Actress Jane Seymour sympathised with her Austenland director Jerusha Hess while shooting the new romantic comedy after she had to fire her own children from the movie.

The Napoleon Dynamite writer-turned-filmmaker cast her two young kids, Eliott and Greta, in a cottage scene, but they were unable to deliver the comedic performance their mother had envisioned.

Seymour was caught in the middle of the awkward shoot but she knew exactly what Hess was going through.

She tells Wenn, "Jerusha was torn between being a mother and being a director and decided to (axe) her kids from the movie. And I looked at her (during filming), and I said, 'Jerusha, I know exactly how this is. I've had my children in my movies before, and it is very taxing.'"