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September 2009
CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS
| An Interview with Anna Faris, Bobb'e J. Thompson, and Bill Hader

CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS
An Interview with Anna Faris, Bobb'e J. Thompson, and Bill Hader
By Brad Balfour


September 14, 2009





Actors Anna Faris, Bobb’e J. Thompson, and Bill Hader Predict "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs" Will Make You Hungry for More

Judging by the lightheartedness expressed at the press conference for the new animated film, "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs," actors Anna Faris, Bobb’e J. Thompson, and Bill Hader had as much fun making it as we did hearing them talk about it. Faris and Hader are comic vets with various movies and television shows between them; Thompson made his humorous mark as the bratty kid in "Role Models."

Inspired by the beloved children's book of the same name, directors/writers Phil Lord and Chris Miller adapts the story of a town where food falls from the sky like rain into a tale of a young inventor, Flint Lockwood (voiced by Hader), who dreams of creating something that will improve life. When he makes a machine that transforms water into food, novice weathergirl Sam Sparks (voiced by Faris)--who hides her intelligence behind a perky exterior--comes to cover the phenomenon of an outpouring of food from above when his machine lodges itself in the clouds above. Other characters include: Tim Lockwood (James Caan), Flint's technophobic father; spoiled local star Brent, who has plagued Flint since childhood (Andy Samberg); By-the-book town cop Earl Devereaux (Mr. T); Earl's rule-breaking son, Cal (Thompson); and Mayor Shelbourne (Bruce Campbell), who realizes that Flint's invention can put the town, and himself, on the map.

Adapted from Ron and Judi Barrett's book, this 3D animated funny adventure not only illustrates a world where giant pancakes, pasta and cheeseburgers fall from the sky as easily as raindrops but it shows how things can go terribly wrong when excess amounts of food overload cities and towns (and kids' bellies). Besides the wacky food scenes--ice cream snowball fights--the directors throw in lots of hilarious pop culture references to make the film as much fun for adults as the kids.


Anna Faris
Anna Faris
  Q: How did you guys develop the characters--did they give you a drawing of the characters or just strictly with the script? And did you get a chance to go back in once you saw some of the renderings and do more based on that?


Anna Faris: They showed us a drawing of our characters before we started recording; that’s pretty much all we had.But they had written pretty specific characters, so it wasn’t a huge search, although Bill has a different story about that. He had a really hard time finding the character. No I’m just kidding. It was amazing; we worked for about a year and then went back in and continued to tweak all the animation. It was pretty incredible to see it all come to life.

Bobb'e J. Thompson: A drawing was pretty much all I had to work off of. It wasn’t too hard, wasn’t too easy. There were difficulties in the middle because I really didn’t figure out what type of kid Cal was until I watched the film. But then I was like okay, I did pretty good.

BH: I had a similar thing. I remember I was brought into a conference room in New York and it was this weird video conferencey thing where they played a reel, and it was a thing of Sam Sparks walking on Jell-O, and then a thing of my character going like this, and I was like, “I’m in!” It was hard actually; the first day of recording I was playing kind of a different guy and then we were like, we think we need to go another way with this.

Q: This movie is obviously about food, and I was wondering if you could talk about your relationship with food. Do you feel watching this that you never want to eat again? Do you find some things repulsive? And Anna, congratulations; didn’t you just get married this summer?

AF: Yes, I did. And I’m super happy; it’s been a great summer. And as far as food goes; my mom is an incredible cook and cooking’s probably my most favorite hobby. And of course I love to try new things. If I wasn’t an actress I would like to be a restaurant critic. We’ll see how that goes.

BJT: I have a really deep relationship with food. Nah. My mama is also a great cook, as am I.


BB: What do you cook?

BJT: Well I cook some instant noodles. [laughter]

Bill Hader: I can’t even do that.

BJT: I’ll teach you. My mama’s a good cook so anytime she cooks I learn a lot from her in the kitchen. I’m kind of very bloated; I eat a lot.

  Anna Faris


BH: My mom is an okay cook. She was alright; she’s really good at like Thanksgiving dinner, it’s weird. Little stuff is kind of hard but she would cook a huge feast and it’s really easy. My relationship with food is very neutral; we’re just friends.


Q: What surprised you the most about seeing this film for the first time? And, Anna, you were at Comic-Con this year; can you tell us about your experiences and highlights at that event?

AF: I had never been to Comic-Con before and I had a fantastic time. I mean, it’s a show. I’m sure probably most of you folks have been there; what surprised me was how happy everybody is there.

They’ve been looking forward to this all year, and so you’re in an environment that for the most part is really supportive, really joyous. I can relate to the idea of escaping through a character, so that was really cool to see all these people doing the same thing.

BH: I remember the first time I saw the film. I saw the Jell-O mold scene; that was the first scene we saw with all of our voices in it, and it was just such a crazy experience. Because you sit alone in a booth and you really don’t know how it’s going to come out. Phil and Chris are great at guiding you, but really all you do is sit in a booth and it’s really exhausting. You say the same line three times in a row and then stop, talk about it, and do it again. You do like eight different versions of something, so by the time you’re done you have no idea.

So when I saw it come together I was so proud of it. And I knew it was good because I kind of got lost in the movie. A lot of times when you’re watching something you’ve done you’re kind of going, “Why am I doing that?” but this was just like so cool. Especially in 3D; it just is almost tailor made for 3D. Stuff flying at you, it rains food.


Q: You just mentioned some of the downsides of doing voice acting; can all three of you talk about what’s appealing about this sort of acting?

BH: Initially you think like "Hey, I could just walk in and you don’t have to worry about it. You just wake up in the morning and go do some voice acting."

AF: We all thought it was going to be easy, basically.

BH: It is one of the hardest jobs I’ve ever had.

AF: Yeah; it is incredibly challenging.

Anna Faris
Bill Hader
 

BH: It’s just draining. But it’s just a unique challenge of trying to channel everything into your voice. And I’m a big fan of animated movies. I think I read something with Tom Hanks talking about “Toy Story” and how he was exhausted all the time. I thought, "Okay good, I’m not just a baby."

BJT: For me, the upside was, like they say, no hair and makeup; you just come in in some basketball shorts and a tank top. Using my voice and not really my face, although it is beautiful, I don’t have to use it. I get to be me and it shows through the character.

BH: Man, I am going to be working for you some day.

AF: They asked me to do this movie and I was so excited. It was a book that I loved as a child so I was really honored to be asked to do it. I did some voice work early on in Seattle when I was growing up and I loved the idea of doing it again. And it’s finally a movie that I’ve done that people under 10 can see. My parents are happy [laughs].


Q: This is a fun, fun movie to watch. I know all of you enjoyed watching it but there are a lot of issues here; you talk about obesity, things of that nature. Are there messages that you want the audience to take from this film?

AF: For me, when I see the movie, there are a number of themes and messages in it. As far as my character, I think she suppresses her intelligence a little bit because she feels some pressure by society, whether it’s through her work or being a woman, to play a certain kind of role. And through meeting Flint she finally sort of lets her guard down and is accepted for who she really is.

BH: I just like the idea of embracing your geekiness. I know that’s something I can relate to; the things that you were in junior high that made you weird or different or whatever it is and saying, “No I like that; it makes me unique.” I think that’s a good message.

BJT: The message that stuck out to me is be comfortable with you who are. I got that from Flint. Because I’m in 8th grade and not many eight grader’s height and I learned to really not worry about it; just be me.

AF: I do think there’s also a really interesting idea of the excessiveness and what we wish for in indulgence and excessiveness can be quite harmful. Which I think is appropriate for this time.


Q: Usually in romantic comedies it’s about a geek girl being transformed into a pretty one. This one seems to be the reverse--can you elaborate on that? Did you relate to it bringing the geekiness out of you?

BJT: I was never a geek; I was always popular [laughs]. But no, I was kind of the only sixth grader that still watched “SpongeBob” so I had to kind of cope with it.

BH: It was kind of a cool moment when you realize that that could be attractive to somebody, that being yourself is good. I remember the first time I met my wife, I went to her apartment and she had “Star Wars” curtains. I said, “I am going to marry you.” I like that reversal; they do that a lot in movies, where the geeky girl becomes cute, and I always was more attracted to the geeky girl in those movies. Then she becomes a girl that would never talk to me.

AF: Bill and I have talked a little bit about this, but we were both geeks in high school. I used to wear Christmas tree skirts as a cape.

BJT: Yikes.

AF: Now I’m comfortable enough to talk about it.

BH: I was kind of like Flint; I was really tall and skinny and gangly. I was taller than everybody in my class. I remember this one time in first grade where we had a test and everybody had to stand on one leg--that was the test--and I couldn’t do it, I was so lopsided. And they were like, “You fail.”
  Anna Faris

Q: Obviously inventing is a big part of this movie--did any of you ever attempt to invent something.

BH: A friend and I tried to invent a robot in his garage when we were kids. My friend’s name was Mark and I wanted to call the robot T-86 because it was 1986 and I thought I was being a genius, and he wanted to call the robot Mark. I stopped hanging out with him.

BJT: I tried. See, my friend and I way way back in the day--about like two weeks ago--we actually tried to invent an automatic pushbutton donut maker type of thing. So we took an Easy Bake oven--it was his sister's--and we spray painted it black to make it look boyish, and we did a whole bunch of stuff and it didn’t work.

BH: You should patent that. You could make some money off that.

BJT: Cops would love it, right?

AF: I wasn’t too mechanical; I’m still not. I was really into bugs and I still do love bumble bees and bees in general--honey bees, not carnivorous bees--and I managed to capture the queen bumble bee when she left her nest in the winter. They’re a little drowsy at that point and I attempted to make a bumble bee hive, but she died. That’s pretty geeky I think. I was like 14 or 15.


Anna Faris
Bobb'e J. Thompson
  Q: What to you remember about when you went to your first acting job?

BJT; My first acting job I had at least two missing teeth and I talked with a lisp. It was actually “My Baby’s Daddy” with Anthony Anderson and Eddie Griffin. It was a feature film with Miramax and it was really fun. It was my very first acting job ever. I didn’t know what the heck I was doing, so instead of trying to remember my lines I thought I was still a regular kid and I was chasing lightening bugs. My first big break was “Role Models”.

BH: You were funny in that. Mine was “SNL”.
Q: How did you land that gig?

BH: I was working as an assistant editor on “Iron Chef” and I was doing sketch comedy and stuff in my free time. I performed a show and Megan Mullaly was in the audience because her brother-in-law was in the show, and afterwards she was like, “Hey, you were really funny,” and I was like “Oh thanks,” and didn’t think anything of it.

Then, a month later, I was at “Iron Chef” and an editor was getting mad at me and basically saying, “You’ll never become an editor because you can’t even be an assistant editor.” I was a pretty lousy assistant editor. And Megan Mullaly called me and said, “I just told Lorne Michaels about you and he wants to meet you.” I was on the phone with her and I got another call from a 212 number and I was like, “Hello?” and it was like, “Hi, this is someone from Lorne Michaels’ office; we want to fly you out,” and I was like, “What?” I had no manager, no agent, no headshot; Megan Mullaly totally gave me a career. So I owe everything to her.

AF: I was nine and did an Arthur Miller play called “Danger: Memory!” at the Seattle Repertory Theatre. I think I got paid $250, which was huge. I was rolling in the dough; I think I’m still living off that. I went out and I bought a piano phone--a phone where the keys were, which was pretty awesome.


Q: What it’s like to do a junket in a candy store. And what are some of your favorite sweets or guilty pleasure foods?

BJT: I’m going to start this one off for sure. Being in this candy store is heaven. And then I like cupcakes, and Ho Hoes, and glazed donuts, and anything sweet.

BH: And you like the pickle ice cream?

BJT: No; that was my sister. I wouldn’t taste it. No bacon chocolate bar, no bacon gum. Just no.

BH: Yeah that’s what I was saying; a guy had to look at bacon and say, “I wish this was a mint.”

BJT: That’s what I’m saying. And the funny thing about the candy bar is, you know those little rice crispers that are inside candy bars? It's bacon bits inside the candy bar. You bite into it and it tastes like chocolate dipped in bacon grease.

BH: This guy's going to read this and just be bummed out. “They didn’t like my invention.”

AF: Sweets-wise, my indulgence is definitely donuts.

BJT: We’ve shared a cupcake or two.
  Anna Faris

AF: But I’m definitely a little bit of a salty, savory kind of gal. Chips are trouble; I raided the mini-bar last night at the hotel.

BJT: You and me both.

BH: I like cupcakes; those are big. I used to live in Chelsea by this place called Billy’s Bakery, and it was hard to walk by that place. It just pulls you in and you’re like, “I will take all of these.” And when I was a kid, I really liked Suzie Q’s, remember Hostess Suzie Q’s? Oh my god. I grew up in Oklahoma and when I came out of Oklahoma I couldn’t find them anywhere, so if I find Suzie Q’s I flip out.

BJT: I grew up in Kansas City so, yes.


Q: Did you find in the process of working on the film any dialogue that stuck with you, that you liked a great deal like a saying, slogan or a joke.

AF: We did a session together when the cheeseburgers are falling and they actually got us In-N-Out burgers.

BH: That was awesome.

AF: It was. So they wanted us to talk with our mouth full and it was a great excuse to eat in In-N-Out Burger.

BH: Yeah you walked into the recording studio and it was just like dozens and dozens of In-N-Out burgers. And they’re just bringing them in really hot, and I was like, “I don’t think we got that one, let’s do it again.” So yeah it was a lot of fun.

BJT: I’m going to have to agree with Anna on the In-N-Out Burger because that was just pure awesomeness.









 

 


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