What does Tom Cruise is still king, finding funding for movies, General Motors, four people you?d rob a bank with, and Bradley Cooper in dreads have in common? My sit down with Hit & Run stars Dax Shepard (Parenthood, Punk?d), Kristen Bell (Veronica Mars, Forgetting Sarah Marshall) and producer Andrew Panay (Wedding Crashers, Van Wilder).
Hit & Run was a lot of fun. I love any heist related movie and it has good car chases and plus a nice love story.
Dax Shepard: When you step outside the studio system and just go find money, you get to make the exact movie you want to see. Rarely are we doing that. We?re trying to answer a question of ?What does an audience want to see?? As soon as you go down that path, you stop using your own voice and you try and predict what?ll work. You usually strike out when you do that. [Hit & Run] was like ?What movie do we want to see as a team?? and ?What movie do we want to make?? and we did that. We were real true to what we wanted to create.
How do you go about finding money for a project?
DS: There?s a second producer and a fourth member to this team, Nate Tuck. At the 11th hour he found some woman in Palm Springs who had money and wants to fund movies. It was surprise to all of us.
Kristen Bell: There?s no formula for finding it, it?s really just talking to everybody.
DS: This is probably the quickest movie from inception to completion. We thought of the idea and pitched it for the first time in April [2011]. I went away for three weeks, wrote the script, came back, took a week to get financing, prepped for four weeks, shot for six weeks, and done. It was April thru July from the inception of the idea to a complete wrap.
You must?ve casted quickly.
DS: Yes and that was a miracle in itself that everyone?s schedule worked out. Bradley [Cooper] was in the middle of shooting a movie. He was starting a movie an hour after we finished and he had to go to a wedding in Italy in the middle of his work schedule with us. We got really lucky.
Bradley Cooper was great as the villain. Whose idea was it to put him in dreads?
[everybody laughs]
DS: That was his idea. He knows some guy in Venice. Up until recently he lived in Venice for a long time. There?s a very eclectic cast of characters parading around Venice and this one guy in particular that he knows. Bradley said ?There?s this dude I know and he wears these glasses and these track suits and he has dreads. I think this is who he is?. It was entirely his idea to look like that. I was very supportive. I loved when I was younger and I had favorite actors and they would really switch it up for a movie if they weren?t a lead for movie ? like Brad Pitt in True Romance. I just loved when actors did that. I think fans of Bradley who are young dudes will get a kick out of this.
Was it your idea to do a lot of the driving in Hit & Run?
DS: All my hobbies revolve around motorsports whether its motorcycles, racing go karts, or off-road racing. And I own the cars in the movie. That Lincoln I spent years building and I think it?s one of the coolest cars in America. I thought the car deserves a movie????.
KB: I don?t know that there?s ever been a movie that?s been written around the props the writer had at his house. This is the first movie I think were the write asked ?What props do I have?? and put pen to paper.
Andrew Panay: I wonder what we should do. Maybe go to my house and see what kind of props I have.
[everyone laughs]
DS: It definitely would be about working out?.
AP: ?.and weights maybe
I imagine the opening to Season 2 of LOST when you see Desmond and he?s working out?.
[everyone laughs]
AP: Maybe like Panic Room in the gym?.
He doesn?t know what?s going on outside in the real world, he?s just keeps working out?.
KB: He?s got two days to lose 50 pounds. Let?s raise the stakes.
So [Kristen] Did you want to do any driving in the film?
KB: I don?t have the same desires. I enjoy being a passenger. Everyone has a different level of control they need in terms of being in a car. Some people are great in the backseat; some people are great in the driver?s seat. I?m good as a passenger and specifically with Dax because his skill level so exceeds anyone else on the road so it?s enjoyable for me because I let him take more liberties than any other driver. In the actual movie, most of the cars were stick shift and I don?t drive stick shift so that knocked me out of a couple of cars. I wasn?t craving to be behind the wheel. I just wanted to be next to him and let him take me over a lot of bumps to make me feel like I was on a rollercoaster.
That would?ve been scary for me. I?m afraid to wreck a really expensive car.
KB: There?s the responsibility when you?re in the driver?s seat that I didn?t want, but I did want to be in the car
DS: Amazingly, we didn?t total anything. Even Tom Arnold?s van that we jumped 100ft still drives around perfectly.
AP: [Dax} is super humble but the driving is incredible. Remember the motel scene after the whack in the face. After everyone gets out of there, the Corvette and the Cadillac, [Dax and Kristen] were drifting as they were spinning out. He was inches away. We got it on camera but it doesn?t do it justice. He was within an inch of the wall every time we shot it and not a mistake. I wish we had more cameras to catch more angles.
KB: Watching it the second time I think people might realize the first time. It doesn?t stick out as much as I wish it did. When I yell at him that he needs to pull over, he does a 180 in the car where he?s going down the road, [demonstrates with her cell phone] drifts around, turns completely into the orange grove and stops in between two trees. It was so precise.
How did you learn to drive like that? What Kristen just demonstrated?.I would?ve crashed.
DS: The good folks at General Motors. I worked for them from when I was 14 years old until I was 28. I just had tons of access, I just had seat time. I drove on every race track in the country. We would launch new vehicle models so when the new Corvette would come out and we?d ship 40 of them to Michigan International Speedway. We?d invite Car and Driver, Road & Track, all the automotive journalist and they?d drive the car for a week on the track. Well they also need people to drive the car while they photograph it so I would be asked to make things look cool.
That?s a legit skill.
KB: [Dax] won?t tell you this but we were able to wrangle some of the best stunt drivers in the world because so little is actually done physically anymore since everything is CGI. When stunt drivers get a chance to handle vehicles on set, they?re like ?Yes!?We had amazing stunt drivers, and at the end of the movie, because Dax did all his driving, they took him aside and gave him an honorary hat and said ?If you were in our profession right now, you?d be one of the top guys in the world.?
I get sick of seeing CGI.
DS: I hate it. I?d rather see something far less impressive on a grand scheme that?s real than see something generated on a computer. What I like that they do with CGI is what they can do to an environment like the big wide shot with the ships in Troy. When it?s someone doing a physical act and they really aren?t doing it, we disconnect just a little bit.
There?s a part of our brain that knows it isn?t real.
DS: Some stuff we accept. I like Sin City, but they?re doing everything real in front of a fake world so I?m still connected. When a car jumps off a train and over a cliff in Fast and Furious, I?m like ?Well. Ok?. Why not have it fly up to the moon while we?re doing this.
KB: The fun of watching something spectacular is because there are limits and they?re being pushed. There are no limits in CGI therefore there?s no real stakes.
DS: This is why Tom Cruise is still the King. When you watch [Mission Impossible ] Ghost Protocol he?s really doing that and it?s palpable.
If you could rob a bank with four people that you know, who would it be? I?ve had a list for years?.
DS: My best childhood friend Aaron. He?s a knockout artist so if things got physical?.
You need that guy?
DS: I need that guy. [thinking]
KB: [Dax} can think and I?ll answer. It?s a twofold answer for me. It would either be the four of us that made this movie and that sounds clich? but I?ve seen the results of what happens when the four of us work together and it?s a very good team. Also I know how each of them work. Or three of my best girlfriends because no one would expect us to rob a bank and I know we?d get away with it. All my girlfriends are petite and cute.
DS: On that same note, I?m going to put Jess Rowland in my group. What a decoy! He?s the 6?7 redheaded cop in the movie.
AP: I don?t think I would enlist me, but I would enlist [Dax] for sure. This team actually makes sense. I?m thinking I?d add my brother because I think he?s an assassin. He?d sit and give the master plan and make sure it was executed.
KB: I want to hear your answer
My list is my friend Chris because he?s be very detailed about making sure we didn?t get caught, Marcus as the muscle, and Leah because she could be a distraction.
In Hit & Run you all work well together and put out this great product. That?s inspiring for anyone who?s trying to make a film.
DS: The only lesson to learn from our movie is this is the product of friends working together for the love of being together. None of the other actors had hopes for this movie; they just liked spending time with us. Now they?re excited. We did it for the right reasons.
KB: There?s a chemistry about the movie because of that. There?s so much love in it. You can tell if people had a good time.
Source: http://blog.seattlepi.com/peoplescritic/2012/08/19/qa-with-dax-shepard-and-kristen-bell/
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