Dinner In America stars Kyle Gallner & Emily Skeggs share the long journey their punk-rock romance film has taken, and reminisce about filming.

Dinner in America, a delightfully dark punk-rock romance, is finally coming home for dinner. The film has been receiving critical praise and gaining devoted fans since it first premiered at Sundance in 2020, and now it is available to watch in theaters today and on demand June 7. Kyle Gallner (2022's Scream) and Emily Skeggs (The Miseducation of Cameron Post) star as Simon and Patty, two misfits rather reasonable grudges regarding how society has treated them.

While Simon is on the run from the law thanks to some unfortunate arson, Patty is struggling through the daily grind of mockery and misery she experiences at the hands of strangers and acquaintances alike. A chance encounters sets off a wild and zany adventure for the two young lovebirds that not only helps them grow as individuals and as a unit, but also exposes the struggling underbelly of the country that many viewers don't realize exists.

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Skeggs and Gallner spoke to Screen Rant about the many years between first learning about Dinner in America and finally opening in theaters, why the story is as much an expose as it is a comedy, and how much they loved the experience of collaborating with each other and director Adam Rehmeier.

Screen Rant: Dinner in America has had a very long gestation period. How did it start for you, and how does it feel to come back around and experience it all over again?

Emily Skeggs: Yeah, it was one of my favorite things I've ever made. I had the best time making it, and it was like summer camp. I have really, really deep happy and nostalgic feelings for this movie.

We've been promoting it for so long. We were at Sundance 2020, and then the pandemic hit. Fortunately, we played a lot of festivals over Zoom; festivals all over the world. It really built a cult following, so we built a lot of anticipation. It just feels right; it feels like it's time, and people need to see the movie.

Kyle, what was it that first called to you about the film and made you want to be part of the project?

Kyle Gallner: It's funny, I actually got sent the script probably about two years before we even made it. I read for another movie that Ross [Putman], who produced this film, was producing. I didn't get it, but he really liked me. And he said, "Hey, can I send you the script?" He emailed me the script when I was in the middle of filming a TV show, and I had two new babies. I read like 10 pages and just never got back to it.

Cut to two years later, I'm filming another movie - the DP who shot Dinner in America [

Jean-Philippe Bernier] was shooting this other project. Dinner in America was supposed to go with another cast, but they dropped out and it fell apart. And JP was like, "There's a movie you'd be really good for," and he started talking about it. Something clicked, and I was like, "This sounds super familiar." I just typed Dinner in America into my email, and I still had it. I read the script that night, and it just was wild. The first 10 minutes is me smashing the window, you know what I mean? There's so much chaos that I'm like, "How did I not I make it through?" But that's what exhaustion will do to you, and having kids. I reached out to my reps, and I was like, "Can you connect me with Adam?"

It was the script initially that really set me off on it. It's really original; the characters are really interesting. It definitely creates its own world, and it marches to its own beat. Then I met Adam, and we Skyped for like three hours - just hearing him talk about the world he wanted to build and these characters; what he's been doing to work on it and create it, and just who he was. That was the final box for me. I was like, "I want to make this movie with that guy.'

And then I sat there kind of wringing my hands, being like, "Who the hell is Patty gonna be?" This is an absolute testament to you, Skeggs, but Patty in the wrong hands is a disaster. Patty in the wrong hands is an absolute sh*tshow. That was my biggest fear. And then I met you, and I was like, "Yes, this is it." You handled her so beautifully, and I really think it's a gift what you've done bringing Patty to life. I think it's a gift for a lot of people, and it was a wonderful thing for me to see and be there with you for. I love you very much.

Emily Skeggs: I'm gonna cry.

The chemistry between the two of you is really what the film lives and dies on, and Kyle is right that in different hands the unique dynamic could have easily been very uncomfortable. How easy or hard was that for you to step into Patty's shoes and really play off this abrasive yet gooey man?

Kyle Gallner: He has a gooey center.

Emily Skeggs: Very gooey. Both of these characters, I think, are really gooey.

First of all, I don't think Patty would be Patty without Simon in any way, shape or form - and vice versa. They very much only exist in each other's worlds, and I think the kind of beautiful thing about this movie is seeing these two people who are seemingly so wrong for each other actually be perfect for each other. They collide in this chaotic way that's really exciting and really true to life. I feel like this is how a lot of people fall in love: they meet that person and they're like, "What?!" and then they're like, "Oh...!" That was really fun.

And I think for both of us, these characters are really personal. They're very much different facets and shades of who we are, or who we were at a certain point in our lives. For me, Patty's very personal. She's kind of like me, stripped down before I learned how to be a proper person in society; before I gained confidence and knew my place in the world and my value. Those are all the things that Patty's looking for, and Simon helps her find them.

That's a universal thing for a lot of people. They want to find their place and their people, and I just love the movie so much for that. I'm so thrilled that we're getting it out there.

I love how it shows that music is also one of the ways that people try to find their place and community to be a part of. Do you relate to these characters in a musical sense? What was your music scene, for example?

Kyle Gallner: Yeah, I grew up as a punk and hardcore kid. I grew up going to punk shows and hardcore shows - just shows in general. There was a time where, with a buddy of mine, we would park on the Sunset Strip by a stretch of venues. We would just walk and listen at the door, and we would do that three to four times a week. We would just go, "That sounds cool! Let's go see what this is," and we would just buy a ticket and go in blind.

Music has always been a big thing for me. I'm not musically inclined; I don't play an instrument or anything. But teenage me always wanted to scream behind a microphone or be in a pop punk band or whatever, so there is a very personal connection for me, and it's a scene I was pretty familiar with.

To get to actually step into a recording studio and live my punk rock dream - not even my teenage punk rock dream, my now dream - was just icing on the cake. But I agree that music is a huge thing, and it can be very healing

Emily, you are in the musical theater scene - shoutout to Fun Home - but you make such a transformation onscreen when it comes from Patty's journey of dancing alone in her room in frustration to actually singing for Simon and recording a song. What is it like for you to to step into that musical side of her?

Emily Skeggs: This process was really eye-opening and rewarding for me personally. I love music, but I've never seen myself as anything other than an actor and a vessel for other people's music. This was the first song I've ever written; Adam and I wrote the song together.

Emily Skeggs: I write little ditties. Like Patty says in the movie, "Things I write in my head."

But it was really rewarding, and it's opened a door. I've been in musical theater, but I've always wanted to be a punk rocker and burn the walls down. I love belting for a reason. I think I love rock and roll, man!

Basically, this is how we wrote the song. We had two weeks of rehearsal before we even started shooting, so one of the first things I did was bring stream of consciousness Patty poetry to Adam, and we wrote the song in like a day. It was just him and I and Kyle in a room, just sitting there, jammin' out. So, we had a trajectory, and we knew where Patty had to go eventually.

Kyle Gallner: I was laughing because it was such a moment for me to sit there, hearing the sh*t you had written in your notebook. It was the first time I was like, "Oh, this is Patty. Woah, okay!" It was such an amazing insight into her. There's so many good memories - I'm sorry, I don't mean to cut you off

Emily Skeggs: No, I'm so happy you're jumping in. We had so many moments making this movie where we were like, "What are we doing? We're taking it this far?" But Adam created such a beautiful environment where it was really collaborative, and he really wanted us to make it personal and bring our own weirdness and uniqueness. He really fought for the movie to stay weird and stay unique, and be what it was going to be.

Kyle Gallner: And there was a lot of trust too There was a lot of trust in Adam, and I trusted you with my life too. I think this movie lives and dies with these characters, and if you're not able to bring them to 11 and keep them there, then it doesn't work.

We were making this movie with zero safety net. The safety net I had was you and Adam. I trusted you guys to be able to take it to these crazy places, and I always knew you were going to be there - whether it was good, bad or ugly, I was like, "She'll catch me if I fall." And that's what matters.

Speaking of taking things to 11, the first 10 minutes were a roller coaster ride of emotions. Can you talk about physically going through those moments and also getting to act opposite Lea Thompson, which is a dream of mine.

Kyle Gallner: Lea Thompson in an absolute babe and probably the coolest. She is amazing. We have to get pretty handsy, but she made everything so comfortable and so cool. I love her. Actually, this whole cast was pretty incredible. There was a lot of local Detroit cast, and everybody just came to play, which was amazing.

But getting to do all that physical stuff, like flipping the dinner table and smashing the window? It's super fun, but I do want to hit on the opening, because the first 20 minutes of the film were a really interesting thing. It's funny, because the audience doesn't have a problem with it, and most reviewers don't have a problem with it. But distributors and stuff were scared of the first 20 minutes, because it's very abrasive. It's very intense.

And people like to put things into a box, so because we make people laugh, we're suddenly just a comedy. But no, those first 20 minutes are unbelievably intentional. We need to paint this picture of Patty and Simon's reality to show what these people have to go through for the next hour and 15 minutes. And the fact that people get so uncomfortable is because they don't want to acknowledge that the world exists in this way. They want to still believe that racism doesn't happen, or people don't use the R word to talk about others who are on medication, or whatever.

I remember that one woman [at a festival] who raised her hand and was like, "That was me every day on the bus. I was Patty every day, getting made fun of." This first 20 minutes, I think, are incredibly important. And it should make you uncomfortable; it should scare people; it should push your buttons. Because if you're watching these first 20 minutes, this is not us trying to make you laugh. This is us making you sweat, and then we're going to take it from there.

An on-the-lam punk rocker and a young woman obsessed with his band unexpectedly fall in love and go on an epic journey together through America's decaying Midwestern suburbs.

More: 10 Best Kyle Gallner Films, According To Rotten Tomatoes

Dinner in America releases in theaters on May 27 and arrives on demand June 7.

Tatiana Hullender is a writer at Screen Rant, focusing on film and television, as well as a co-host of several podcasts. In the interviews she conducts for Screen Rant, she seeks to learn what drives each creative mind and how different experiences influence the same narrative. As a graduate of Columbia University in New York City, Tatiana studied theater and comparative literature. She has been passionate about all manner of storytelling since being exposed to Jane Austen and BBC adaptations of her work all at once. But Regency satire of manners isn’t the only genre she loves, as a love of comic books naturally developed into a love of cinematic universes and their superheroes. So long as a story has heart and humor, there’s a chance of finding something to enjoy in the telling of it. Visit @myrcellasear on Twitter to follow Tatiana’s articles, interviews and podcasts including: The Flash Podcast, Pop A La Carte and Ladies With Gumption. Subscribe to them on the Podcast app, or contact her directly at painted(dot)out(at)gmail.com.