Opening in theaters on October 16th is ‘Trust Me, I’m a Doctor‘, which was directed by Thane Economou (‘The Wedding Party‘), and focuses on the death of model and reality TV star, Anna Nicole Smith.
The film stars Abbie Cornish (‘Sucker Punch‘) as Smith, as well as Kal Penn (‘Superman Returns‘) as her doctor Sandeep Kapoor, and Linda Hamilton (‘The Terminator‘) as his lawyer Ellyn Garofalo.
Moviefone recently had the pleasure of speaking with Kal Penn, Linda Hamilton and director Thane Economou about their work on ‘Trust Me, I’m a Doctor’, developing the screenplay, meeting the real Dr. Sandeep Kapoor, how the actors approached their characters, and working with Economou on set.
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Moviefone: To begin with, Kal, how much did you know about Dr. Kapoor and this story before you signed on for the film?
Kal Penn: I knew almost nothing. I definitely knew nothing about the real Dr. Kapoor, because when I got the email about this script, I remember skimming it before I read the script, and I was like, “Oh, right! That’s that doctor that’s in jail for killing Anna Nicole Smith.” Then I start reading the script, and I was like, “Oh, that’s not at all what happened, my god.” I was weirded out by why I thought that. I never followed the real case. Obviously, I knew it was very tragic, and we didn’t want to make light of that in making the film. But I thought, “Why in the zeitgeist of never following a case did I think that I knew all about the case,” which is kind of how we all are, especially in 2026, right? Everybody’s an armchair expert on anything. So, then I started reading the script, and I was like, “This is a movie about vulnerability, and about really bad decisions, and the yin and yang between wanting to be a private person, but also loving attention.” So, I thought there was a story there.
MF: Linda, how much did you know about this true story before starting the project, and what was your first reaction to the screenplay?
Linda Hamilton: I was alive and paying attention during the unfolding of the real story. However, I had not read, ‘Trust Me, I’m a Doctor’, and it was so interesting to read the script having no idea of what tone it was going to take. The tone of it was so good and fresh, I thought that. Of course, I read the book later, but I just enjoyed the way that he presented a story and rather audacious to try to make a film, a dark comedy about the passing of an icon. Do you know what I mean? That’s some tricky business there, but I felt that it was very much on the page and that we could do it right. In the end, she’s a background player in his life because it’s a story of his life during that time. Just the joy of that for me, that we all have our ideas of the icon, Anna Nicole, and we might know how the story turned out, but there’s so much in between those two places that we explore in this film.
MF: Thane, can you talk about your interest in this story and why you wanted to make this movie?
Thane Economou: For me, I was handed this book by my great producer, Ryan Hawkins, and he said, “Let me know if you have a take.” I’m looking at the cover, you know, it’s Dr. Kapoor and Anna Nicole Smith. I said, “Is this going to be salacious or something like that?” I start reading it and 30 pages in its heartbreaking as Anna Nicole Smith passes away. I go, “Well, what’s the rest of this book then?” I found myself fascinated by this trial. I knew basically nothing about it. I found it endlessly interesting. I found myself chuckling to myself. The tone was not what I was expecting, that I was pulling out of it. So what pulled me in was the take that I kind of pitched to Ryan as I said, “Listen, this is not a story about a guy at the center of the conspiracy. This is about a guy who tangentially just brushes fame and then gets sucked into the whirlwind. This is about a guy who has no business being in an Anna Nicole Smith biopic, and yet here he is. What is it like for a somewhat normal guy to get sucked into a crazy whirlwind like this?”
MF: Thane, did you have any contact with the real Dr. Kapoor before or after making the movie?
TE: You know, before the film, we had a couple of meetings. The most important thing that I wanted to make sure was that he was on board with it. I said, “Listen, in this memoir, you admit to making some mistakes, often mistakes covering up things because you thought they’d make you look bad, and you just kept stumbling over your own two feet into deeper and deeper holes.” I said, “If you admit to a mistake in the book, it’s going in the movie. I need to portray that.” To his credit, he said, “I understand that.” He understood that we needed to present him as a three-dimensional character, as a flawed character, because those flaws, what drives him to make these very human mistakes, that’s what really interested me in him.
MF: Kal, I understand that you did met Dr. Kapoor. What did you learn from meeting him that surprised you and helped inform your performance?
KP: To me, the thing that surprised me the most was the vulnerability across the board, and the insecurity. I was skeptical at first because it’s a script based on a book that the real Dr. Kapoor wrote. So I was like, what is the purpose of all of this? In fact, when I met the real Dr. Kapoor, he was very kind. He said, “I’m a really big fan, I’m so glad you’re playing me, because I know you’ll do justice to my story.” I was like, “Buddy, that is not my job. My job is not to do justice to your story, it is to portray the character as written.” But what it unlocked for me in getting to know him and shadowing him is a couple things. First, he has a really small medical practice, and still does in the San Fernando Valley. It’s very 1950s-style doctoring. If I want to make an appointment with my doctor, I gotta either go online or talk to some robot and the first appointment is in like 7 weeks. It’s excruciating. For him, you call his office, you get a real human, and he’ll see you right away. So, then it made sense to me, it’s just like in the 1950s, you’re getting invitations to your patient’s Sweet 16. You’re getting invitations to somebody’s Super Bowl party. So it wasn’t weird that Anna would invite him to a Pride party. What was weird, obviously, is drinking heavily with your patient and then making out with her on a couch next to a dance floor. That’s where you lose me. But that’s, to me, where the insecurity and vulnerability come in. Where the real Dr. Kapoor had never experienced a taste of this type of a thing, and he’s the first one to acknowledge that among his many flaws, he was drunk, but he also was high with proximity to fame in a way that I think most people either don’t understand, or think, if I was in that situation, what would I have done? So all of that, to me, kind of unlocked the decisions that he made.
MF: Linda, did you meet the real Ellyn Garofalo, and how did your research into this story help you prepare to play this role?
LH: I saw footage, photos and images but I did not meet the real Ellyn, and that was kind of an interesting choice. But it was largely because everything on the page was there, and the character was there. I didn’t feel that by adding a certain rhythm that was more particular to Ellyn, that it was going to add anything to the film. I needed to just play it straight as it was because it was perfectly laid out there. It’s not Ellyn’s story, it’s Sandeep’s story. Then you’ve got Abbie Cornish playing the real Anna Nicole Smith. That’s a different job. That’s a character that everyone, not everyone, but most people have heard of, she’s larger than life and everyone has their impression of her. So, I could bury the real Ellyn a little bit, but not really because it was there on the page. The real Sandeep was also there, informing us in a lot of scenes. So if I had questions, I could turn to him and ask. So it was good. I would like to give my apologies to Ellyn Garofalo if I’m nothing like her, but I did love playing her. I just want her to know.
MF: Thane, why was Kal the right actor to play this role?
TE: Kal was kind of the list. I wanted Kal. I’d always loved Kal, not just the comedic work, but like he’s incredible in ‘The Namesake‘, and so I knew his dramatic work was unbelievable. From our first conversation, he said exactly what I wanted to hear. He said, ‘If I have this role tomorrow, I need to get on a plane and study Dr. Kapoor. That’s what he did. He went to his practice, he shadowed him, he learned how he talked, how he walked, and how he sat. There were tremendous moments where he became so important in discovering who the true Dr. Kapoor was and Kal did that through his research.
MF: Kal, can you talk about collaborating with Thane on set?
KP: Look, I’m fairly text-based with my work. I loved that I could shadow the real Sandeep, but I think once you start shooting, it’s really based on the text, and it’s based on listening to your scene partners. The film is chopped up. It’s not linear in the way that it’s told. So the thing I really relied on with Thane more than anything was that I had to rearrange the script to outline the beats and my arc. I would get confused often in rehearsals, and I was like, did this happen in real life, or are you saying this happened in the twisted way that we’re telling the story? For his first feature, what a brain to be able to sort both of those things and tell the story that way.
MF: Finally, Linda, what was your experience like working with Thane as a director?
LH: It was fantastic working with him, and I say that genuinely. I watched him grow. I watched him grow every day, and it was a really audacious attempt at a first movie, and he had such vision and ideas. He and I have the same birthday. He’s my birthday buddy, so we got on great. But to watch him gain in confidence and really start taking charge of scenes, it was lovely. I’m all in, trying to bring new talent to offer him everything that I could to make it work. He was great to collaborate with, and I had a root-roaring good time.
Editorial Note: James White conducted this interview and contributed to this article.
What is the plot of ‘Trust Me, I’m a Doctor’?
The life of Dr. Sandeep Kapoor (Kal Penn) was turned upside down when he’s implicated in the wrongful death trial of one-time Playboy centerfold Anna Nicole Smith (Abbie Cornish).
Who is in the cast of ‘Trust Me, I’m a Doctor’?
- Abbie Cornish as Anna Nicole Smith
- Kal Penn as Dr. Sandeep Kapoor
- Linda Hamilton as Ellyn Garofalo
- Elon Gold as Harvey Levin
- David Julian Hirsh as Howard K. Stern
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