Greta Gerwig admitted in interviews that the film was a difficult experience for her. Gerwig indicates that she and Joe Swanberg got into a number of quarrels over the film and did not speak to each other for three months. In fact, during production, the entire tone of the film shifted from the original plan of making a "happy" film to something much more complicated.
In terms of the seemingly authentic sex scenes, Greta Gerwig said, "I don't mind being nude onscreen. Or anywhere, really. But having someone touch you on camera is really ... [long pause] It's really kind of an awful experience. Because half of your brain is like, "Okay, I wanna make this look real, because I want it to feel real for the audience," but then you're also fighting to say, "But it's not real." But it is actually real, because somebody is actually touching you. That kind of work that you have to do to disassociate from your body is kind of traumatic. I don't enjoy that at all. It's ... gross."