Anyhow, I recently participated in a press conference with Producers David Heyman, Richard Zanuck and director Peyton Reed and the transcript is below. As always, you can either read the transcript or listen to the audio by clicking here.
Finally, if you want to watch some movie clips from âYes Manâ, click here.
HOW MUCH INPUT FROM JIM FOR SOME OF THE IDEAS IN THE FILM?
REED. Jimâs a hermit. We didnât see or hear from him until the day before shooting, so anything he told you is completely false. Strike it from the record. Jim was obviously very involved from the beginning and we all worked together when we were writing and we were doing a movie where a guy says yes to life, so the possibilities were literally infinite in terms of what we could do with that concept. So I think we all brought a lot to this story in terms of where this path of "yes" could lead him. A lot of things we were writing, we were looking at YouTube, and would see something like the skating thing, and that made its way into the movie. One of the things Iâm pleased about is that it was a very collaborative effort in terms of where to take this movie. One of the things that was important to me and to Jim about this movie was to really ground it in some kind of reality. Itâs not a movie thatâs a magical conceit movie. Itâs not magical realism. Itâs just about a guy who makes a choice to adopt this philosophy. And part of that to me was setting it in a neighborhood, and so itâs a neighborhood Iâm very familiar with, that area, and I just liked the idea of putting Jimâs character, Carl, into that neighborhood because it felt like a relatively un-filmed part of Los Angeles and there was a lot of visual opportunity there, so as we started writing the movie, we started to set things â we looked at the Hollywood Bowl, the Griffith Observatory and things like the Big Foot Lodge, Elysium Park and all these areas that really I hadnât seen on film that much and Space Land as well . . . .so for me, it was one of the exciting things about the movie, because it's an area thatâs my neighborhood, and I really was happy to put it in the movie.
EVER HAVE TO BRING JIM DOWN A BIT AND WHAT IS THAT LIKE WITH JIM CARREY?
REED. Well I think itâs interesting that in this movie, way before we started shooting any film, Jim and I talked a lot about what we wanted the movie to be and what we didnât want it to be, and I think we were both in synch about his character and how grounded . . . . Jim really reined himself in a lot in the movie. So I think it was important for him â it was the first comedy heâd done in a few years, and he really wanted to put a different spin on it. He wanted it to be a Jim Carrey studio comedy but he also wanted it to be a little more grounded and based in reality, so it was something we both had in mind throughout the process of making the movie, so there were actually times when Jim reined himself in and I encouraged him to bring it up a little bit. So it was kind of â there was a lot of back and forth between the two of us. But I think we were all mindful of keeping that character in balance.
CAN YOU TALK ABOUT ZOOEYâS INVOLVEMENT IN THE MUSIC?
REED. In casting Zooey, sheâs an amazing voice and can sing, and we wanted to make that apart of the movie. So Jonathan Karp, whoâs the music supervisor, found this band, these girls, Von Iva, from
GIVEN THE RECESSION A GOOD TIME TO RELEASE A COMEDY. DOES THE ECONOMY AFFECT THE KIND OF MOVIES YOUâLL BE WANTING TO MAKE IN THE NEXT FEW YEARS?
ZANUCK. Well, I think anytime you make a good comedy is a good time, and because of the situation in the country and the world, this happens to be a better time than we would like to release a comedy. And Iâve noticed in the screenings weâve had that thereâs an eagerness on the part of the audience to laugh, because their day probably hasnât been filled with that much laughter. So as far as the future is concerned, as I say, itâs always a good time if you have a funny premise and a star like Jim Carrey. That will always in most cases work. Right now I think is a good time and I think youâve seen that with "Four Christmases" doing the kind of business it did last weekend. You see an example of audience eagerness to laugh.
MR ZANUCK, YOU HAVE AN INCREDIBLE CAREER. WAS WONDERING HOW YOU THINK MOVIES HAVE CHANGED OVER THE YEARS . . . A JOKE ABOUT ORAL SEX WOULDNâT HAVE FLOWN 30 YEARS AGO IN A COMEDY . . .
ZANUCK. I donât know. Youâre talking to the man who made "
CAN YOU TALK ABOUT THE MERITS AND PITFALLS OF TRANSFERRING STORY FROM ORIGINAL BRITISH SETTING.
HEYMAN. I think the key, whether youâre transferring or not, in any adaptation is to remember why you are involved or why you are adapting the book itself. So with this book in particular, what drew all of us to the story was the fact that it was his generosity of spirit that is so much a part of Danny Wallace himself and infuses all of his books, but particularly "Yes Man". So with "Yes Man", we made the decision to move it across the waters because even actually in the book Danny goes off and journeys around Europe, but the locations were not specific to the story in terms of it being
HOW ARE THE TWO SCREENPLAYS FOR THE LAST POTTER BOOK PROGRESSING?
HEYMAN. Itâs one writer, Steve Kloves, and heâs doing a great job. I go back on Friday and we have a meeting about the script. Itâs going really well.
WHAT SCENE WAS TOO EXPENSIVE TO DO . . . WHAT ABOUT CARREY ON THE MOTORCYCLE?
REED. The motorcycle? Thatâs a trade secret. In terms of things we couldnât afford to do or couldnât get insurance to do, Jimâs frontal shot, we couldnât do that. I donât think there was anything we decided to do that they said, absolutely not, but again the jumping off the bridge was an insurance issue and we had to wait until the last day of the shoot to do it, in case we accidentally killed Jim. But in terms of anything else that was too expensive, I canât really think of anything that we eliminated. We eliminated plenty of things because they seemed too unfunny or too stupid, but not based on insurance or cost.
TO MR ZANUCK, ABOUT WEANING PEOPLE OFF MINDLESS FILMS, IS THIS A SENTIMENT SHARED BY MANY PEOPLE? DO YOU THINK ANY KIND OF TREND?
ZANUCK. I think itâs a hope, not a trend, because the money is in the big pictures and in the kind of mindless films that Iâm referring to. Itâs very tough. I had a tough time 12 years ago getting Driving Miss Daisy off the ground. Today, it would be impossible. It would have been impossible to get The Verdict off the ground without Paul Newman obviously, but today without any star, kind of a dramatic piece would be very tough. Because the marketplace, for the very reasons Iâve mentioned â the market out there wants to see the bigger films. Itâs the "Harry Potters" of the world, which is an intelligent big picture, but whatâs taking the kids to the theatres, luring them in, is a kind of mindless scenario of film, so I think itâs every filmmakerâs dream to go back in time to the real dramatic pieces, the hard-hitting. And you do have those occasionally. I think "Slumdog Millionaire", which I saw the other day, is an example of a really fine film that says something and is meaningful. But itâs tough to get mass audiences in to those films today.
Iâm a very interesting film now, just came from the set. "
Itâs everything you would imagine. You put Tim Burtoninto a world where his vision can run wild, and youâll get the result that weâre getting. I mean, when she goes into the rabbit hole, itâs a dream actually, her dream, and itâs anything that comes to her mind and then embellished because weâre very faithful to the Lewis Carroll book. But itâs Tim Burton really being able to crank up his wild imagination. In kind of a dark way too, as the original material was dark and scary.
DID YOU TRY TO TALK CARREY OUT OF THE BUNGEE JUMP?
REED. I think it started when we were working on the script and talked about that idea. One of the first things Jim said was, okay, if weâre doing the bungee jump, Iâm doing the jump. No stunt guys, Iâm doing the jump . . . he wouldnât let it go â Iâm going to jump off a bridge, regardless of whether you film it or not. Why not just film it and be there while Iâm doing it? He wouldnât let it go, and it became this thing with the studio where there were insurance issues. Youâre sending your star off of a bridge. Warner Brothers finally agreed to do it but it had to be the last day of shooting in case Jim died or was injured or something. It made my job a little more difficult because I knew that if Jim actually jumped, we could only do it one time, so I had to make sure that if Jim did this perfect jump, I didnât miss the shot. So we had six cameras and this elaborate camera move, talking to the camera guys beforehand and doing practice runs. Fortunately we got it and I think thereâs real value in seeing the actor do it.
REGARDING
ZANUCK. 3-D cameras are very clumsy, quite frankly, compared to 2-D cameras, and it would have cost a lot more, we would have needed more crew involved. I didnât see what Cameron said, but I was convinced and so was Tim seeing test after test of pictures that had been released in 3-D, shot in 2-D, and you canât tell the difference. I would defy Jim Cameron to see the tests I saw and point out which was 2-D and which was 3-D.