'the idea of you' author robinne lee reacts to the movie adaptation and the new ending

So Into That

Caro Chambers

Society & Culture, Food, Arts

5 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 15 May 2024

⏱️ 56 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Get this week's full So Into That newsletter here! https://whattocook.substack.com/p/the-idea-of-you-author-robinne-lee

The Idea of You was a book that changed the way I read.

I absolutely loved it. I recommend it all the time. And it was my gateway drug into the romance genre… although, as its author Robinne Lee shares in this episode, she never intended to write a romance novel (nor does she consider it to be one).

The Idea of You really is about much more than meets the eye. As Robinne wrote in this Time article, the book grapples with themes including “ageism, sexism, the double standard, motherhood, female friendship, agency, and the dark side of celebrity.” And now that it’s been turned into a hit movie starring Anne Hathaway, it’s the perfect time to hear from Robinne herself.

If you haven’t read the book or seen the movie yet (BTW, I really recommend reading the book first!), it follows the relationship between a 40-year-old single mom and art gallery owner (Solène) and a boy-band lead singer 16 years her junior (Hayes). In the podcast, we talk about the inspiration for the book (it’s not Harry Styles and Olivia Wilde, y’all); the tension between motherhood, romantic love, and career; what she wishes was different about the movie; and much more.

We also get into:

* Her hustling for 7 years to sell the book, copy by copy

* Why she ended the story the way she did

* Writing sex scenes and why she doesn’t see TIOY as a romance novel

* Anne Hathaway and Nicholas Galitzine’s performances in the movie

* A tantalizing tease about her next book

Whether you’re a fan of The Idea of You or not (yet!), I’m so excited for you to get to know Robinne, who is also a talented actor and overall smart and fascinating woman.

PS: I know I said So Into That episodes are going to air every other week now, but the world is currently *loving* The Idea of You, so I didn’t want to sit on this interview!!

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello, welcome back to So Into That, the podcast where you get to chat with
0:04.7	really awesome people about the things that we are so into right now. I'm your
0:10.4	host, Caroline Chambers, and this week's guest you guys this has been a long time in the making
0:16.0	getting Robin on the podcast Robin Lee the author of The Idea of You is our guest today. If you do not know what the idea of you is our guest today. If you do not know what the idea of you is, the book, the movie,
0:26.0	have you been living under a rock? The movie came out on Prime a couple of weeks ago with Anne Hathaway, Nicholas Galizine, I don't know how to say his last name, and it's, I don't know, I feel like it's the hottest movie right now.
0:41.2	It's what everybody's talking about, everybody's watching, and it is based on the book, the idea of you by Robin Lee, the incredible author and actress and mother who I get to chat with today.
0:54.1	Robin called in from Paris where she lives with her family.
0:59.0	Fun fact that we didn't even get to chat about
1:02.0	is that she's an expat living in Paris, but we had way too much to talk about about this book that she wrote that came out in 2017 and really didn't pick up the like extreme cult feverish
1:19.6	obsession until 2020 when everyone was stuck in their homes looking for escapism and it gave us exactly that.
1:26.5	If you're a long-term follower of mine you know that the idea of you was the first what I call romance book but as you'll learn in this podcast, Robin would not call a romance.
1:37.0	The idea of view was the first romance book that I ever read and it really has like changed.
1:42.0	It's definitely changed the way that I read. I now pretty much only read sort of romance, women's fiction, light-hearted, happy books. But as you'll hear in this podcast,
1:55.0	she feels like the book shouldn't be classified as such.
1:59.0	There's so many huge issues that are being tackled
2:02.0	of feminism and motherhood and the push and
2:05.4	pull of motherhood and balancing like our desires with what we have to do as
2:10.9	mothers. It's such a beautiful book. It literally has like, I think I've
2:17.2	recommended it 1500 times on my Instagram. Everyone I meet I recommend it to because it doesn't follow the traditional
2:25.1	arc of like a romance be tree right it has so much more depth, female friendships,
2:33.6	this incredibly strong female character.
2:36.5	So in this episode, you get to hear from Robin
	...

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