Many people thought Amanda Seyfried was auditioning to play Joni Mitchell when she showed off her dulcimer skills by performing the singer’s tune “California” during a March 2025 appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. It turns out Seyfried actually learned to play the instrument because she had already been cast to play Joni on screen.
In a new interview with British GQ, Seyfried reveals she was supposed to play Joni in a film about her and her manger Elliot Roberts, which wound up not happening.
As part of her prep for the role, Seyfried spent time with Joni at her home in Los Angeles, where they shared a steak dinner and listened to Joni’s iconic album Blue together. Seyfried adds that during the meeting, Joni “told me a lot of stories.”
For the role, Seyfried committed herself to learning how to play all the songs on Blue, along with other Joni classics like “Both Sides Now.” She tells the mag she “f****** wept” the day she finished learning the last song.
“I felt like a bona fide musician, like I belong here,” she says. “I felt like I had put my own flag on the top of the mountain. Because it was a f***** mountain, I tell you.”
Writer/director Cameron Crowe is currently working on a Joni biopic, which will reportedly star Meryl Streep as Joni in her later years.
As for whether she had a chance to be in Crowe’s film, Seyfried tells the mag, “Apparently a lot of people reached out to Cameron Crowe and were like, ‘What the f*** are you doing, dude?'” She noted, “I don’t know what he said, but from my knowledge, his version is, she’s really young and then she’s older.”
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