DIRECTOR PEYTON REED BRINGS IT ON FOR `THE BREAK-UP'.

Byline: Bob Strauss Film Writer

Peyton Reed has only directed three feature-length comedies.

But they're as different from one another as they are collectively from the standard kinds of movies major studios think are funny these days.

``I love comedies, but it is harder and harder now to get a good comedy going that isn't this big, high-concept, kind-of-broad thing,'' says North Carolina native Reed, who cut his directing teeth on Disney TV movies and satiric cable laughfests ``Mr. Show'' and ``Upright Citizens Brigade.''

``I don't know that I would like to make those movies. If there's not a certain amount of gravity, then suddenly you're in Vietnam. Jokes are being lobbed here and there, but you're in the jungle and you don't know what's going on. That can get you through a first act, but you do want to leave movies with a little more.''

Reed's ``Bring It On'' was fizzy teen-cheerleader entertainment with surprisingly agile ethical dimensions. ``Down With Love'' was a deliriously aestheticized dissection of the Doris Day/Rock Hudson virginity farces of the 1960s.

And now ``The Break-Up'' starts well after most romantic comedies leave off: Two years past the hook-up, when a couple, played by Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn, are fed up with living together.

``I was interested in getting at some of the real emotions of the situation, and have it be less about two people fighting over a condo,'' Reed says. ``I liked the idea of starting from a break-up and examining some universal relationship issues: people who aren't communicating, balancing the male and the female perspective.''

Not an easy task in today's formulaic movie world. Especially when it came to finishing a film story that didn't naturally lend itself to the happily-ever-after fantasy. In fact, there were reportedly two other conclusions shot and audience-tested before the one that made the final cut.

``There were several problems with the original ending,'' Reed admits. ``We loved what we always set out to say with the movie, which was because of this relationship, these two people sort of evolve. We really thought very hard together -- and by that I mean me, Vince, Jen and the studio -- about what was the most organic ending to the movie.

``It's going to be interesting to see how people respond to the movie,'' Reed admits. ``Because it seems like the core audience for a romantic comedy wants things to let out in a certain way.

``I don't think our movie lays it out that way.''

Bob Strauss, [phone]

bob.strauss(at)dailynews.com

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Comedy vets Jennifer Aniston and Peyton Reed collaborate for his new take on romantic comedy, ``The Break-Up.''

KEYWORDS} movie - the break-up - director - peyton reed