11 years later, Tamara Jenkins returns with 'Private Life'

Tamara Jenkins has had time to consider why there have been such long stretches between her movies. Her latest, "Private Life ," starring Kathryn Hahn and Paul Giamatti as a New York couple struggling with infertility treatments, comes 11 years after her last one, the Oscar-nominated "The Savages."

For Jenkins' fans, such prolonged absences (it was nine years following her 1998 debut, "The Slums of Beverly Hills") are a disappointment. For others, it's a prime example of how the movie industry doesn't value its female filmmakers like its male ones. For Jenkins, it's more complicated.

"When you're in it, you're like: Is it me or is it them? What makes that problem, in terms of myself?" Jenkins wonders. "When I was at Sundance people kept asking me that question. I kept saying, 'Yeah, I know. I'm a loser. How is it possible 11 years went by?' And then I looked around and I realized Patty Jenkins ('Wonder Woman') hadn't made a movie and Debra Granik ('Leave No Trace') hadn't made a feature for years. So I'm not alone."

This image released by Netflix shows filmmaker Tamara Jenkins on the set of "Private Life." Jenkins wrote and directed the film, her first in 11 years. (Jojo WhildenNetflix via AP)

Still, Jenkins adds, there are other factors, too. She and her husband, Jim Taylor (Alexander Payne's frequent writing partner), had a kid in that time period — the experience of which eventually led her to writing "Private Life." And then she's meticulous — "novel-y," she says — in her writing process; she estimates it took two years to write "Private Life," some of that time spent at the upstate New York artists' colony Yadoo (which also figures into the film).

"It's also a desire to not necessarily make any old thing. There are a lot of things out there that might be makeable but aren't good. There are a lot of really bad movies," Jenkins said in a recent interview. "And I never have had an easy time trying to get these things made. Like 'The Savages,' which took place in a nursing home, nobody wants to make that movie. This is different but, still, it doesn't sound sexy on paper."

"Private Life," which premieres on Netflix and in select theaters Friday, is indeed more than its synopsis. Hahn and Giamatti play downtown New York creatives reaching middle age and going through one fertility trial after another. But in Jenkins' hands, "Private Life" is a caustically funny, painfully intimate, medicalized examination of, as she says, "a marriage in the middle." Though much of the plot follows a struggle to conceive, it's ultimately centered on the couple; Giamatti compares it to "Waiting for Godot."

This image released by Netflix shows actor Paul Giamatti, left, with filmmaker Tamara Jenkins on the set of "Private Life." Jenkins wrote and directed the film, her first in 11 years. (Jojo WhildenNetflix via AP)

"People ask me what it's about and I say it's a movie about marriage," says Jenkins. "It's obviously on a very specific journey that they're on. But there was something so existential about that problem for them. It's so primal."

As an on-screen couple, Hahn and Giamatti are remarkably attuned to each other, especially considering they didn't know each other before the film. Jenkins set up a meeting at Giamatti's Brooklyn home for the two to meet and get acquainted.

"I feel something about this movie that I don't feel about many things I've been in. I really love it, and a lot of it is those two women I got to work with," Giamatti said by phone during a break from shooting "Billions."

This image released by Netflix shows actress Kayli Carter, right, with filmmaker Tamara Jenkins on the set of "Private Life." Jenkins wrote and directed the film, her first in 11 years. (Jojo WhildenNetflix via AP)

"I wish Tamara was able to be more prolific. I don't know how much it is her wanting to take that much time with something. I don't think so. I think she'd like to be more prolific," Giamatti adds. "But she's incredibly devoted to the very singular thing she wants to do."

Hahn says that Jenkins during shooting is as passionate about a scene being acted as she was when writing it.

"Tamara, as a director, she's a channeler. She's definitely feeling whatever you're feeling at the same amount of intensity. She can't help it. She will feel alongside of you," Hahn says. "We both understood (Hahn's character) Rachel on a pretty deep level. We kind of mind-melded."

This image released by Netflix shows Paul Giamatti, left, and Kathryn Hahn in a scene from "Private Life." (Jojo WhildenNetflix via AP)

Both Hahn and Giamatti have won raves for their soulful, connected performances, though numerous critics have called Hahn's disarmingly naked performance her best yet.

"It's not lost on me that I feel most seen as a performer and as an artist by women filmmakers. That is for damn sure," says Hahn, who's currently prepping an HBO series directed by Nicole Holofcener.

Jenkins, 56, has regularly turned pieces from her life into her films. "The Slums of Beverly Hills," about a transient, lower-middle class Jewish family in Beverly Hills, was inspired by her own 1970s youth. "The Savages," which starred Laura Linney (she was Oscar nominated, as was Jenkins' script) and Philip Seymour Hoffman, chronicled two siblings dealing with an elderly parent with dementia. It too was partly autobiographical.

Jenkins initially dismissed her own trials having a kid as decent movie fodder ("I was like: No way! I'll never do that! Gross!") only to eventually see the dramatic possibilities of a very common experience.

"There's the sort of famous thing that people say: Why don't you just adopt? — 'just' in italics, like adopting is such an easy thing to do, like you can just walk out and get one of those kids over there," says Jenkins. "If you're trying to have a kid and it's not happening the old-fashioned, regular way, all of the routes of having a kid are really complicated, morally and emotionally and economically and socially. It's all very complicated."

One complication Jenkins would rather not encounter: another long wait until her next film.

"The older you get, if you keep waiting 11 years until your next movie, it's going to get really complicated with the walker and the back problem," she says, laughing. "So I would like to pick up the pace in my own middle age."

Follow AP Film Writer Jake Coyle on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/jakecoyleAP

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuela’s government accused the United States of attacking civilian and military installations in multiple states after at least seven explosions and low-flying aircraft were heard around 2 a.m. local time Saturday in the capital, Caracas.

The Pentagon and White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Smoke could be seen rising from the hangar of a military base in Caracas. Another military installation in the capital was without power.

People in various neighborhoods rushed to the streets. Some could be seen in the distance from various areas of Caracas.

“The whole ground shook. This is horrible. We heard explosions and planes,” said Carmen Hidalgo, a 21-year-old office worker, her voice trembling. She was walking briskly with two relatives, returning from a birthday party. “We felt like the air was hitting us.”

Venezuela’s government, in the statement, called on its supporters to take to the streets.

“People to the streets!” the statement said. “The Bolivarian Government calls on all social and political forces in the country to activate mobilization plans and repudiate this imperialist attack.”

The statement added that President Nicolás Maduro had “ordered all national defense plans to be implemented” and declared “a state of external disturbance.”

This comes as the U.S. military has been targeting, in recent days, alleged drug-smuggling boats. On Friday, Venezuela said it was open to negotiating an agreement with the U.S. to combat drug trafficking.

Maduro also said in a pretaped interview aired Thursday that the U.S. wants to force a government change in Venezuela and gain access to its vast oil reserves through the monthslong pressure campaign that began with a massive military deployment to the Caribbean Sea in August.

Maduro has been charged with narco-terrorism in the U.S. The CIA was behind a drone strike last week at a docking area believed to have been used by Venezuelan drug cartels in what was the first known direct operation on Venezuelan soil since the U.S. began strikes on boats in September.

U.S. President Donald Trump for months had threatened that he could soon order strikes on targets on Venezuelan land. The U.S. has also seized sanctioned oil tankers off the coast of Venezuela, and Trump ordered a blockade of others in a move that seemed designed to put a tighter chokehold on the South American country’s economy.

The U.S. military has been attacking boats in the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean since early September. As of Friday, the number of known boat strikes is 35 and the number of people killed is at least 115, according to numbers announced by the Trump administration.

They followed a major buildup of American forces in the waters off South America, including the arrival in November of the nation’s most advanced aircraft carrier, which added thousands more troops to what was already the largest military presence in the region in generations.

Trump has justified the boat strikes as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs into the U.S. and asserted that the U.S. is engaged in an “armed conflict” with drug cartels.

Meanwhile, Iranian state television reported on the explosions in Caracas on Saturday, showing images of the Venezuelan capital. Iran has been close to Venezuela for years, in part due to their shared enmity of the U.S.

Pedestrians walk past the Miraflores presidential palace after explosions and low-flying aircraft were heard in Caracas, Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Cristian Hernandez)

Residents evacuate a building near the Miraflores presidential palace after explosions and low-flying aircraft were heard in Caracas, Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Cristian Hernandez)

Smoke raises at La Carlota airport after explosions and low-flying aircraft were heard in Caracas, Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

Pedestrians run after explosions and low-flying aircraft were heard in Caracas, Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

Smoke raises at La Carlota airport after explosions and low-flying aircraft were heard in Caracas, Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

Smoke raises at La Carlota airport after explosions and low-flying aircraft were heard in Caracas, Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

Pedestrians run after explosions and low-flying aircraft were heard in Caracas, Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)