Julie Anne Robinson, director of the movie ‘One For The Money’, now in cinemas, turned to the novel by Janet Evanovich again and again for guidance during production. “I’ve looked at it down to details of dress colors,” reveals Robinson. “The description of Stephanie’s apartment, I pulled it from the book.

It had to be a red brick building. It had to be a place where a lot of old age pensioners could live. Even small details like Mrs. Delgado who lives opposite Stephanie; she’s there in the book. The fact that Stephanie drinks a Big Gulp. The fact that she feeds Ritz crackers to Rex. We’ve gone down to the smallest detail. The actual cage that Rex is kept in is identical to the one described in the book.”

At first glance, Robinson, a British director with a background at the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Royal Court and the National Theatre, might seem an unlikely choice for a New Jersey-set story about working class Americans. But Katherine Heigl, who fondly remembered her experience working with Robinson on several episodes of Grey’s Anatomy, suggested the director be seriously considered.

“After spending some time talking to her we realized that her vision was exactly right for the movie,” recalls producer Lucchesi. “Being a director you’ve got to steer a big ship of about 150 people and everybody’s got an opinion. You need a captain who can really channel the way to the right port. And Julie Anne did that.”

“Julie Anne came onto this project with such unbelievable energy and passion and determination,” reports Heigl. “She has incredible focus and I never saw her get tired or burn out. And I think she’s just done a beautiful job with the casting of this movie, with the locations, the set design, everything. The right look and feel of this movie, the balance between comedy and drama, will be thanks to Julie Anne, for sure.”

Actor Jason O’Mara, who plays Joe Morelli in the film, credits Robinson and the clarity of her direction for the vibrancy of the cast’s performances. “She’s really what you want from a director. You come prepared, you know how you want to play the scene, but she says one thing to you and it changes the way you deliver the lines and suddenly it comes alive.

Julie knows what she wants and there’s never any indecision, but at the same time she’s open to a lot of ideas. So she’s been very collaborative and that’s given everybody on this movie a sense of ownership and pride in their work. Hopefully that will come through.”

Joe Morelli’s tumultuous love/hate history with Stephanie Plum began when she was only six and culminated in a disastrous high school date. A former bad-boy turned vice cop, Morelli becomes an unlikely suspect in a homicide investigation and jumps bail, which seemingly points to his guilt. But as Stephanie tracks him down as her very first FTA (“Failed To Appear” in bail bond speak), she realizes the case against Morelli is more complicated than she initially thought.

“Joe Morelli has to have humor, a little bit of danger, be handsome, but also authentic,” says producer Tom Rosenberg. “You have to buy he’s from Trenton and that he’s a policeman. It’s a very tough role to pull off, but Jason did it effortlessly.”

“In Jason and Katie, we’ve got two actors who can match each other,” adds director Julie Anne Robinson. “She’s a very powerful actress and he meets her head on in their scenes together. There’s a tension and an electricity in every frame. They play off each other. They play off the script. It’s great fun to watch. I fell in love with their chemistry.”

From the moment O’Mara read the script, he was ready to sign on to the project. “It really jumped off the page,” remembers the actor. “And when I read Katie’s role I realized she was perfect for it and she was going to really knock this one out of the park. She’s got a great sense of comic timing. The part of this I’ve really enjoyed is the comedy.”

“Jason is going to be the only person people can think of from now on when they read the books,” affirms Heigl. “He’s brought Morelli to life in the most seamless and perfect way.”

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Janet Evanovich, author of the popular Stephanie Plum series, decided Katherine Heigl would be perfect for the lead role in a movie based on her book, One for the Money, after she saw Heigl’s performance in 27 dresses. “I just knew it,” Evanovich told the actress. “From that instant, you were Stephanie Plum to me.”

The instant she is referring to is when Heigl’s 27 Dresses character fled from a bar, cursing loudly. The movie is an adaption of Evanovich’s first book and is set to hit theatres in January. It has been 17 years since the first novel in the Plum series was released, and Heigl will play the role of main character, Stephanie Plum, who goes from being a lingerie salesperson to a bounty hunter.

The book series has sold 80 million copies with nine landing at the number one spot on USA Today’s best sellers. Evanovich stated, “I don’t know why it took so long, but as far as I’m concerned, the search is over. Every time I write Stephanie Plum, it’s going to be Katherine Heigl’s face there. She totally nailed it.”

The author just released the 18th book in the series, Explosive Eighteen. Although Evanovich gave up any say in the casting for the main role and had sold the rights to One for the Money before being published in 1994, her ideal actress to play Stephanie Plum still got the part.

Names of certain actresses sometimes cropped up from time to time as potential leads, but none were who the author wanted. “Every now and then, I would get a phone call that would be: Jennifer Lopez is going to be attached to this,” said a disinterested Evanovich. “Or, Reese Witherspoon. There was never anybody really there.”

Many fans wanted Sandra Bullock, but the author was still not satisfied with any Hollywood actresses. “I had been going around to everybody saying Katherine Heigl has to be Stephanie Plum, and then one day, I got that phone call saying that it was Katherine,” said an excited Evanovich. Heigl, herself, was pleased to be chosen for the role.

When she was working on the set of The Ugly Truth, producer Gary Lucchesi gave her a copy of Evanovich’s One for the Money, and Heigl loved it. “Two months later, someone was able to get me to come out of the bedroom after I had gone through 10 books. (They are) so addicting,” said Heigl.

Lucchesi and Lakeshore Entertainment got the rights and chose Heigl to star as Stephanie Plum. However, the fans were not happy that blonde Heigl would be playing the brunette bounty hunter. Heigl said she tried dying her hair brown, but decided instead to wear a wig. The actress enjoyed going to the gun range to train for her role, but she said she had a hard time with the New Jersey accent.

“It was nerve-racking,” she said. “There were moments I saw it wavering. I’m normally the jerk in the audience who goes, ‘Blah, they totally lost the accent there.’ This was karmic.” Heigl claimed to be very vocal about staying true to the original story. “I became very possessive of Janet’s material. I was really loud about how important it was to honor the book,” she insisted.

Evanovich was kept in the dark and did not know how the movie would turn out. “I was terrified to see it,” the author said. “But when I did, it was everything I could have wanted and more. I was almost in tears when the movie ended. I was so relieved.” Heigl was ecstatic that she was happy with the movie and ended up developing a friendship with the author. The two talked about future plans for more Plum movies.

However, since there are 18 novels so far, it would be an impossible feat for Heigl to star in each one, since Stephanie Plum stays at age 32 during the entire series. “You’ll have to go to the gym and no Cheetos,” said Evanovich. Heigl jokingly claimed she could prevent aging with botox, then said, “But if we shoot six at a time, there we go.”

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