“Her characters often serve to ‘hold up the wall’ of the narrative, she said, like the empathetic best friend in ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ or the kindly stranger in ‘Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.’ Or the kindly mental-institution psychiatrist in ‘It’s Kind of a Funny Story,’ the kindly rape-treatment counselor in ‘Trust’ or the kindly medium in ‘Beautiful Creatures.'”