Delaney Buffett found the inspiration for her Tribeca Film Festival–featured Adult Best Friends in an unlikely place: midway through her toast at the wedding of her childhood best friend, Katie Corwin. Buffett began to joke about being “replaced” by Corwin’s now husband, before having the split-second realization that it wasn’t a joke at all.
While the idea for the film came from Corwin, its creation was driven by a second figure in her life: her father, Jimmy Buffett, who died in September 2023, just one month after Adult Best Friends wrapped filming. “It was for him and because of him,” says Delaney Buffett, 32. “I wanted to make him proud, and I wanted to apply that same work ethic that he had applied to give me the life that I have.”
Buffett was raised in Palm Beach, where she and Corwin met at 10 years old. They bonded over their love of Chris Farley’s 90s films, such as Tommy Boy and Black Sheep. “I was never a cinephile,” Buffett says. “I just love comedy. That is what I fell in love with initially.”
Buffett didn’t originally plan on becoming a filmmaker. She majored in criminology at the University of Pennsylvania, but during her freshman year, in 2011, a required English class renewed her love of storytelling. “I [had] forgot[ten] how much I loved to write,” she says.
After graduating from college, in 2014, Buffett decided to pivot from criminology to the world of filmmaking. She moved to New York, where she worked as an assistant in the HBO marketing department and then as a production assistant on films such as The Wizard of Lies and Billionaire Boys Club. “I just sort of fell in love with being on set,” she says.
Increasingly eager to make her own films, Buffett began taking screenwriting classes online in her free time. She and Corwin, who was working as an actress, began dreaming of making a movie together. Corwin’s 2022 wedding provided the subject matter: “Aging friendships and what happens when another partner comes into your life,” as Buffett puts it. “What happens to that person who’s been there the entire time, and how do you hold on to that?”
Influenced by comedies such as Bridesmaids and Booksmart, Buffett wanted the heart of Adult Best Friends to be the authentic friendship between two women. That’s why she and Corwin decided to not only write the film together but also to play the two main characters. “Since we’ve been friends for 20-plus years,” she says, “that came easy.”
Buffett directed the film and assembled a cast of real-life friends, including Cazzie David, Cory Walls, and Zachary Quinto. “We knew everyone in the movie is so funny in their own way, and they have such a specific brand of comedy and a specific voice,” explains Buffett. “So being able to know that, and then reverse-engineer a character from there, was amazing.”
“When you’re making an independent film, you have to seize every opportunity in front of you, and you have to juggle a lot of things,” says Buffett, again crediting her father for teaching her the importance of having a work ethic. “For my entire life, I saw him juggle everything,” she says. “He never saw an opportunity he didn’t take, even in his last few years, when he could be complacent.”
As a first-time director, Buffett also looked to her father’s example when it came to leadership skills. “The way he ran his band and his team, he always led with kindness, but they got the job done,” she says. “And that’s what I wanted to do on set every day.... I wanted to see his legacy carried out.”
Adult Best Friends is available for streaming on Apple TV+
Paulina Prosnitz is a Junior Editor at Air Mail
