You can still have chemistry on screen without getting on with the person. But it just makes your job a lot easier if you don't have to gird your loins, if that's not quite the right phrase, every time you're going to do a scene with that person.
Marriage is like wine. It is not be properly judged until the second glass.
I've often wished when I started a book I knew what was going to happen. I talked to writers who write 80-page outlines, and I'm just in awe of that.

