Toronto 2015: Ethan Hawke, Julianne Moore and Greta Gerwig on ‘the female gaze’ of ‘Maggie’s Plan’

“Maggie’s Plan,” directed and written for the screen by Rebecca Miller, had its world premiere here Saturday night, and though audience members were kept waiting in a downpour outside the Princess of Wales Theatre, the film’s charm seemed to warm them back up once the movie finally began inside.

The film is playing the Toronto International Film Festival as a for-sale title, which Miller addressed during her introduction.

“Coming to a film festival without U.S. distribution is a bit like dressing up in a bridal outfit, going to city hall and hoping someone will propose,” Miller said. “Only the bravest brides do it that way.”

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The film is not so much about a single plan but rather a series of plans hatched by a young woman in New York City. Maggie Harding (Greta Gerwig), an administrator at the New School, is thinking of having a baby on her own via a sperm donation from a man she has no romantic interest in.

Then she meets troubled fictocritical anthropologist John Harding (Ethan Hawke), who feels trapped in his marriage to the ambitious Danish scholar Georgette Harding (Julianne Moore). John leaves Georgette and marries Maggie; they have a child, but Maggie falls out of love with John. She then schemes to get John and Georgette back together.

Miller’s previous films, including 2002 Sundance Grand Jury prize winner “Personal Velocity” and the 2009 “The Private Lives of Pippa Lee,” veered more toward drama, so the screwball comedic sensibility of “Maggie’s Plan” is something new.

Miller, Moore, Hawke and Gerwig all came out for a Q&A at the end. Miller recalled that during a festival screening of her 2005 film “The Ballad of Jack and Rose,” she liked when the audience laughed at the rare lighthearted moments.

“I had a wonderful sense of: I really liked hearing people laugh and I thought, I want to do that more,” she said.

In trying to describe how she came to this particular cast, Miller created something of a comedic sketch of her own.

“Greta just has a knack, she’s a very unusual person,” Miller said to laughs from the crowd. “She’s just really unique. ... The blend of intelligence, innocence, comic timing, all these things that Maggie needed to be lovable after all she does. I just felt so happy and at home when I met Greta.”

Of Moore, as she said: “And Julianne is one of my old friends and dear friends.” Moore broadly mouthed the word “old” to the audience, to uproarious laughter. Catching herself, Miller added, “She’s not an old friend, she’s a friend for a long time.”

Hawke was asked to elaborate on a comment from Miller, who said each of the actors contributed to creating their characters.

“This is kind of a long answer,” he said, pausing as he made something of a confession that seemed to catch the room by surprise.

“It’s a little embarrassing to say this,” he said, adding that he’s been acting since age 13 but this is the first time he’s been directed by a woman.

“One of the things that was so surprising for me about, for lack of a better word, the female gaze is, one thing that’s annoying about male directors is they all want you to dress exactly like them and they all want the women to wear their outfit exactly a certain way, and it was wonderful to be liberated from that.

“But it was interesting to feel the camaraderie between the three of you and to feel something other, something that women go through their whole career. It was a very new experience for me.”

An audience member asked the cast members which they preferred as actors and “as people,” comedy or drama.

“I think I like acting in dramas, but I like to watch comedies,” Moore said, laughing. “I don’t think I ever thought that before.”

Hawke asked: “How much pot is involved? Under the influence of marijuana, I drastically prefer comedy. But I’ve always enjoyed dramas, that’s always been my thing.”

Gerwig said she likes to act “in pictures that will hire me. I like things that are mildly funny but not enough to make you laugh.”

Miller’s response might have also acted as something of a description of “Maggie’s Plan” itself when she said, “I guess I skew now more toward comedies, but of a certain kind, not roll around comedy.

“I used to love very sad things. I’m lightening up.”

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