When Whit Stillman listened in on a conference call to discuss casting on his current film, “Damsels in Distress,” he heard way more than expected. Two years ago, Stillman was angling to cast British ingenue Ophelia Lovibond in his Greta Gerwig movie, but one of the actress’ agents apparently had other ideas. “First you have her running around in a bikini in an Ashton Kutcher film, and now a Whit Stillman movie?!” Stillman heard one of Lovibond’s team exclaim at a colleague on the call. And Stillman was even repped by the same agency as Lovibond. She wound up in big-budget bomb “Mr. Popper’s Penguins,” and he changed agencies. Meanwhile “Damsels” is playing its 17th week, at Cinema Village.