And then there's Spielberg, who handpicked Cody to write the pilot for a comedy idea he had about a woman with multiple personalities. She conceived the story, then pitched it to him over the phone at the Universal lot. ''I've never met him in person,'' she says. ''Isn't that awesome? It's like Charlie's Angels. So we had the call, and he said, 'Okay, go write it.' I walked outside and just went numb. E.T. is the first film I ever saw in the theater. I sank down to the curb and put my head between my knees.'' (Showtime is co-producing the pilot of the series, titled The United States of Tara, and Toni Collette has signed on to star.)
Cody says she's keeping her sanity during this frenzied time with some help from her new fast friends — Dana Fox, who's currently writing Vince Vaughn's next comedy, and Lorene Scafaria, who has her first film, Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, in production. The three often meet to write at Doughboys coffee shop, though they have a tendency to get distracted. ''We always joke that we're going to start our own little club, like those Mexican directors did,'' says Cody. ''We argue about which one of us gets to be [Alejandro González] Iñárritu.'' First, though, they need a catchy name. ''It should play into all of the stereotypes of what people think about women,'' says Fox. ''So we thought about naming the club 'I Don't Get It' or 'Hee Hee Hee, I'm Scared.' And we'll dress up in geisha outfits, or white T-shirts and no pants! Honestly, this is all we ever talk about.''
When their workload eventually lightens, the trio plans to start a production company with a strong emphasis on projects that don't involve beautiful actresses acting dumb and, whoops!, falling down the stairs into the arms of Mr. Right. But first, they've got to help Cody celebrate Juno. ''Diablo won't let me read the script because she actually feels like the movie totally did it justice,'' says Fox. ''She has no idea what a miracle that is for a writer. I keep telling her, 'You have to enjoy every minute of this.' Because she's like, 'Oh, no, no, I don't need to.' Well, okay, lady, but you better have your f---ing outfit on when I show up at your house with beers in the limo and we drive around to all the different theaters that are playing Juno. Because I'm not going in the limo by myself!''
''I'm f---ing sick of actors!'' declares Cody, stabbing the lime in her third vodka soda. ''They look airbrushed in reality. I swear Jennifer Garner has to be bathing in the blood of virgins because she has the most beautiful skin that I've ever seen on a human being. The boys too! I met Brandon Routh from Superman last year. He looks like a special effect. He's too beautiful to live. And actors are all tiny people. Why is that? I'm a hulk compared to them! If you look at pictures of me with actors, I look like I ate them all.''
We're getting near the point of having had too much to drink. But before the waitress brings the tab, Cody describes, as evidence of her strange new existence, a recent night with former boy-bander Lance Bass. She'd been meeting with Anna Faris when the two got to drinking and Cody let it slip that she was turning 29 at midnight. Because this is Hollywood, and because such things happen here, Faris pulled a $40 bottle of hand lotion out of her bag and presented it to her as a birthday gift, and then a car roared up to the hotel, whisking the two to Bass' house, where Cody found herself bumming a cigarette from Melrose, the runner-up in America's Next Top Model Cycle 7. ''That's the weird thing about this town,'' says Cody. ''People just end up congregating in really weird places. Why is Melrose there? But more importantly, why am I at Lance Bass' house? He didn't invite me. Oh, and here's something awesome about Lance Bass: When you go into his bathroom, he has the MTV Moonman award holding his toilet paper.''
Marveling on her way out of the Rustic that there's Alice in Chains on the jukebox, she bursts forth from the comforting gloom into the fading daylight. ''Best bar of all time,'' she declares, promising to bring Jonny back for the $6.99 Bloody Mary Breakfast Special. We shake hands on the street corner, and Cody heads in the opposite direction of her car. She's going to wander around Hollywood until her buzz wears off. It'll be a while.
See more from the EW 2007 Holiday Movie Preview:
Inside the making of Sweeney Todd
Johnny Depp: EW's extended Q&A with the Sweeney Todd star
Beowulf: High stakes for a 3-D epic
Mr. and Mrs. Noah Baumbach invite you to their Wedding
First Listen: The title song from Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story
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