corrected at the first chance; the script carries it a long way.