Wanda Sykes can make anything funny. Got a guy with a big beard swarmed by animals? Cut to Wanda Sykes saying something sarcastic. That’s what Tom Shadyac, director of Evan Almighty did. Sykes plays Evan Baxter (Steve Carell)’s assistant in his congressional office. When God’s task of building the ark makes Evan grows funny hair and birds flock to him, Wanda brings the funny.
CraveOnline: This being a clean cut family film, did you have to censor yourself as you were riffing there?
Wanda Sykes: There are some things that just wouldn’t work, you know. Put it this way: We weren’t told, “Hey, this is a PG. This is going to be a clean movie, so no cursing.” At least I wasn’t getting that direction, which I’m happy he didn’t give it to me because it probably would have stifled me. But you just could feel it. You’re standing here in this big ark, and with all these animals so it just felt right. There were a couple of incidents when I wanted to say “ass” and Tom [Shadyac] was like, “Oh, that’s so funny but you can’t say ass. Try butt.” And I was like, “No, butt’s not funny, man.” And he’s like, “No it will be. Just say butt. Just give me one butt” and I’m like, “No, I’m going to do butt because that’s the one you’ll use and then we’ll be fighting at the premiere so I’ll just try another line.” So there was quite a bit of that.
CraveOnline: It seems like there are some scenes in this movie where they just put you alone in a room and said, “Okay, react!” Is that kind of an accurate way to describe how it happened?
Wanda Sykes: Yes, that’s very accurate. Like the scene when he goes to Congress, his first time, and I’m just looking at the TV screen and I’m kind of just making comments as far as what’s going on. First, I’m just looking at a blank screen. There’s nothing going on. And they hadn’t even shot that scene yet so I didn’t even have anything to even go on. Tom was just like, “Okay, he’s going to have this thing and he’s going to look something like the guy from Fleetwood Mac and blah blah blah” and I’m like, “Alright.” So it was a lot of that and at times funny but frustrating because I felt like I was working in the dark. I’m like. “Man, can I least see the scene first and I’m sure I can come up with stuff that’s better” and he’s like, “No, no it’ll be fine.” Those were the days that I would call my agent and go, “You know what? We really didn’t get a good deal on this movie. I mean, it sounded good at first. But trust me, they’re getting every penny out of me. They’re making up stuff. It isn’t even in the script. You should see it!”
CraveOnline: Do your costars try to crack you up?
Wanda Sykes: Working with Steve, we didn’t try. We did. We just cracked each other up. Steve is very funny and the guy shows up, he works hard. Me, I would’ve been complaining the whole time, with the hair and he had to go through so much. Makeup, he had birds all on him and they’re pooping on his head. So he was a real trooper and just got into the spirit of the thing. So you just had to have fun with it.
CraveOnline: Will we see any of those crack up moments on the DVD?
Wanda Sykes: Probably not because I’m pretty sure they want to keep the DVD clean too.
CraveOnline: Oh, so there was non-clean stuff between takes?
Wanda Sykes: Yeah, of course, there were a couple of F bombs and stuff we would do and we’d have fun.
CraveOnline: If God told you to build an ark, what would you put on it?
Wanda Sykes: A flat screen TV, some air conditioning, but it’ll be a hybrid though. A bar. Two bars. That’s a big ark. Jacuzzi, a pool.
CraveOnline: What about animals?
Wanda Sykes: I really don’t need them. Animals wouldn’t make it I don’t think.
CraveOnline: How often do you go to church?
Wanda Sykes: I was brought up in a church and even as an adult I used to go to church all the time. And now, not so much. I don’t know. I consider myself more of a spiritual person.
CraveOnline: How do you think religious people will respond to this movie?
Wanda Sykes: Hopefully religious people, I’m sure it’ll appeal to them because it’s a very family friendly movie. I mean there’s nothing edgy in here at all, because a lot of films they go, “Oh it’s family friendly” and then you get there, you sit with your kids and all of a sudden somebody gets shot in the head and you’re like, “Hey, what the? That’s not good. What’s going on?” But this is very family friendly and, hopefully they’ll like it.
CraveOnline: Everyone ends up doing Steve’s dance in the credits. Did you?
Wanda Sykes: There is a moment of me doing the happy dance in there. But I did more of a tango with John Michael Higgins. We did more of a two step. But yeah, I think it was a thing of, probably as a black woman I was like, “I’m not dancing. You always want us to dance. I’m not going to dance.” Ao I was being all defiant but the shot that they got us dancing on the ark, I had reason to dance. That was the last shot and we were wrapped on the movie and I was so happy to get out of that suit I’d been wearing for the last two months. It smelled like monkey balls. It was just uughh. Oh I mean we had baboons like this close to us, so trust me, I know what a monkeys balls smells like.
CraveOnline: As a woman and a comedian, how distressed are you about the Paris Hilton situation?
Wanda Sykes: Oh, I stay up. I lose sleep. I lose sleep over
CraveOnline: Do you come from a funny family?
Wanda Sykes: My family, they’re funny but they have to work small rooms. Like the family reunion, they’re really funny. Anybody looking on the outside would be like, “What the hell?” They wouldn’t find it funny. My mother, she’s a really good impersonator but it’s like people you don’t know. So it’s like, “This is the lady that sits in the third pew.” And she’ll do something and I’ll go, “Ha ha ha, that’s funny.”
CraveOnline: You had an HBO special a few months ago. Are you back on the road and what is your new material about?
Wanda Sykes: I just wrapped up some dates on the road. In April and May, I was on the road. And I did more about, I’ve been travelling a lot, like to
CraveOnline: Do you have to play assistants and supporting characters because there are so few roles out there for black women?
Wanda Sykes: You know, I’m pretty sure if I didn’t do this role somebody else would’ve fit in and I don’t think it’s necessarily written or they were looking for a black woman. I think they just wanted somebody to be funny. There’s lots of funny actresses out there who could have pulled the job off. I enjoy playing those roles and I guess in comedy that’s just, what am I looking for? Thelma Ritter. So that role has always been there, the underling, the wise crack underling, and I think anyone who’s in power and someone that you root for, you like them because they have someone so close to them who tells them like it is. So that role was always fun to play.
CraveOnline: What else are you up to besides honing your stand up material?
Wanda Sykes: I haven’t signed on for anything except for The New Adventures of Old Christine. The TV show. I will be back on that as a series regular so I’m really looking forward to that.
CraveOnline: Will you be on the new season of Curb Your Enthusiasm?
Wanda Sykes: I’m sorry but I am so out of the loop on that show. I didn’t do anything with the last season. Sorry. He didn’t call me.
CraveOnline: Why do you enjoy going back to television?
Wanda Sykes: Television is fast, you know. That’s the closest thing that I can get to stand up. Because TV, each week it’s a new script, it’s fresh, we get to play around, you get the quick response because we get to perform in front of a live audience. So all those things are appealing to me.
