Weekly Hornet

Issue date: 10/3/07 Section: Entertainment

Directing duo, the Farrelly brothers, Peter and Bobby, have directed some of the funniest comedic films of our generation. They gave us, "Kingpin," "There's Something About Mary" and "Me, Myself, and Irene."

Their newest film, "The Heartbreak Kid," has them working again with Ben Stiller as their lead man. The Farrellys speak about their newest flick, working with improvisational comedians and their future endeavors in an exclusive interview.

The Hornet: Did you guys have the same chemistry with Ben Stiller coming back as the leading man, or was it a new experience?

Peter Farrelly: We did have the same chemistry, but it wasn't the same experience. We had great chemistry. We love Ben. Ben, since we did "Something About Mary," has become a conglomerate and he is way more involved than he was on 'Mary.' In 'Mary' he was one of the actors. This one, he is way more involved and we want him to be, because he has great instincts, great ideas.

TH: Lately, R-rated comedies have been doing quite well, and you guys haven't done an R-rated film since "Me, Myself, and Irene." Does the success of the current R-rated comedies have any effect on you going back to that format?

PF: Not really. We did hit a point after "Me, Myself, and Irene," where we felt like every movie, people were expecting us to break the ceiling in the same way. And a) you can't do it when they're expecting it, and b) we didn't want to keep going in the exact same direction. So we decided to do movies that were actually more heartfelt and would maybe surprise the audience in another way.

TH: Malin Ackerman has done some comedies, but not where she has been the main comedic force. In this film she is the comedic leading lady. How was she casted for the role and what made you two think she could be funny enough?

Bobby Farrelly: It was only after we casted that we realized she was in "Harold and Kumar," and "Entourage." We found her in the auditioning process where we basically brought in the top hundred girls in Hollywood that people really didn't know, and we let them read for this particular part. And Malin just nailed it.

TH: "The Heartbreak Kid" is a remake of the 1972 version starring Cybill Shepard. Did you guys come across the old version and think "We should remake this," or was it offered to do a remake of it?

PF: We were actually offered it five years ago and at the time, we just instinctively passed. We love "Heartbreak Kid," it's a classic and we don't want to remake a classic. However, a friend of ours had not seen the film. We took him home one night, we watched the movie, and we started seeing a couple of scrapes in the armor there. We saw how it wasn't aging as well as it could have.

In our version though, we flip the story around; in the original he marries the kind of frumpy woman, goes on his honeymoon and meets a fantastically beautiful woman and falls in love with her. In this version, he marries the fantastically beautiful woman upfront, goes on his honeymoon and realizes the looks aren't enough. Then he meets a girl who's more his type and falls in love with her. And so we completely rewrote it and tried to make it our own.

TH: You two have done movies with people with disabilities, such as the brother in "There's Something About Mary," the weight issue in "Shallow Hal" and with "The Heartbreak Kid," it's about looks and image.

How do you feel about comedy giving the audience a different perspective on some of these disabilities and social issues?

PF: Yeah, it's important to us. We noticed when we started making movies that there were never any disabled people in the movies, and if they were, they always played the sad person who's just the big-hearted character.

We have friends with disabilities. The more people with disabilities we put in our movies, the more you get use to seeing them, the more comfortable around them you are and the more they're integrated into society. And if we can have a lot of laughs along the way, it's just a win-win situation.

TH: You've worked with a lot of improvisational comedians such as Jim Carrey, Jack Black and Ben Stiller in your movies. How much freedom do you allow these comedians when you work with them?

BF: It's great if it looks like everything is improvised because it has a feeling that they are just making it up as they go, and that's what you kind of go for. As a director, you want them to make it theirs, you don't want to make it feel like they're reading lines from a cue card.

PF: Mostly, I would say that what's on the screen is 80 percent from the script and 20 percent from the actors and us.

TH: There is a rumor that you two are going to make a Three Stooges movie. Did you two go through with writing the script and how is the project coming along?

BF: We have written the scripts about the Three Stooges. We've come up with an idea to redo them. It's not a biography or anything, its three new guys playing Moe, Larry and Curly. They're characters we were inspired a lot by and we grew up watching them and we still laugh at it.

It's been a project that we're really passionate about, but truthfully we've had a hard time getting it off the ground. We've had a hard time bringing in the studios, to get excited about the project like we are. But we're still working on it and I think we're going to make the movie, I just don't know exactly when.

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