New ‘Anchorman 2′ Trailer!

Here’s a new teaser trailer for Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues!

Starring Will Ferrell, David Koechner, Paul Rudd and Steve Carell, it’s pretty much the same as the first teaser trailer but who cares, right? It’s still funny and it’s just making me wish it were already December.

In theaters on December 20th! Read more

Trailer: ‘The Way, Way Back’ starring Steve Carell, Sam Rockwell, Maya Rudolph & Rob Corddry

Synopsis: The Way, Way Back is the funny and poignant coming of age story of 14-year-old Duncan’s (Liam James) summer vacation with his mother, Pam (Toni Collette), her overbearing boyfriend, Trent (Steve Carell), and his daughter, Steph (Zoe Levin).  Having a rough time fitting in, the introverted Duncan finds an unexpected friend in gregarious Owen (Sam Rockwell), manager of the Water Wizz water park. Through his funny, clandestine friendship with Owen, Duncan slowly opens up to and begins to finally find his place in the world – all during a summer he will never forget. 

Written & Directed by Nat Faxon & Jim Rash

Starring Steve Carell, Toni Collette, Allison Janney, AnnaSophia Robb, Sam Rockwell, Maya Rudolph and Liam James, Amanda Peet and Rob Corddry

In Theaters July 5th Read more

Steve Carell on ‘Burt Wonderstone’: “I think anyone loves to play a character that is either evil to a certain extent or has a real definable character flaw”

Though The Incredible Burt Wonderstone hasn’t received the best pre-release reviews, it seems most people are happy just to see star Steve Carell doing a full-out comedy again after several turns as a dour man having a mid-life crisis.  In a lengthy interview with Time magazine, Carell elaborates on his performance in Burt Wonderstone, working with co-star Jim Carrey, and how he shifted his mindset for his upcoming dramatic turn in Foxcatcher… and then right back to comedy for Anchorman 2.

Though Carell was inspired by Vegas-style magicians, he explains that his character wasn’t based on a single particular trickster.  He says, “It was more of an aesthetic thing. I was really just trying to get the sense of the showmanship and the performance quality that these guys have. There are different styles. There are more comedic-based magicians, there are close-up, sleight-of-hand magicians, there are big-prop magicians, there are shows ranging from incredibly spectacular to intimate. You kind of pick and choose, and you try to emulate different aspects of each of them. What I was doing was a conglomeration of a bunch of different things I observed.” Read more

Steve Carell on Shooting, Producing and Finding the Right cast for ‘The Incredible Burt Wonderstone’

Though I like Steve Carell from his roles in Anchorman, The 40 Year Old Virgin, and, of course, The Office, I really don’t think any of his recent films have really shown him at his comedic best.  However, from the looks of The Incredible Burt Wonderstone we may have another Carell winner coming soon.  The comedian spoke to Collider about the movie during filming, mainly speaking about how he varies his performances in multiple takes and the importance of casting the movie right.

Like other comedians, Carell tries to have fun when he goes through multiple takes of a scene by giving a varied performance in each.  He explains, “It’s nice to be able to try different things with each take and to find things that work and don’t work. You never know. You never know until you put it in front of an audience. But it’s nice to have options when you’re shooting it. You try to look at it, even incrementally, performance-wise and you try things that might be a little more broad or a little more grounded. Once they’re editing and finding the exact tone of the movie, you have those options.” Read more

Steve Buscemi on Improv in ‘The Incredible Burt Wonderstone’: “I never did improv professionally, but that was certainly in my training as an actor”

Steve Buscemi is one of my favorite actors, mostly because he’s so versatile.  He can be cold and calculating, like in Fargo or as Nucky Thompson in HBO’s Boardwalk Empire, and he can be quirky, like in Ghost World or The Big Lebowski.  But I’m looking forward to seeing a more comedic Buscemi — the kind who makes cameos in all of Adam Sandler‘s movies — as Anton Marvelton, the partner to Steve Carell‘s titular magician in The Incredible Burt Wonderstone.  Buscemi spoke to Collider about tackling a lead comedic role and his experience with improv.

As for whether he finds it more difficult to shoot a comedy or a drama, Buscemi points out that the rules of shooting a comedy are less strict.  He says, “The preparation is the same. But I’d say on this it’s just a bit looser, and there’s room for improv. Whereas on, say, Boardwalk, we really stick to the script. Not that we’re not sticking to the script on this, there’s just more room for improvisation.” Read more

Q&A: Showrunner Greg Daniels Gives the Details on the Final Season of ‘The Office’

Greg Daniels, the showrunner for NBC’s The Office, dropped a bombshell during a recent conference call I participated in: This will be the last season of The Office.

For fans of the show (like me), it was a bit of a shock but definitely not unexpected. This is the 9th season and it’s core group of actors, John Krasinski, Jenna Fischer and Ed Helms are in their last years of a contract and would be on the verge of a huge raise. Rainn Wilson is set to leave and spin off his character, Dwight, on the new show, The Farm and Mindy Kalling (who has a new FOX pilot) and B.J. Novak have taken diminished roles this season. So, yeah, a shock but not unexpected.

I’ll be sad to see the show go but as you’ll read in this interview, they won’t leave it’s audience hanging. Daniels talks about wrapping up the storylines, finally finding out about the documentary crew that’s been following the characters for the past 9 years and if Steve Carell will return.

The Office’s final season begins on NBC on Thursday, September 20th at 9/8c Read more

Steve Carell: “I would never do a role because I want people to perceive me a certain way”

Although movies like The 40 Year Old Virgin are hilarious, I think Steve Carell is at his best in supporting roles.  In fact, in the Meryl Streep and Tommy Lee Jones movie Hope Springs about an aging couple that is looking to put the spark back into their relationship, Carell plays a more subdued role than usual as the couple’s therapist. 

He speaks to MovieFone about working with the two respected veterans and why he sometimes chooses roles that are a bit out of his element.

When asked if he felt nervous acting with Oscar winners Meryl Streep and Tommy Lee Jones, Carell reveals that he was, but only at first.  He explains, “There was when I [first] read the script, but not actually in the execution. It was really just fun and exciting to be there with them. A lot of these scenes were sort of lengthy — they could be 8-10 minutes long — and [the director] David Frankel shot them uncut, so we went and would do the scene in its entirety. So that, to me, was fun and exciting, as well, to be able to do a little one-act play with these two. I guess I try not to be nervous, because I didn’t want that to be reflected in what I was doing at all, because the character I was playing had to be very much in control and poised and confident and calm. So that’s sort of where I tried to get my head.” Read more

Biography: Steve Carell

Steve Carell is one of the most sought-after actors in Hollywood. After first gaining recognition for his contributions as a correspondent on Comedy Central’s Emmy Award-winning The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Mr. Carell successfully segued into primetime television and feature film stardom.

The Massachusetts native’s first movie lead was in The 40-Year-Old Virgin, for which he wrote the screenplay with director Judd Apatow; the picture opened at #1 and remained atop the domestic box office for two straight weekends. The 2005 sleeper hit went on to gross more than $175 million worldwide and achieve #1 openings in 12 countries, followed by over $100 million in DVD sales in North America alone. The movie won an American Film Institute Award as one of its (10 Best) AFI Movies of the Year, among other honors. Mr. Carell and Mr. Apatow shared a Writers Guild of America Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay.

Mr. Carell shared the Screen Actors Guild Awards’ top movies prize, for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture, with his fellow actors from Little Miss Sunshine, directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris from Michael Arndt’s Academy Award-winning screenplay. The movie’s many other accolades included an Academy Award nomination for Best Picture. Read more

Steve Carell on ‘Seeking a Friend’, Working with Dogs and the Upcoming, ‘Hope Springs’

Looks like Steve Carell is steering away from light comedy.

The former Office star is starring in the dark comedy Seeking A Friend for the End of the World.  In an interview with Reuters, he said, “I thought the script was oddly funny and dark and absurd, but also moving and relevant.  I thought it would be very challenging to try and mine any sort of comedy based on this dark premise.”

Carell admits that he probably wouldn’t be able to score with his costar Keira Knightley in the real world.  “It would take the apocalypse to make it work,” he said.  “These are two people that, given any other circumstance, wouldn’t become friends, let alone drawn together in a soulful way…All of those things melt away and it becomes about who they are, what they need and what they care about.” Read more

Interview: Actor Tyler Langdon on Playing a Character with Social Anxiety in ‘Nerve’ and Getting Cast in ‘The Incredible Burt Wonderstone’

I recently had the chance to see Nerve, an independent film about a character with social anxiety starring Tyler Langdon.  I had never seen Langdon act before, but I was really impressed by his performance in the movie as Josh Biggs.  I was happy to hear that after starring in Nerve and receiving a Hollywood Discovery Award at the Hollywood Film Festival, Langdon is set to appear in the upcoming New Line Cinema comedy The Incredible Burt Wonderstone as the teenage version of star Steve Carell‘s character. 

This is by far the most visible role for Langdon, and I reached out to see what he could say about how he transitioned from a lead role in an independent film to a supporting role in a big-budget Hollywood movie.  In particular, he elaborates on how he managed to make that leap from indie film festivals to multiplexes.

You’ve obviously been a working actor for quite some time, but one of your most high profile roles to date is the role of Josh Biggs in Nerve.  How did you get that part?

I originally heard about the role through LA Casting, believe it or not. From what the director, J.R. Sawyers, tells me, I was one of only a few people in the original audition for Josh who played it exactly as he had imagined. He brought me back in for a callback a week or so later and then offered me the part shortly after that. Read more

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