sentences:  She found the character in the novel and script unsympathetic ("an ogre, a princess, an ass", as she called her) and insisted on approaching Joanna from a more sympathetic point of view.Hoffman believed that the recent loss of her fiancé, John Cazale, only months earlier, gave Streep an emotional edge and "still-fresh pain" to draw on for the performance.Streep was only contracted to work 12 days on the film.