The Duplass Brothers: “Honest and real and really unpredictable is what we’re really looking for”
March 25, 2010 by Lance Carter
Filed under Interviews
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 13:37 — 9.4MB)
Jay and Mark Duplass (The Duplass Brothers) are hot right now. They have Cyrus (starring John C. Reilly, Jonah Hill & Marisa Tomei) and are currently in pre-production on Jeff Who Lives At Home (with Ed Helms and Jason Segel).
To be honest, I’d never seen one of their films till Cyrus. I’d heard about them, especially once I got to Austin for SXSW, and was excited to see the film. The film is both hilarious and touching and you will love seeing John C. Reilly and Jonah Hill in different roles than you’re familiar seeing them in.
I got a chance to talk with them in a roundtable interview so most of the questions aren’t mine. I did ask some casting questions regarding John and Jonah. And check out the audio (above or on iTunes) portion for the whole discussion.
(For more on Cyrus, click here for my interview with the stars John C. Reilly and Jonah Hill)
How long have you guys been working on this script?
Jay: Good question. You know, we normally write our scripts pretty quickly when we it’s just us producing them because we know we’re gonna improvise the dialogue a bit so once the structure is rock solid we know we’re production-ready. But you know, this was a script where you have to write it well and make it attractive to actors and to the studios so that they want to greenlight it. So we just spent a little time making it look pretty, you know? The bells and whistles. We were, I think we worked on it for like a year or so on and off. We were doing other things at the time. But on and off before we actually got the greenlight.
Do you have any experience as children as of single parents dating again or knowing people in those situations?
Mark: No, none really. We are good little Catholic boys and our Catholic parents have been married for 42 years and are still together.
Jay: What we do have a lot of experience with is desperation (laughter). We have that in spades.
Mark: Inter-personal dysfunction.
Along those lines, when you guys have the photograph of breastfeeding (laughter), it was terribly icky, I was dying laughing. Were there other things like that that you took out because you were like, you know what, that’s just too icky? Or was that about it?
Mark: The level of ickiness was about what we had hoped it would be. There’s an ick-ometer that we have on set.
Jay: We were riding high at about a 3.8 the whole time. If you stay right there, if you go over, people start crying and it gets weird.
John C. Reilly and Jonah Hill on ‘Cyrus’, Improvising and more!
March 22, 2010 by Lance Carter
Filed under Interviews
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 14:34 — 10.0MB)
John C. Reilly and Jonah Hill, two of the best comedic actors around right now, are currently starring in the new film, Cyrus.
Cyrus is a bit of a departure for both actors (although you can’t tell from the trailer). Reilly plays more of a grown up then he has recently and Hill plays it serious but it’s still an incredibly funny movie. The film, one of the highlights from SXSW, was mostly improvised and solidifies just how talented these two guys really are.
So do you think the era of the John C. Riley, leading man romantic comedy is finally here?
John: Yes (laughter). I don’t know. Is there an era right now? I hope so. I’m a very romantic person. I like doing parts like this. And I think there’s lots of people out there that are not represented in movies that have romantic feelings whose stories don’t get told.
Exactly.
John: You know what I’m talking about (laughter). Neither of us look like Brad Pitt. Let’s not fool ourselves. I’m with you brother.
Yeah, I’m happy to see you do this genre and bring a reality to it that’s missing, an emotional reality.
John: Yeah we try to be truthful in our emotions in this movie.
Did you think of yourself kind of as the straight man in this, if you’re gonna call it a romantic comedy?
John: No, you know, the “straight man” is Marisa’s [Tomei] character because she doesn’t know what’s going on. We’ve got this whole secret battle happening standing in front of her like it’s not going on. Because I’m a very foolish character in this movie, too, I make a lot of mistakes and bad choices and yeah.
But with a little more maturity though I think. I like the maturity of your character.
John: Yeah, that’s one thing I really did enjoy playing in this movie, you know I’m not a kid anymore. I often play or have played man-child kind of characters before. It was really great to be able to just sit in a scene and be as mature as I am in life. And I think that’s some of the best moments of awkwardness between Jonah and I when he’s like, ‘Seriously dude don’t fuck my mom’ (laughter), and my comeback, you improvised that line, and my comeback was, ‘Well, I’m not going to lie to you. Your mom and I did have sex.’ It’s just one of those moments where you’re being truthful. Alright, if this is the situation, regardless of what the script says, this is how I would deal with it, if I was sitting across from a 21-year-old like, Mommy and I are –
Jonah: Special friends (laughter).
South By Southwest: The Good, The Great
March 18, 2010 by Lance Carter
Filed under Columns
I’m back from South By Southwest (SXSW) and let me tell you, it was an experience! If you follow me on Twitter, you’ll know what I mean.
In five days, I saw 10 movies and interviewed 19 actors and directors.
And now, I’m exhausted!
I interviewed:
Edward Norton and Tim Blake Nelson for their fun and incredibly entertaining film, Leaves Of Grass.
Kyle Gallner and Brittney Robertson for coming of age story, Cherry.
Jon Foster and Director Will Canon from the great film, Brotherhood. How good was it? Well, it won the SXSW Award for Narrative Feature.
Patrick Wilson, Judy Greer, Chloe Sevigny and Director Chris D’Arienzo for the hilarious, Barry Munday.
John C. Reilly, Jonah Hill and directors Jay and Mark Duplass for the also hilarious, Cyrus.
Lee Turgensen, Paul Fitzgerald and director Joe Infantolino for the incredibly acted, Helena From The Wedding.
Ashley Green and Shiloh Fernandez from Skateland. I loved this move… what more can I say?
Random Quotes: John C. Reilly
October 22, 2009 by Lance Carter
Filed under Performing Arts News
On his versatile career:
“The key to being allowed to do anything is to keep changing so you don’t get defined as one thing. After I started doing comedies, I got lots of offers to do comedies. But that’s the time to go out and try to do something different.”
On deciding to become an actor:
“When I was a teenager, I worried, ‘What should I be? I should pick a career.’ At some point, in college, I figured out that the only people who get to try their hand at everything — cops, crooks, singers, race car drivers, vampires — are actors.
“You spend six months doing the most exciting parts of whatever occupation it is you’re playing. And then you move on. I turned the fun part of my life into my work.”
On not being recognized:
“That just means I’m doing my job.”
John C. Reilly talks comedy, drama and not being a ‘Who’
October 7, 2009 by Lance Carter
Filed under Performing Arts News
John C. Reilly is starring in the new film, Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant, where he plays a 200 year old vampire.
Cinematical: So, you’ve been in a bunch of movies. You were saying you’ve done over 50 movies and not many comedies, and lately you’ve done several.
John C. Reilly: Well, that is what they want to make you know. For some reason it has gotten very popular with studios.
But you have been really good at it. Do you think it is your improv background or do you just take to it naturally?
I guess so. I often played funny parts in serious movies, you know, like kind of comic relief in different things. I don’t know. To me, acting is acting. When the circumstances are ridiculous, then you are in comedy. But in terms of what I do as an actor, it is pretty similar from movie to movie.
Is that your biggest transformative role that you have … I mean clothing wise, wardrobe wise that you have been in?
Gangs of New York was a similar level of artifice, I guess. Yeah, I am one of those people who is not very patient in the makeup chair. I have been offered movies like Planet of the Apes and stuff like The Grinch Who Stole Christmas and I turned them down.
