♫ It’s time to play the music. Its time to light the lights. It’s time to meet the Muppets on the Muppet Show tonight… ♫
OK, you won’t be able to meet the Muppets on the Muppet Show tonight (I wish!) but you CAN meet the Muppets on November 23, 2011 when the new Muppet Movie opens in theaters across the country. Are you excited? I sure am!
Back in September I was fortunate to attend a press junket and chat with Jason Segel and Nick Stoller, along with some other wonderful bloggers. Jason and Nick both wrote the Muppet Movie.
Jason Segel stars on How I Met Your Mother. He’s also been in plenty of movies including Forgetting Sarah Marshall, I Love You Man, Knocked Up and Bad Teacher. He even voiced the character of Vector in the movie Despicable Me.
Jason wrote the movie Forgetting Sarah Marshall. In the movie he performs with puppets. They were custom made for him and the movie from Jim Henson puppeteers. As a life long fan of the Muppets, Jason pitched a story idea that would help revive the much loved Muppets. Not only was the pitch accepted but Jason was given the opportunity to write the movie too.
The Muppet Movie is co-written by Nick Stoller. Nick wrote such movies as Get Him to the Geek, as well as the screen play for Gulliver’s Travels (which Jason co-stared in), Yes Man and Fun with Dick and Jane.
Jason and Nick teamed up to write the Muppet Movie. Although I haven’t seen it yet (only bits and pieces) I can tell you that the movie is going to be epic. Bring tissues! Not for tears of sadness but more so for tears of laughter. This movie looks hysterical! I am so excited. I cannot wait to see it. We’re hoping to see it opening day (unless the theater is packed).
Here is our interview with Jason and Nick.
Q: What is your favorite Muppet movie, episode or song?
Nick: Oh, wow. Well my favorite Muppet movie I think is actually Muppets take Manhattan. Which I just love. My favorite song oddly enough it’s not a very popular one but it was a Peter Sellers episode of the Muppet show and Peter Sellers somehow gets away with singing a song called Whiskey, Wine, and Wild Women. And I just remember at that point realizing what the Muppets did that was so special is the whole family could sit and enjoy that.
Kids are just watching a goofy guy sing a song with a bunch of puppets and it’s fun. And adults are experiencing it on a whole different level and I think there’s something neat about the whole family walking away having enjoyed something together, having a shared experience.
Jason: I love the Great Muppet Caper. And I love Happiness Hotel. For some reason that song, I just love that song.
Q: Are you guys still in awe that you did this project?
Nick: I mean it was a childhood dream of mine. I have a list of dreams that I wanted to publish. One was being on David Letterman, which I did a few years ago. One is hosting SNL which I still haven’t done but I think that I will soon. And then one was make a Muppets Movie. And then be on the cover of Men’s Health. Start the campaign for that. 🙂
Q: How did that process start for you when you said okay now so time to go after them and make it happen?
Jason: Well Nick and I had just made Forgetting Sarah Marshall and I had been a crazy puppet lover for a long time. And I made short films with puppets.
Nick: We actually, I just need to tell one quick story. We had a meeting on Sarah Marshall. We had a meeting with various puppet companies to decide who we were going to use. Of course we ended up going with Henson company but we had our meeting with the Henson company and they passed out puppets to everyone in the meeting. The business meeting. They’re just doing as like a little goof, right. So Jason’s in the meeting. I’m in the meeting. The producers are in the meeting. And they had out puppets. Everyone’s like ha, puts them down. The entire meeting Jason has his hand in the puppet. Like the puppet is part of the meeting.
Jason: After, after that movie we had a little bit of writing juice. The movie did well and we’re trying to figure out what the next thing was. And I went to Nick and I told him I would like to make a Muppet Movie and Nick helped me think of the plot. And…
Nick: You said, Do you want to write a Muppet Movie? And I said yes.
Jason: It was pretty easy. And so we went in and pitched it and the next thing you knew we were writing this movie. One of the greatest things is sitting, if you could, watching Nick and I along in my house writing the script, doing all the different voices terribly to each other. It was really an exercise in trying to realize slowly going crazy.
Q: Since you are so passionate and knowledgeable about the Muppets did you have a mentor that you looked at for this?
Nick: Well I think what we look towards was the legacy that they had created with those first three movies and the TV show. That was really our model and we didn’t have to stray very far from that time or try to update it or anything like that. The Muppets, their style of humor is pretty timeless. CGI is amazing but I feel a little bit like its Hollywood playing with their new toy. To get back to something here like you know, puppetry and the Muppets style of just kind humor I was excited about that.
Q: Was Disney receptive to your idea when you approached them?
Nick: They were very receptive to the idea of us writing a script. You know at that point it becomes about kind of re-launching a giant franchise too, which is something…
Jason: We’re not Johnny Depp.
Nick: Yeah, exactly.
Jason: We have no experience in that.
Nick: All of a sudden we’re sitting in meetings about toys and rides. We didn’t have any experience at all. Or at least I didn’t. You designed a few rides.
Jason: I’ve designed a few rides.
Nick: But you know I think realizing the scope of what we were going to do it made us understand why it took a while to get made because you know there’s a lot that could come from this. Hopefully the Muppets will be back in full force.
Q: What was it like working with the Muppets?
Jason: I was saying before I got to do a lot of sitting which was nice. Yeah, because I am a good like 2 feet taller than most of the Muppets.
Nick: The hardest thing was not being like awestruck while filming. So the way we handled that is we made it so that our characters were awestruck. Make it very easy.
Jason: Yeah, this is, this is my job in the movie. I go like this a lot (Jason made an awe-struck face).
Q: The whole family can sit down and watch a Muppets movie. When you were writing the script how conscious were you of keeping that throughout the movie?
Nick: It was kind of natural that it is just the tone of the Muppets and so there wasn’t, it wasn’t you know, because we both grew up on it, it wasn’t like we attempted to do that so much as a just naturally happened.
Jason: We didn’t have to put much effort into it. I was really inspired by Toy Story 3 as well in that movie hit on every level. Kids are watching a movie about losing their toys. And parents are watching a movie about losing their children.
Q: How was your first encounter with Miss Piggy and Kermit?
Nick: My first encounter was at a table read in New York where they surprised us and brought the puppets out for the table read. And when Kermit first spoke line that we had written I literally cried at the table read and they had to stop the table read for a second while I pulled it together.
Jason: Shameful (said with a smile).
Nick: It was because I’m a grown man. I should be able to handle this. This is also my profession. But no, I cried like a little baby just for a second.
Q: Who is your favorite Muppet?
Nick: You always have to think Kermit first because he’s the best. But, but then Beeker is my favorite.
Jason: Yeah, Beeker’s awesome.
Q: Is there more Beeker in the movie?
Nick: There’s quite a bit of Beeker, yeah, absolutely.
Q: Did you guys improvise a lot?
Jason: We did. I didn’t realize how talented these puppeteers are. Their job is to disappear. And it’s such a shame because they’re comedians and actors and hilarious improvers and they’re hiding under this table most of the time. You’ll never see their faces. That was what I walked away from most impressed by is how crazy talented guys are.
Q: Did you guys write a lot of the songs?
Jason: Brett McKenzie from Flight of the Concords wrote most of the music, which was a perfect match. Because if you think about it, Flight of the Concord’s are Muppety. Two kind of wide-eyes innocents dwelling through the hard cruel world and that’s very much what the Muppets are like.
Q: Do you have any plans of doing another movie?
Nick: Well I’m superstitious and so we’re trying not to think of it until this comes out. But we’re starting to think of ideas. I think my main goal is just to try to get the Muppets back to where they belong and you know the forefront of comedy. And to have, to have our generation get to experience what they had when they were young. And share that with like their kids. I just think it would be great.
Jason: Like I said the Muppets are always a force for good. Their humor is never mean and I think that’s a really great lesson to impart to children.
This was a fun interview. You can tell that Nick and Jason are full of boundless energy. I think they would be A LOT of fun to hang out with.
I am so excited to see this movie. Ever since I saw them filming one of the scenes back in January I have been very anxious to see the movie. I can’t believe the movie will FINALLY be in theaters next week.
If you would like to learn more about the movie visit www.Disney.Go.com/Muppets. You can also follow them on Facebook, www.Facebook.com/Muppets.
Kimberly
*I was not compensated for this post. I was a guest of Disney at the Muppet press junket.
**Top photo found on the Internet. Copyright unknown. If you know the copyright please contact me and let me know so I can properly credit the owner. Thank you.
Christian N says
AHHHH! Jason Segel is my idol! He rocks!!! I wish I could’ve met him. My favorite show is How I Met Your Mother. If you haven’t seen it, you really have to check it out!
Glad you had a blast with that interview! Hope you got me an autograph. 😛
Christian N says
AHHHH! Jason Segel is my idol! He rocks!!! Let me show my awe-struck face! I wish I could’ve met him. My favorite show is How I Met Your Mother. If you haven’t seen it, you really have to check it out!
Glad you had a blast with that interview! Hope you got me an autograph. 😛