Interviewing the stars of Tristram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story (review) is disconcertingly like being part of the movie. Dizzyingly deconstructive, the movie functions at times as its own press kit, including a plug for the DVD version. Deliberately blurring the line between fact and fiction, Michael Winterbottom's film stars Steve Coogan (24 Hour Party People) and Rob Brydon as, well, themselves, or at least versions thereof, as well as the parts they play in the film within the film—an adaptation of Laurence Sterne's 18th-century novel, itself preoccupied with the process of its own creation. The movie's central conceit is that the goings-on behind the scenes mimic the novel's action; where Tristram, the novel's narrator, is diverted from his autobiography by dozens of minor digressions, so Coogan, the movie's star, frets about being upstaged by Brydon, and occasionally is.

Needless to say, the first question that comes to mind is how the actors managed to keep this all straight. As it turns out, they didn't feel the need. "I almost like not to know what I'm doing," Coogan says. "But I'm comfortable with not knowing, and I trust Michael to make it work."

For Winterbottom, whose rapid-fire filmography runs the gamut from Thomas Hardy (Jude, The Claim) to science fiction (Code 46), adapting Laurence Sterne's putatively "unfilmable" novel was an irresistible challenge. Winterbottom, who talks as speedily as he films, says the movie's funhouse structure was a natural extension of the book. "We started out just thinking about a straight adaptation, but we had to use filmmaking as the equivalent of writing the book, since so much of the book is about its own writing."

Although Tristram Shandy inevitably sparks comparisons to self-reflexive predecessors like The Player and Day for Night (to say nothing of Adaptation), Winterbottom downplays the backstage aspects, pointing out that funding shortfalls, hectic schedules and ego clashes are not unique to moviemaking. "I don't think it translates into anything at all about filmmaking," he says, "but does hopefully shed some light about all the conflicting things in your life."

Although Sterne's novel is remembered for its pre-postmodern gimmickry—a black page to express the grief of a character's death, for instance—Winterbottom's interest lay elsewhere. "Its basic attitude towards people is very warm," he says. "It really makes you like them, and all the witticism is forgiven." Rather than a McSweeney's-ist avant la lettre, one might characterize the novel's narrator as history's most unselfish autobiographer, one who seems to find his surroundings more interesting than himself.

Narcissism was a bete noire for Coogan and Brydon as well. Both actors get laughs by caricaturing themselves, Coogan riffing on his real-life reputation as an arrogant ladies' man, Brydon exaggerating his unknown status. "I think we both like playing on our own foibles," Brydon says. "Neither of us minds taking what you might consider a weakness in yourself and exploiting it. You might not do it at face value—you might stretch it or pervert it a bit. I'll do something and go, 'Ah, you're a bit of a buffoon for doing that, aren't you?' But if you took it and you did it slightly differently, that could be very entertaining for an audience. It's not as thought-through as that, but as a comedian, you naturally look for the angle in any situation." Brydon, who'd been thinking of capping his teeth, prodded Coogan into riffing on their "not-white" color, and shows up in the movie's last scene with a new set of gleaming choppers.

For Coogan, who's a celebrity in Britain, the concern was how to mimic his real life without merely copying its more familiar aspects. He was happy to exaggerate his own vanity and insecurity, characteristics familiar from many of his onscreen personae, most famously the massively petty talk-show host Alan Partridge. But Coogan says he was quick to "stamp on" early drafts that bore too close a resemblance to his real life, prompting the addition of a fictional son for his cinematic counterpart. "It was important that there were certainly things that were literally fictitious just to give me license," Coogan says. "Once you put that marker on, I felt secure."

Winterbottom makes no appearance in the film, and Jeremy Northam's director resembles his off-camera counterpart only in his track-suit wardrobe. Perhaps that's because the character Winterbottom most resembles is Tristram himself, his ability to live life jeopardized by his prolific output. Winterbottom, however, seems more comfortable with that state of affairs than his protagonist. "Obviously, it's more enjoyable to be making a film than not," he says, "especially since when you're not making a film, what you're doing is running around trying to get money for the next one. It's just more satisfying to be working on something than hanging around."