Cera with Doubleday in Youth in Revolt.   (Photo: Bruce Birmelin/Courtesy of Dimension Films)

More than just selling films, he’s also helping to make them. Cera—who has published comic fiction in McSweeney’s and plays guitar—rewrote much of the script for Youth in Revolt with Arteta, helped cast the film, and even wrote and recorded part of the soundtrack. “After the first five minutes of talking to Michael,” says Arteta, recalling their first conversation two years ago, “I said, ‘How about you and me unofficially writing this script?’ I put myself in his 19-year-old hands.” He predicts the actor will spend a few more years acting before becoming an auteur “like a Ron Howard or Woody Allen, but with his unique point of view—the playfully warped reality of Cera versus Cera.”

Turns out the real guy is a combination of Francois’s confidence and Nick’s kindness and wit (we won’t speculate on his horndoggery). “I watched him collaborate with Miguel,” says Youth in Revolt’s producer, David Permut, “and a movie as delicate as this one, and as absurd, he really strove to keep it grounded and real. Michael could move in any direction he chose, and I have no doubt he could direct.”

Presently, a restless Cera is eager to find another acting job; he hasn’t worked since Scott Pilgrim wrapped in August. The leap to something more seems premature. “I really love movies and would like to [write and direct] someday, but it’s scary,” he says. “It’s just hard to know what I’m going to be like in the future.”

Related:

• Archive: “Movie Features”
• Articles by Logan Hill
• Table of Contents: Jan 4, 2010 issue of New York | Subscribe!