'Verity' puts Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson and Josh Hartnett in a steamy Colleen Hoover thriller

In “Verity,” it’s hard to know who to trust. There’s Anne Hathaway’s titular character, a wildly popular novelist who is unable to speak or move after a car accident, but whose secret, and disturbing, autobiography speaks volumes. There’s Dakota Johnson’s struggling author, Lowen, who has been hired to finish Verity’s remaining novels and who finds herself living in Verity’s home and fantasizing about her more successful counterpart’s life, and husband.

And then there’s Josh Hartnett, as said husband, who is caring and responsible but perhaps a bit quick to suggest that Lowen borrow one of Verity’s dresses for their night out on the town. The actors couldn’t help get the giggles on set It is all quite heightened in the way that one might hope for in a sexy, psychological thriller, which opens in theaters Friday. At some point, Lowen even starts to suspect that Verity might be faking her paralysis.

And the actors often found themselves doing something that the script did not call for: Giggling. “There would be some shots where Dakota and I would just have to stare at each other,” Hathaway recently told The Associated Press. “There’s just something about knowing that you’re supposed to be scary that makes you giggle.” But that is just part of the fun of going big for a pulpy, popcorn thriller, where Johnson gets to blow vape smoke in Hathaway’s face and all get to participate in a fantasy sequence in which Johnson starts out kissing Hartnett’s character and ends with Hathaway on her lips.

“It just seemed really fun to play somebody who’s deeply unwell,” Johnson said. ‘Verity’ is based on a Colleen Hoover psychological thriller “Verity” is the latest Colleen Hoover adaptation to make it to the big screen. After “It Ends With Us,” it is one of her more popular bestsellers.

That film made over $350 million worldwide in theaters, but also became infamous for its off-screen legal battles. On “Verity,” however, the drama stayed on the screen. For director Michael Showalter, it offered a chance to dip into a genre that he has been dreaming about since he took an Alfred Hitchcock film class in high school.

Hitchcock, and Brian De Palma, were in his head when casting the movie too. It held extra significance that Johnson’s grandmother, Tippi Hedren, was in “The Birds” and “Marnie,” and her mother, Melanie Griffith, starred in De Palma… In “Verity,” it’s hard to know who to trust.There’s Anne Hathaway’s titular character, a wildly popular novelist who is unable to speak or move after a car accident, but whose secret, and disturbing, autobiography speaks volumes.