Noah Baumbach’s While We’re Young Premiere in New York

While We’re Young – The picture stars Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts as a middle-aged creative couple, Josh and Cornelia, who, in a slump due to one overdeveloped project (Josh has been making the same documentary for eight years) and zero children (they tried), begin a spontaneous relationship with a much younger, seemingly electrifying Brooklyn one (Darby and Jamie, played by Amanda Seyfried and Adam Driver). The result is an exploration in generational codes of authenticity, brought to life as Josh and Cornelia take a step away from their nights of Netflix, CDs, and red wine for a bike riding, vinyl-listening, retro-in-Bushwick-free-for-all with the just married (in an empty water tower in Harlem) 25-year-olds Jamie and Darby.

“It was just Noah,” said Amanda Seyfried, in cherry red Valentino, right before the screening. “I like his movies, I like his vibe. And nothing seems to be sugarcoated. It’s as real as it gets. It didn’t even matter what the movie was about or what the character was that I was up for. It just mattered that I had the opportunity to be in a movie of his.”

This sentiment was echoed throughout the night, with Ben Stiller noting, “I think in movies, sometimes drama is based on these big stories and things that don’t happen to ordinary people all the time. [Noah] finds the things that happen to regular people and finds the connection and the drama in that.”

The film gave way to a party a few minutes away at classic leather-banqueted bistro Lexington Brass. Here, Seyfried, Stiller, Baumbach, and a Chloé-sporting Dree Hemingway were greeted by Grace Coddington, Wes Anderson, Spike Jonze, and more for cocktails and mini bison burgers. “When I turned 40, I wanted to do a comedy about marriage,” said Baumbach as James Murphy made his way to greet Jonze. “Everything sprang from that.”