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Is it meant to be? In 2001, romantic comedy fans<\/a> followed the would-or-wouldn\u2019t-they romance of Kate Beckinsale<\/strong><\/a> and John Cusack<\/strong><\/a>\u2018s lovestruck characters in\u00a0Serendipity.<\/i><\/p>\n In the classic film, the actors played Jonathan Trager and Sara Thomas, respectively, who ended up searching for one another over several years<\/a> in New York City after they first met, fell in love and went their separate ways. Despite a heartbreaking parting, the pair remained convinced that their initial encounter was fated.<\/p>\n \u201cAs is often the case, there was a sort of central problem with the female character not necessarily being totally believable. So we had a lot of meetings about it: I didn\u2019t want this character to be this kind of wispy fool, even though she was so interested in fate,\u201d Beckinsale recalled of her acting process during an April 2020 interview with Vulture<\/a>. \u201cYou can be like that without being this sort of ghastly supernatural person. \u2026 She\u2019s a therapist. You don\u2019t want her to be a bad, embarrassing therapist, but she\u2019s also obsessed with the notion of serendipity and fate<\/a>. So trying to marry those two things without making her a character who seems completely implausible. You can be a kind of whimsical, positive, open person who\u2019s also intelligent.\u201d<\/p>\n The England native fondly looked back on her Manhattan filming experience<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd then suddenly there we were in August in New York, in scarves and overcoats, sweating to death and pretending to be ice-skating on what was actually linoleum, because it was too hot for ice,\u201d she told the outlet at the time. \u201cI remember being incredibly hot all of the time. A classic Christmas movie<\/a> and we\u2019re all pouring sweat.\u201d<\/p>\n The\u00a0Pearl Harbor\u00a0<\/i>actress is no stranger to reliving the sweet flick, even recreating its now-infamous elevator scene<\/a> alongside a begrudging hotel employee.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u00a0knew I recognized the elevators in this hotel I was staying in,\u201d she captioned an Instagram<\/a> clip in September 2018, where she recited her wistful film dialogue. \u201cThis is where we shot\u00a0Serendipity<\/i>. Alas, I could not get my leading man to play ball this time\u00a0@fairmontroyalyork.\u201d<\/p>\n The film\u2019s director, Peter Chelsom<\/strong>, also opened up about the filmmaking journey nearly twenty years after the movie\u2019s release.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were making a film about a world that we hope might exist,\u201d Chelsom told Insider<\/a> in October 2021. \u201cYes, there\u2019s no clock. Yes, you can\u2019t see the stars. All that is absolutely right. But with it this way it transports you, you can escape more. \u2026 It\u2019s the balance between the man and woman. They have mirror problems: marrying the so-called perfect partner and realizing they can\u2019t. There were a lot of films in the early 2000s \u2014 and I said this back then \u2014 they were sexist. This idea of \u2018frat boy behaves really badly, s\u2014t hits the fan in act two, then all of act three is him apologizing to the beautiful blonde.\u2019 That was the laziness of romantic comedies in the early 2000s and in some ways\u00a0Serendipity<\/i>\u00a0was the apex.\u201d<\/p>\n