BLAST: I was so happy to see Christ O’Dowd as a love interest in this film. I love his work on “The IT Crowd.”
KW: Isn’t he just the best?
BLAST: Absolutely. It was great to see Jon Hamm, the sort of ideal of the ‘handsome man,’ play a total asshole against Chris’s loveable everyman.
KW: I know! He’s such a dream.
WMC: Everybody’s saying that. We’ve talked to so many people who are like ‘Who is that?’ Especially after what he plays on “The IT Crowd” – I mean, he looks like he smells, just from the TV – so it’s great that he’s so dishy.
KW: And he’s an amazing actor. And a really funny improviser as well.
BLAST: Your chemistry with Maya Rudolph in the film is exceptional. Obviously, you know each other pretty well – are you trying to make each other laugh?
KW: Well, we did a lot of laughing. We weren’t intentionally trying to make each other laugh, but I do remember the scene at the shower, when we’re having that really serious fight and then all of sudden, we start talking about her bleaching her asshole. It was totally improvised – we were yelling it at each other and we’re looking at each other like ‘Are you going to laugh? Because I’m about to start laughing.’ And then the scene was over and we were totally laughing like ‘What were we talking about? Wait, can we try that again? That felt like it was funny. Can we try it again?’
But Maya and I – I instantly clicked with her when I started working with her, and we definitely have a second language with each other when we’re in a room together. We talk a lot.
WMC: They can’t not be funny. In between takes, for me, it was entertaining just to sit by and eavesdrop on their conversations, because everything they say is funny. They’ll start talking in different voices, they’ll start singing, a dance number might break out, then back to something else. You know, those disjointed conversations you can have with someone that you’re really close to, and no one else can follow them.
Those two – you guys! I’d watch a web series with you. I really would.
BLAST: Have you both always been this hilarious? When was the first time that someone said, “Hey – you’re really funny?”
KW: I don’t know. I remember going to a birthday party when I was little and someone telling me that I was weird. I do remember that, and it traumatized me. Now, I realize that’s a compliment. I really don’t remember – I mean, the Groundlings was the first place that I found my voice in that way.
WMC: I remember in the first grade, this big, mean girl decided we were going to be friends.
KW: This is the best beginning of a story ever.
WMC: And I was really small, ok, a real small, sickly, pale kid. So I had this big bully as my friend. She was really mean, but I figured out the way to make her not be mean was to make her laugh. So, as kind a protective device.
BLAST: When she’d be mean to other people?
WMC: No, when she was mean to me! So, to protect my own self. And to avoid getting a spanking when I was bad. I’d sort of jolly my mom out of punishing me.
KW: I wish you had video of that.
WMC: I’m sure it was so annoying. I had a feeling that I was like Bobby Hill, on “King of the Hill” – look how funny he thinks he is.
BLAST: Coming from a sketch comedy background, was it hard to play these sustained film characters?
KW: You know, it’s so hard to compare, because they are really two completely different worlds. Sketch characters last for three minutes, they’re usually a little broader, especially with “SNL” – it’s live, they’re so fast, you know – after commercial, you’re playing a completely different person.
With this, it was like ‘Oh, we’re shooting this one again?’ You got many opportunities to do the same scene, over and over, which is also good, so it’s like two different muscles.
BLAST: So do you find it necessary to switch up your comedy styles?
KW: I think what’s funny is funny, and when you know what kind of character you have to play, you just kind of get in that zone.
WMC: I think you do change it a little though, because a sketch is like three minutes.
KW: It’s like ‘joke, joke, joke, joke.’
WMC: You’ve got to big and broad and get the point across and ‘goodbye.’ With this, you’ve got to be a little more subtle and play the reality of it. But it’s hard – what was the shoot, 50 days?
KW: 51.
WMC: She’s got to live with the character of Annie for 51 days. And she’s kind of a sad sack. Poor Annie, her life is falling apart, and that’s how you have to spend the majority of your day for 51 days – being that person.
BLAST: Was it easy to get Wilson Phillips to appear in the film?
KW: Yes! I mean, ‘yes,’ that’s a weird answer. They showed up and we were so excited that they said yes.
WMC: To shoot at a really hot botanical garden – it was so hot – in the middle of the night. It’s like ‘just walk out onto this water.’ It was a pretty strange scene. I mean, they were recording a Christmas album at the time.
KW: They’re hot ladies.
WMC: They’re hot! They are super cute and funny, and we were geeking out all over the place.
KW: And we had to sing along to that song [WP classic “Hold On”] for hours and it never go old. You’d see people in the crew, guys kind of nodding along.
BLAST: It was stuck in my head for a couple days after.
KW: Try two months. That was stuck in my head forever.
WMC: And they would shoot our individual close-ups of us just jammin’ out. So we just all night long.
BLAST: So why Wilson Phillips and why “Hold On”? Seems a little random.
WMC: That’s because you’re young. Back when we were coming up…
KW: That is a song that women our age sing along to in our cars.
WMC: That was the anthem of the 90s. Hold on for one more day! Oh my god, I’m old.
BLAST: Another point on great casting, what was it like to work with Jill Clayburgh?
KW: It was beyond an honor. She’s so funny. There were, maybe two or three scenes that got cut. She was remarkable. It was a highlight of my career.
BLAST: I doubt I’ll have the opportunity to ask this to anyone ever again, so I have to know – what was it like to motorboat Helen Mirren?
KW: It was warm and, yeah, something I can brag about at dinner parties.
WMC: Wasn’t that the highlight of your career?
KW: That might be. She was a sport – I remember, before we shot it, I was like ‘I’m really going to get in there,’ and she’s like ‘Okay. Do it. It’s fine with me.’
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