What’s it like to have your life on screen? ‘Spoiler Alert’s’ Michael Ausiello found out

“You always hear actors talking about 14-hour days and wrapping at like 2 o’clock in the morning, but I’d never had that experience,” he says. “I’m someone who goes to bed early, but we had some nights we were shooting until 1 or 2 o’clock. It interfered with my sleep schedule… but in a good way.”

The reason? “Spoiler Alert” chronicles his relationship with husband Kit Cowan. “It was exciting to be working on something that I was so passionate about.”

Ausiello, an executive with TVLine and executive producer of the film, didn’t know what might happen to his book after it was published. Emmy winner Jim Parsons came calling and, soon a deal was struck. Parsons was cast as Ausiello; British actor Ben Aldridge was hired to play Cowan.

On the set, Ausiello says, “I was always aware that we were making a movie. I never felt like my life was flashing before my eyes. But there were some super-meta, surreal moments like when Jim is sitting in the TV Guide office or when he’s flashing my TV Guide business card. I never ever felt like we were making a documentary or replaying these events from my life. I was always aware that we were making a film.”

Still, “Spoiler Alert” is extremely touching, according to audiences who have seen it. When Cowan is diagnosed with cancer, Ausiello slips into caregiver mode. In the film, Parsons goes full Shirley MacLaine in “Terms of Endearment” when Cowan doesn’t get a bed in a hospital.

In reality, “it didn’t necessarily happen as explosively as it does in the movie,” Ausiello says. “But I ventured far outside my non-confrontational comfort zone and maybe made a big scene at the hospital.”

While Parsons doesn’t look like the real Michael Ausiello, he does have the same comedic sensibility. “From the moment I met Jim on the Red Carpet, I felt a connection to him,” Ausiello says. “So it feels kind of perfect that he would be playing me.”

Aldridge is ideal casting, too, because he actually looks like Cowan “and has a Kit-like spirit.”

Now that Ausiello has seen the film some 15 times, he says it isn’t difficult to watch because he’s aware it’s a movie. “Jim and Ben are so good at playing this couple, I get sucked in because it’s just such a moving piece of art.”

What separates “Spoiler Alert” from other relationship dramas are the details. Ausiello, for example, has what must be the largest individual collection of Smurf toys. When Cowan sees his apartment for the first time, he is taken aback. When they move in together (spoiler alert), much of that goes away. For the film, Ausiello let producers use pieces from his collection.

“It was a nerve-wracking day,” he admits. “For the first time, my collection was being handled by people other than myself. But the studio and the production team were careful and protective and respectful. Now it’s in storage in New York City, waiting for the next adventure.”

And Ausiello’s future as an author and filmmaker? “If I can find a story that fires me the way this one did, I would jump at it,” he says. “But I don’t want to write another book or do another project like this just because I feel the pressure to follow the experience. It has to be something that moves me.”

Now promoting the film, Ausiello finds it weird to be on the other side of an interview. “I don’t know if ‘fun’ would be the word because I’m most comfortable asking the questions,” he explains. “But it’s nice to get good feedback. I can’t imagine doing a press tour for a movie or project people hated. That would be excruciating.”