Interview: Michael Ealy and Meagan Good of “Think Like a Man Too”

Posted on June 22, 2014 at 9:32 am

I am a huge fan of Michael Ealy and Meagan Good and it was a lot of fun to talk to them about “Think Like a Man Too.”

Meagan, I loved your performance of Bell Biv DeVoe’s classic “Poison!”

MG: It was an evolution. Initially the song was supposed to be En Vogue’s “Never Gonna Get It.” We were all excited to learn the words and everything and then they were like, “You know what, we want to do ‘Poison’ instead.” We actually went into the studio and recorded it and all of us girls sounded like pretty bad except for Taraji who really sings. And then we got the set and we literally just sang to our own voices basically. And we did it for two days and it was like the easiest thing because you don’t have to do anything, just come to work, show up, have fun,be silly, laugh, joke, crowd surf, whatever it is you’re doing that day, it was just a lot of fun. It was actually just like going to a party.

Michael, I have heard that the hardest thing for actor is to play a nice person and your character is the nicest person of all of the characters. With so many colorful characters around you, with Kevin Hart being so extreme, how do you create a character who is nice but doesn’t get lost in all the hubub?

ME: I think it’s knowing who you are playing with. Like you said, Kevin Hart is at decibel 10 throughout the film and if you don’t have something to kind of ground that it could be a bit overwhelming. And having done three films with Kevin I know exactly where I need to be in every scene and it’s usually the straight guy, I think of Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin. And I have so much fun doing it. Dominique’s sincerity was in my opinion in the words especially in the first script, so love to Keith and David for writing such a character that is kind of endearing in that way.

Meagan, your character is very fashion oriented. How did you create her look?

MG: Shout out to Salvador Pérez Jr., who did an incredible job. I really wanted to do something that I felt a little bit out of the box and I wanted her to kind of have more like a rocker vibe and something that was like a little ‘vintage-y’ but a lot more on the edgy side and with that rocker-esque thing. So we did a lot of cuffs and we did a lot of shirts that were cut out in the side and just different stuff like that and for me, I felt like there is always that girl but she doesn’t always get represented. So that’s what I’m trying to do.

You can tell me. Behind the scenes, did you guys have some real fun in Vegas?

ME: The first two weeks I think everybody was like, “Yeah, we’re going to party. We’re going to do Vegas. We’ll do Vegas, get some stories.” And literally that work schedule just kind of knocked all of that out. We did like the first week, we hung out with Kevin at a party but that was about it and after that it was like we need to film in the casinos during the off hours , when there are still people in there playing but it is not nearly as crowded. That’s when the casinos gave us permission to shoot. So we would have to sleep from five or six in the evening until midnight, wake up, go to work, go do hair and makeup, be ready to shoot by 2:00 AM. So our hours were so off at a certain point, we were starting to become vampires, it was just crazy. And then we did all the daytime stuff and it was just awkward. And we were there for two months. Vegas is a place you stay for two days. Needless to say, we all kind of got to the point where it was like, “Yeah… How many days left, I’ve got to get out of here.”

Meagan, you had to be angry and frustrated in a comic way without going over the top. You kept the character sweet and gave her a lot of depth. And all of that opposite Romany Malco, who has a lot of energy, too.

MG: I think me and Romany have very good chemistry. We both kind of refer to ourselves as aliens because we are the same kind kind of awkward in a way which works out very well. But I think it’s the chemistry and I also try to be very conscious of not being in the way. I did not want to be that girl that’s always like, “He’s not doing what I want him to do.” Just whining and being obnoxious. I tried to be very conscious of that and still be sincere with the frustration and anxiety but not play it in a way that comes off obnoxious; which is kind what I believe in real life too, just bring it all the way back, to be honest but relaxed.

So are we going to have a third one?

MG: We hope so.

ME: It’s up to the fans. It really is up to the fans, I mean we weren’t anticipating a second one so the fans dictated the second one and the fans dictate the third one.

You encourage people to Tweet and Facebook to get the word out. How has social media changed the way that people find movies? Are you guys both on Twitter?

MG: Yes.

ME: Yes. I joined right before the first film at the request of my publicist. I remember talking to Meg and neither of us were really enthusiastic about it and then we both got TV shows and you have to push and you have to interact with your fans weekly. So you just kind of get better at it almost naturally and then you kind of see the power. So the things that you are able to do, the charity organizations that you work with and what you are able to do not just for your own self promotion. It is a powerful, powerful tool and I do think it is a good way to motivate people and create some sort of movement and I think the social media effect on Think like a Man was probably like responsible for about 70% of the box office. That was one of the most powerful campaigns on social media that I think there ever was. We all learned on the first that you can just buy into the system, reach out to the grassroots and watch what happens.

What are the most important lessons people have learned from these films about male/female relationships?

MG: My gosh, that we are very different! Which I think is important. I think it’s very important to recognize that in a real way because what’s common sense to him is not common sense to me. What’s common sense to me is not common sense to him and so if you can really understand that then you can start to understand the person better or if you are not seeing eye to eye on something, there is more of a respect level just because you understand that you see it very differently, not just that you disagree. The interesting thing is that people walk away saying, “Well, I am a Dominique” or “I am a Maya” or “ I am a Maya mixed with Lori” and people kind of see themselves in our relationships.

ME: Yeah. That’s the coolest part.

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Actors Interview

Think Like a Man Too

Posted on June 19, 2014 at 6:00 pm

A romantic comedy based on Steve Harvey’s book of advice for women about relationships has now led to a sequel based on finding the slightest possible premise for getting the gang back together to see if they can create some more box office magic.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that. After all, seeing pretty people do silly things so they can kiss and make up is always a good reason to go to a movie. And these are some of Hollywood’s most appealing performers.

In the first film, a group of buddies with a regular basketball game find themselves flummoxed by a bevy of beauties who read Steve Harvey’s book for tips on dealing with players, mama’s boys, and perpetual adolescents. The happily ever after ending has now led to a proposal and the whole group is going to Las Vegas for separate wild pre-nuptial parties followed by the wedding itself. When the groom-to-be assures his bride that everything will be perfect and nothing can possibly go wrong, we know that nothing will be perfect and everything will go wrong in the most humiliating way possible until we find our way to another happy ending with a possible opening for #3, which I hereby predict will involve a baby or two.

Would-be chef Dom (Michael Ealy) and corporate powerhouse Lauren (Taraji P. Henson) are deeply in love but struggling with job opportunities in different cities that they are afraid to tell one another. Mya (Meagan Good) is not happy to run into stories about the wild past of “Zeke the Freak” (Romany Malco). Kristen (Gabrielle Union) wants to get pregnant as quickly as possible and that puts a lot of pressure on Jeremy (Jerry Ferrara).

But the development that has the biggest impact on the film is the one that happened off-screen. Since the first one was released, Kevin Hart has become a box office powerhouse with a concert film in 2013 and two enormously successful comedies already in 2014 (About Last Night and Ride Along). This is most likely the reason that he takes up so much more of “Too” than he did in the first one. And since is a very loud guy, he seems to take up even more than he does, too often with all the appeal of a buzzing mosquito.

The entire premise of the first film is jettisoned, along with any aspirations beyond silly fun. It takes Cedric (Hart) far too long to figure out that he has mistakenly booked himself into a room that costs ten times what he thinks, because every time there is any possibility to mitigate the damages of whatever he has gotten himself into, he blusters like a bantam rooster to block any kind of reality check from the other characters. And this is close to the movie’s most plausible plotline. Even Lucy and Ethel could not make us believe that anyone cares whether the boys or the girls have a wilder pre-nuptial party. Director Tim Story throws in every possible signifier of movie fun, from a makeover (“Bridesmaids'” Wendy McLendon-Covey) to a dance number (okay, the girls’ dancing to Bell Biv DeVoe’s irresistible “Poison” is a treat) and the ever-popular night in the pokey plus the completely superfluous addition of a couple of cute white guys (Adam Brody and “About a Boy’s” David Walton.

The cast is clearly just here to have a good time, and the audience will, too.

Parents should know that this film includes some strong language including crude sexual references and humor, sexual situations, strippers, drinking and drunkenness, and drug use, along with a lot of foolish Las Vegas behavior.

Family discussion: What were the groups trying to accomplish in their pre-nuptial parties? Which couple has the strongest relationship?

If you like this, try: the first film and “About Last Night” (rated R), also featuring Hart, Ealy, and Hall.

Interview: Christopher Lennertz, Comedy Movie Composer

Posted on February 20, 2014 at 7:53 am

Christopher Lennertz is one of Hollywood’s busiest composers. Lately, he has specialized in writing scores for comedies like Kevin Hart’s Ride Along, with two more big comedic projects later this year: Think Like A Man Too (with Ride Along director Tim Story) and Horrible Bosses 2. In addition, he also does the music for the CW series Supernatural and the NBC drama Revolution. Past credits include last year’s Identity Thief, Think Like A Man, Horrible Bosses, and Alvin & The Chipmunks. He was generous in taking time from his very busy schedule to talk to me.

How did you get involved in writing music for movies?

I started loving music at a very young age, I started playing the trumpet when I was nine and then I think I wrote my first song in fifth grade. Then I realized that the guitar is much cooler and the girls seem to like guitar players much better so I started playing the guitar when I was 13 and I just got more and more into music. I played in a rock band and as I really started to get into it, I studied classical and jazz and then coming out of California, I originally studied guitar and then I found myself in my sophomore year of college recording a session with Henry Mancini.

Wow!

Yeah, that sort of changed everything and I sure went back the next day, changed my major and decided I wanted to be a composer. I think it was just watching that session that gave me the impetus to sort of change my focus and focus on writing rather than on performing and that is a big difference. For me, that was a really big move.

What it is about writing that makes writing a score a comedy especially challenging? Especially something like Ride Along which is really 60% action movie, 40% comedy; how do you cover both types of themes in composing?

You’re right. There are sort of three different styles of music in Ride Along. One is most definitely the comedy and that is usually focusing on what Kevin Hart is doing. But one of the things that Ioved about that movie and that I liked about those types of comedies is that it allows you to sort of us set up the comedy with reality and sort of hyper reality so what that ended up doing was playing Ice Cube really, really straight, very, very tough no-nonsense, so that when Kevin did get funny, everything sort of became a big contrast. Same thing with the action; I really treated the action as real.

At what stage in a movie like that do you get involved? Is it early on or after the story has been shot?

This one I came onto about halfway through shooting and I had worked with the director, Tim Story, on Think Like a Man, so we had a relationship. At that point it was relatively quick that I sort of jumped in and started to come up with ideas and Tim and I started working on our approach and figuring out what he really wanted out of the music and that is sort of what put it to the next level.

I know you can’t talk too much about Think Like a Man Too, but you are working on that now aren’t you?

I started on it last week. All I can tell you is that it is just as funny, if not possibly funnier than the last one but it is also very similar in the fact that the ending is even more romantic and it is really kind of sweet. Again it is a great movie because it is funny for guys and super romantic at the end. It is just all around a great movie and I think it is just going to be bigger than the first one.

Do you just create the themes or do you also work on the adapting them to individual scenes?

By the end of the day every single scene has gone through trial and error. I try to make it fit every bit of the action just the way Tim wants it to and that’s really how we do it. It is a very intricate process going through the movie from start to finish we will probably, on Think like A Man 2 be about a six week to two month process. Usually what happens is I’ll write for a brief period of time, I’ll write for five days, seven days, have him come in, check out how the process is going, give me some directions, continue writing, that kind of thing and then slowly but surely we get through the whole thing and that is definitely what I assume is going to happen with this one too.

What’s on your iPod? What are you listening to when you are in the car?

Oh wow! You know, that is one of the reasons I love doing what I do. If you looked at my playlist in the car you would find Metallica, you’ll find U2, you’ll find the Beatles. You will also find Danny Elfman, John Williams and you also find John Coltrane and Miles Davis and a bunch of stuff like that so I really like the idea of being very eclectic with music because it really keeps things interesting. I think every style of music has a valid thing to contribute to people’s lives and I think that I love the fact that I can float around in various multiple genres.

Can you give me an example of a movie where you think that the music works really, really effectively to create the mood and tell the story?

There’s so many. I think John Williams is sheer perfection. Indiana Jones was sheer perfection and Star Wars and at the same time I think of Braveheart. The Godfather was perfect. That was really one of my favorites.

If you could pick any movie from the past that you could magically transport yourself back in time and create a score for, what movie would you pick?

It is really hard to do that because the movies that I love the most already have what I would consider to be phenomenal scores and so when I go back and think about that I think one that always comes to mind that I would love to get a crack at is Terminator. Because I feel like, and let me explain this and be clear, I think that the music for Terminator was absolutely perfect the year that it came out but because it was so synthesized it becomes very traditional. It becomes very dated 80’s music, an example of that where the music was so current as far as what the instruments were, that later on you watch it and you can’t get it out of your head how dated it sounds so I think that given an opportunity, I would love to take a shot at it. I would love to do a big sword and sorcery kind of thing. I would love to do a Lord of the Rings or Braveheart or something like that but then again, who wouldn’t?