Couple Greta Gerwig & Noah Baumbach Open Up on Being the First Duo in Hollywood Right Now

For the first time in over eight years of being together, Greta Gerwig and partner Noah Baumbach are in serious contention to be landing Academy nominations for their respective projects that are Little Women and Marriage Story.

In a lengthy feature interview with The Hollywood Reporter, both Gerwig and Baumbach opened up on the same. It's already making for some tricky awards-season moments, like at the Governors Awards in October, where Baumbach and Gerwig were seated at different tables. "They're asking me, 'Who do you want your plus one to be?' I'm like, 'What do you mean? Oh, Greta's over at the Sony table?' We just hoped we were close enough that we could reach over to each other," Baumbach says as he re-enacts the need to physically connect by stretching across the table and touching Gerwig.

One of the advantages of directors dating each other, however, is that both parties are equally aware of just how draining a job it can be. Explains Baumbach, "You come home at 3 in the morning and you climb into bed and the other person's half asleep — you feel …"

"Lonely," Gerwig finishes his sentence.

"Wrecked and lonely and you don't even know if you got [the best footage]," he continues.

"The thing you want more than anything is for someone to just take care of you because shooting a movie is so much," Gerwig goes on. "But because we're both doing it, we haven't necessarily always been able to be the person who was there. Sometimes it's not completely possible."

The couple joke about their brushes with mainstream moviemaking — Gerwig insists that studios "kind of don't bother" approaching them with tentpoles — but the fact is they are both more in demand than they let on, particularly these days. According to Barber, the two "are regularly approached for four-quadrant projects," separately and together. "They almost always get an early look," he says. "And while they have not yet chosen to make one of these movies, I wouldn't be surprised to see them at some point soon make one as a team or on their own."

"We're both just grinding it out," Gerwig sums up how she views their current career status.