Catching up with Stu P.

Stu Pollard is in town for the holidays, and with him he brought his latest project, “Ira & Abby,” to show Louisville audiences. Pollard co-produced this romantic comedy written by Jennifer Westfeldt (who penned 2001’s “Kissing Jessica Stein”; starred in Stu’s 2005 film “Keep Your Distance”; and can now be seen on ABC’s “Notes From the Underbelly”). Here’s what he had to say about it:

LEO: How’d you get hooked up with this project?
SP: The connection was Jennifer Westfeldt. At some point when we were in post (production) during “Keep Your Distance,” Jennifer approached me about the project. We discussed the idea of writing a business plan, which was how I had successfully raised the money for “KYD.” So they hired me to do that. As far as producing, it was my first go-round on the feature level working in a strictly productorial capacity, which was very liberating. You don’t have to worry about wearing too many hats. There’s pros and cons, of course. I wasn’t as involved in the creative process as I would have liked to be. By the same token, in the span of two years, I’ve been able to produce three movies as opposed to making one every five.

LEO: Is producing something you’d like to continue?
SP: Oh, absolutely. I still have a very strong desire to direct. And I have a couple of passion projects that hopefully you’ll be hearing about in the not-too-distant future. I’ve got a movie now on the festival circuit called “Dirty Country,” which is a very uproarious documentary about the dirtiest singer in country music you’ve never heard of, named Larry Pierce. It’s gotten very good reviews so far and won an audience award at this year’s South By Southwest. I hope it comes to Louisville soon.

See “Ira & Abby” at the Village 8 starting Friday. Stu will host a Q&A after Friday’s 7:30 p.m. showing. —Sara Havens