Interview: Tom McCarthy and Alex Shaffer of ‘Win Win’

Posted on March 23, 2011 at 8:00 am

Tom McCarthy has appeared as an actor in movies like “Duplicity” and “Baby Mama” but he is now better known for his writing and directing the acclaimed films “The Station Agent,” the Oscar-winning “Spotlight,” and “The Visitor.” His film “Win Win,” stars newcomer Alex Shaffer as a teenage wrestling champ who ends up staying with a lawyer/coach played by Paul Giamatti when his grandfather, who is in the early stages of dementia, is placed by Giamatti’s character into a nursing home. I spoke to both of them about wrestling, writing, what it feels like to be good at both, and doing whatever it takes.

I don’t know much about wrestling so I was surprised by how fast you moved.

TM: Especially the lighter weights. They are really exciting. The lighter weights it’s just wicked to watch. That match that I went to at your school – even the refs couldn’t keep up.

AS: Over 130 or 140 it’s more about strength.

One of the key moments in the film has Paul Giamatti’s character asking your character, Kyle, what it feels like to be that good at something. Kyle says it feels like being in control. Is that how it feels?

AS: For Kyle, for me it just feels good to be that good. It’s a very comforting feeling.

TM: That would have been a good answer for Kyle, too.

What makes you feel that good?

TM: I like being immersed in work. I like it when I’m in a sweet spot in the work. When I’m writing I have a ritual or a regimen and I get really lost in it, get out of my own head and follow an idea, or a story, or a character. I really like being in that space.

What was the beginning of the idea of this movie for you?

TM: I have this mental folder that I drop things into and when they feel like they’re of the same world I start to put together the movie. It certainly was the wrestling at the beginning. I called Joe , my co-writer, and said, “Have you ever seen a movie about high school wrestling?” We started to joke about our own bad experiences and then talked about the good ones, the world in general, how unique a world it was, looking back on it 20 years later.

And the other idea was about where we are in society, the title, “Win Win,” like “Oh, you can have a mortgage and pay nothing and a car and put no money down” and we all believed it for a while. Oh, that’s great, why wouldn’t you do that! It will cost nothing! The other idea that aligned with that thought was that we are polarized in society. The bad bankers did bad things – but those people are our neighbors. We ride the train, the bus with them. They’re not bad people; they just made some bad choices.

So wrestling with that part of our human condition – we all have that aptitude, to so surprisingly and sometimes shockingly bad things in certain scenarios. Mike is confronted with that and that I felt very interested in. It’s not enough to say, “I have a family, I have a good job, I’m a good person.” That is not an excuse or a guarantee. That I found interesting.

Alex, you went from doing something that you knew very well and were very good at to something that was completely new to you, and you were surrounded by some of the most experienced and talented actors in movies. What was that like for you?

AS: I wasn’t nervous because it was something I didn’t care about that much. Sorry, Tom! Halfways, no more like one-third of the way through, I began to think, “I really want to do good. I like this guy, I don’t want to ruin the movie for him.”

TM: I think that’s a good way to go into it! I think that’s a problem for a lot of actors who go into an audition wanting it so badly, they sabotage themselves because they’re so anxious. I think when I stopped caring about acting quite so much, when I got more involved in writing and directing, either I’m right for it or not, I started getting more jobs.

How did you like being a blonde for the filming?

AS: I was a blonde before the filming.

TM: He came to us like that!

AS: It wasn’t my idea for the movie. Our team before we wrestled Phillipsburg, not every year but when the team’s good, we want to psych them out, so that year the whole team bleached our hair blonde.

I thought it was very funny that Amy Ryan’s character Jackie called you Eminem.

TM: We got a studio note about that: “Emeneim, isn’t he a little bit past now?” I don’t think Jackie’s cutting edge! And besides, now he won the Grammy!

AS: He’s amazing! He will never be gone!
(more…)

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The Art of the Movie Title Sequence

Posted on March 22, 2011 at 9:51 pm

A Brief History of Title Design from Ian Albinson on Vimeo.

A wonderful salute to movie titles.

‘Memphis’ Comes to Movie Theaters — Special Event

Posted on March 22, 2011 at 9:43 pm

The Broadway smash hit, “Memphis,” Tony Award-winner for best musical, is coming to a movie theater near you. NCM Fathom and Broadway Worldwide are presenting an exclusive Broadway musical event in more than than 530 movie theaters for four nights only: Thursday, April 28; Saturday, April 30; and Tuesday, May 3 at 7:30 p.m., with a special matinee on Sunday, May 1 at 12:30 p.m. (all times are local). This is the first time a current Tony Award-winning Best Musical will be presented in movie theaters while concurrently running on Broadway. In addition to the electrifying musical, audiences will be treated to an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at the musical that won four 2010 Tony Awards and continues to play to sold out houses on Broadway. “Memphis” was captured live in performance with the original Broadway cast for this special Fathom event presentation.

Tickets are available at participating theater box offices and online. For a complete list of theater locations, prices and additional information — including cast photos and other details —visit the NCM Fathom website (theaters and participants are subject to change).

“Memphis” takes place in the smoky halls and underground clubs of the segregated 50’s, where a young white DJ named Huey Calhoun (Chad Kimball) fell in love with everything he shouldn’t: rock and roll and an electrifying black singer (Montego Glover). It is an original story about the cultural revolution that erupted when his vision met her voice, and the music changed forever. Bursting off the stage with explosive dancing, irresistible songs and a thrilling tale of fame and forbidden love, this incredible journey is filled with laughter, soaring emotion and roof-raising rock ‘n’ roll.

This is the first time that audiences across the country will have the chance to see the Broadway cast of an award-winning musical while the show is still playing in New York. “Memphis’ will launch a U. S. national tour in Memphis, Tenn., in October 2011 at the Orpheum Theatre.

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Based on a play Musical

Yogi Bear

Posted on March 22, 2011 at 7:38 pm

Yogi Bear (voice of Dan Aykroyd) is genuinely perplexed by the suggestion that he might want to forage for food and catch fish with his paws. “Isn’t that kind of unsanitary?”

He may live in the woods, but for Yogi, star of the 1960’s series of cartoons from Hanna-Barbera, that does not mean his life has to be bereft of civilization. He has a best friend named Boo Boo with a natty bow tie (voice of Justin Timberlake!). His cave is equipped with a soda machine. He is never seen without his hat, collar, and tie. And he is a well-known aficionado of fine dining. His preferred cuisine is the contents of picnic baskets brought by visitors to Jellystone Park, the campground and nature preserve that is his home. He loves picnic baskets so much, he’s given them an extra syllable, to hold onto the word just a little longer. He calls them “pick-a-nic baskets,” and they are to him what the grail was to Galahad, the whale was to Ahab, and the Road Runner is to Wile E. Coyote.

But to the frustrated Ranger Smith (the always-likable Tom Cavanagh), Yogi’s antics make it impossible for him to have the nice, peaceful, orderly park he dreams of. “There’s no better place on earth,” he sighs, “except without him.” And Smith can’t figure out how to talk to the pretty nature nerd who has arrived to make a documentary about the talking bear in Jellystone Park (the always-adorable Anna Faris as Rachel).

Soon, though, Smith has a bigger problem. The Mayor (slimy Andrew Daly) and his aide (elfin Nathan Corddry) want rescue the city’s budget by privatizing the park and selling off the logging rights. Ranger Smith has just one week to get enough money from increased admissions to the park to save the day.

Yogi Bear began as one segment of the 1958 animated series “Huckleberry Hound.” He quickly eclipsed the other characters, who are all but forgotten (I don’t see “Pixie, Trixie, and Mr. Jinks: The Movie” coming to a multiplex any time soon), and soon became a headliner with his own series. Yogi’s adventures were filled with the same silly slapstick, but he had a special quality that endeared him to kids. They identified with his place midway between the animal world of the forest and Smith’s ultra-civilized world of a uniformed, rule-enforcing (but always-forgiving) grown-up.

Yogi often brags that he is “smarter than the average bear,” but he often outsmarts himself, allowing kids to feel that they are a step ahead of him. As often in comedy, especially for kids, a lot of the humor in cartoons comes from ineptitude and foolishness. Children, who are constantly surrounded by things they do not understand love to see characters who are even more confounded by the world around them. In this film, Yogi may be smart enough to design a flying contraption. But his efforts to persuade Ranger Smith that it is not intended for stealing picnic baskets fails when the Ranger points out that printed across its stern is “Baskitnabber 2000.”

Moments like these are classic Yogi, but it is still an uneven transition to a live-action feature film from the very simplified story-line and animation of a seven-minute hand-drawn cartoon. The running time, computer graphics, and 3D effects overwhelm the slightness of the material, especially when it departs from the core relationship of Yogi and Ranger Smith. The story drags in the middle, when the junior ranger (T.J. Miller), chafing because Ranger Smith won’t let him do anything but sort maps, agrees to sabotage the efforts to keep the park going in exchange for a promotion. Smith’s inept efforts to romance the pretty film-maker are weak and it hardly helps when Yogi offers his advice to Smith about, ahem, marking his territory.

These are what I call “lunchbox movies.” We’ve had a string of big-budget multiplex fodder featuring whatever character was on some studio executive’s second grade lunchbox (Garfield, Alvin and the Chipmunks, Inspector Gadget). They toss in some potty humor for the little kids and some boombox oldies to amuse the parents (Sir Mix-a-Lot will be cashing yet another royalty check). But Yogi and his pic-a-nic basket — and the kids and parents looking for a holiday treat — deserve better.

The Tourist

Posted on March 22, 2011 at 3:05 pm

Behind this forgettable trifle are some very talented people, all punching below their weight when they’re not just calling it in. The screenplay is by Julian Fellowes (“Gosford Park”), Christopher McQuarrie (“The Usual Suspects”), and director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck (“The Lives of Others”), based on the 2005 French film, “Anthony Zimmer.” Two of the biggest stars on the planet, Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp do their best to put some sizzle in this would-be romantic thriller, but they are both poorly used and have no chemistry whatsoever. Venice is pretty, though.

Jolie is the veddy proper Elise Clifton-Ward, whose role in this film is somewhere between femme fatale (drawing the poor schlub who happens across her path into a world of intrigue and peril) and Girl from Ipanema — she spends a lot of time walking slowly while those she passes say, “Ahhhhhhh.”

Elise receives a note from Alexander Pearce, the man she loves and has not seen for two years, asking her to find a man on the train who resembles him to use as a decoy and distract the various Interpol teams that are trying to track him down. Enter the shlub, a math teacher from Wisconsin so (apparently) incapable of dishonesty that his very name is Frank. And yet, we see him tell a lie very early on. It’s a small one, perhaps understandable, but still….

Elise invites him to spend the night in her lavish hotel suite (on the sofa) and kisses him on the balcony, thus drawing the fire, and the attention, of Interpol and of someone even more bent on tracking Pearce down, the man he stole from. It’s a nice set-up, but the execution depends on three things that never happen: a witty script, a spark between the leading characters, and an understanding of tone. The script sags. Jolie and Depp are both poorly cast (she may be more of a serene and elegant mother earth in her real life these days but on screen she only comes alive when she is aggressive and a little wicked and Depp can do just about anything but act like an ordinary guy). And von Donnersmarck has no sense of humor or lightness to make the sillier aspects of the story endearing instead of annoying. This is yet another example of an American remake of a French film that just misses the fun, the romance, and the point.

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Action/Adventure Romance Thriller