Jonah Hill Explains Why He Wanted His 'Don't Look Up' Character to Carry an Hermès Birkin Bag

Jonah Hill's character Jason Orlean in Don't Look Up made quite the fashion statement by carrying a highly sought-after Hermès Birkin handbag in the movie. But viewers may be surprised to hear that the luxe accessory wasn't written into the script by the film's writers — it was actually Hill himself who improvised the style moment.

Hill, who plays the role of President Janie Orlean's (Meryl Streep) chief of staff son, thought the Birkin bag would be a subtle reminder of how Jason "worships his mom."

"He's in a suit because he works in the White House, but I gave him a Birkin because he's kind of emulating his mother," the actor, 38, told W Magazine.

"A lot of these people worship their dads, and I thought it was cool that he worships his mom," Hill continued. "He always calls his mom a 'total rock star.' Isn't that awesome?"

Working along the star-studded cast of Don't Look Up was a special experience for Hill. And even he admits he was a bit starstruck by Streep when they first began the project.

"For sure. I definitely was [starstruck] when I met Meryl. I maybe shook her hand a couple of times," Hill said.

Once he got to know Streep, they immediately hit it off. "Then, like, right away we had to have a superclose dynamic. I was excited. She's so awesome: as a person, as a professional, as an artist," Hill explained. "She was there rehearsing after I left. She was there before me. She's like in beast mode all the time, and cool. We would talk a lot and hang out, so the intimidation goes away pretty quickly."

The plot of Don't Look Up, which was released on Netflix on Dec. 24, deals with the impending end of the world, in which Michigan State astronomy grad student Kate Dibiasky (Jennifer Lawrence) discovers a new, yet deadly comet heading toward Earth, with a nearly 100% probability of wiping out the planet within six months.

Professor Dr. Randall Mindy (played by Leonardo DiCaprio), Dibiasky and NASA's Dr. Teddy Oglethorpe (Rob Morgan) try to warn President Janie Orlean (Streep) and her Jason Orlean (Hill) of the catastrophic-level event.

Since the end-of-world disaster movie debuted on Netflix, it broke a record for the streaming service when it amassed the most hours viewed in a single week (Dec. 27 through Jan. 2) with 152.29 million hours streamed around the world. Netflix confirmed the new record to PEOPLE. In its first week of release, the movie attracted 111.03 million viewing hours and debuted among Netflix's top 10 list in 94 countries.

It now sits as the platform's No. 3 most-viewed film of all time (in a film's first 28 days) behind 2018's Bird Box and last year's Red Notice, per Netflix's tallies.

Don't Look Up is now streaming on Netflix.