Seth Rogen has two very different movies coming out. In the family friendly Monsters Vs. Aliens, he plays Bob, a brainless bob with a crush on a mold of Jello. In the R-rated Observe & Report, he plays a bipolar mall cop chasing a flasher. We say bring the kids to both and see which one they like better.
Crave Online: How does doing a movie like Monsters Vs. Aliens fall into Playboy's contention that you're the luckiest man on earth?
Seth Rogen: Yeah, I think I’m lucky to be in a movie like this. I don’t want to talk too much about Playboy, though because it’s filthy and this is a kid’s movie. Don’t do that. Keep your mind out of the gutter, dude.
Crave Online: Well, you have Observe and Report opening a couple weeks later. Do you worry about breaking out of the raunchy typecast?
Seth Rogen: Yeah, honestly I’m very thankful that people are allowing me to do this. I’m kind of shocked that I’ve gotten away with it, that I can do a movie like Observe and Report and a movie like Monsters vs. Aliens, one which has been described as transgressive, and the other which is a delightful family romp. So I personally am very thankful. I do like both those kinds of movies. I try to do the types of movies that I like to go see, and I genuinely like to go see both those types of movies. Being responsible for the writing of a majority of my movies, I don’t feel typecast, and if I did I’d probably write myself a different role.
Crave Online: Will Green Hornet be a fusion of both?
Seth Rogen: As far as Green Hornet goes, yeah, I mean it will be a PG-13 movie. I think it has a lot of the humor that people are used to from us, but obviously in a finessed way so that more people can enjoy it. And it’s a big action movie, also, so that helps it round itself off.
Crave Online: What is the status of Green Hornet now?
Seth Rogen: Michel Gondry is going to direct it. Me and Evan are in the process of rewriting it with him right now. We should start shooting it in the end of June, around then.
Crave Online: How is it changing from what it was before?
Seth Rogen: You can’t have a guy like Michel around and not get a bunch of new ideas thrown at you. That guy, as soon as he’s in the room, anything seems possible. It’s really exciting to work with a guy like that. We hire directors specifically who we think are smarter than us and who can do things that we can’t do, and he more than fits that criteria.
Crave Online: What is Steven Chow's involvement at this point?
Seth Rogen: He’s kind of our mascot. He may be Kato, I’m not 100 percent sure that that’s the case but it is a very likely possibility. I’m not sure, we're in the early phases right now of just putting those elements in place so I’m just being honest, I don’t know.
Crave Online: Will you be doing a lot of stunts?
Seth Rogen: Yeah, lots.
Crave Online: Will you wear tights?
Seth Rogen: No, not at all. It’s a suit.
Crave Online: Will you stick to the original concept?
Seth Rogen: We were inspired by the original, we kind of took what we thought was good and left what we didn’t. We didn’t feel any great obligation to live up to the original because the radio play is totally different from the original and it’s totally different from the comic book so there is no set way.
Crave Online: Are you as funny in day to day life as you are in the movies?
Seth Rogen: I’m hilarious every second of the day, my friend, a non-stop roller coaster of laughter. I don’t know. I guess it depends. Some of the characters feel closer to me, some of them feel farther, but it’s not like working coal mines or anything. We make goofy jokes all day. It never feels like it’s that difficult a job. I have to be honest.
Crave Online: Which characters are closer to the real you?
Seth Rogen: I think the guy I play in Knocked Up is probably the closest to me in a lot of ways, and all the other ones are kind of not that much like me. That’s not a great thing to admit, but not any more. None of them are like me any more because, as you can see, I’m amazing.
Crave Online: When you get asked to play a blob with no brain, how do you feel?
Seth Rogen: I was glad to see that it was animated first. That was nice. But yeah, I figured I’ve played a few gelatinous blobs with no brain. It’s time I do it in the animated world as well as the live-action one. Yeah, I’m in on the joke. I get it. I was flattered more than anything. It’s just nice to talk to Jeffrey Katzenberg to his face and not just send him love letters behind his back.
Crave Online: How do you feel about Jello in real life?
Seth Rogen: If it’s nice to me, I like it. I give what I get when it comes to Jello. I will say that the notion of things floating in a Jello mold is a decidedly American invention, and as a Canadian, it’s something I’m a little disturbed by and don’t quite understand. How does it get in there? What is the point of it? What is it? What are those things? What is that? Is it food? Is it marshmallow? What is that? I don’t know. But other than that, I’m pro-Jello ultimately.
Crave Online: With Observe and Report and later Funny People, are you moving towards more dramatic roles?
Seth Rogen: No, not really. I'd say, I mean, I guess the end result of this movie, I think it comes across as a serious role I suppose but as we were filming it, it did not seem like that at all. I think people are, ideally, from what I've read, viewing it exactly how we wanted them too but when we were filming it, it did not feel like a dark, serious role. The second they yelled cut, we were laughing after every single thing we were doing, regardless of how dark it may seem on film.
Crave Online: How would you compare yourself to Ronnie Barnhardt?
Seth Rogen: I don't think I'm like Ronnie that much. I think for all these movies, I think you just need one small thing for people to relate to. I think for this one, he views himself one way and the world views him another way. He has a hard time dealing with that and I think that's relatable. It's small but I relate to that.
Crave Online: Were there scenes cut you were sad to see go?
Seth Rogen: Almost every scene is in there in some way or another, but the scene where [Anna Faris] is doing makeup on Jody's mom, in the movie, all it is now is where I'm rubbing the rose on my face and I rub the rose on her face but that was like a whole scene where I like ask her to wait for me and you're applying, that's Jody's mom sitting in the chair. That scene was really funny I remember.
Crave Online: What would you do if you weren't an actor?
Seth Rogen: Work at a comic book store. Or a video game store. That's what I realized. I have a friend who works at a Gamestop and he loves it. He claims it's great.
Crave Online: As a salesperson or manager?
Seth Rogen: Probably a salesperson. I like to get in there with the people, you know.
Crave Online: Were you paying attention to the controversy over whether the studio would tone the film down?
Seth Rogen: Whenever an article about your movie comes out in a webpage, someone e-mails it to someone, generally speaking I would say. There was never really a major battle as I would put it. I think when people first saw it at these early screenings, they kind of made the assumption that the studio would never let us release it in the form that they saw it. But, it was always the plan. There was really never a moment of [controversy]. There were little things, little specific things, some of the moments in the fight with the cops and some little specific things here and there but there was never like a giant overarcing maybe this movie will be drastically different moment. I think yeah, when people saw the first screenings, they assumed that moment would happen but I guess they weren't privy to the conversations we had before making the movie where we were all like, "We're making a crazy f*cking movie, don't be shocked when it turns out crazy."
Crave Online: Why do you always carry someone cradle style in your movies?
Seth Rogen: In Knocked Up, no one carries anyone. It's really only these three. I guess there's a baby. Yeah, I don't know. Never thought of it. It's not entirely accidental. It's symbolic in a lot of ways. I didn't have anything to do with the writing of Observe & Report but I know for Superbad and Pineapple, yeah, it's a very symbolic thing, carry your friend out of some danger. It just works for the theme and it's a hilarious image.
Crave Online: How was working on Funny People, which seems like a different sort of Apatow movie?
Seth Rogen: It was a fun set. It was great. I'm a big fan of Adam's. I think the movie's about standup comedy so we all had to, like, do standup comedy and we filmed all the performances, like live comedy performances. All the actors would go out to the improv and UCB theater and places like that over the weekends and do comedy and kind of hone their acts and write a lot of their own material. It was a nightmare and I'm glad I never have to do it again.
Crave Online: Judd said it'll be less than 2.5 hours.
Seth Rogen: Really? He said that and I can quote him on that? That's good to know.
Crave Online: Is it weird to be in a long dramedy?
Seth Rogen: Well, Knocked up was like two hours and 10 minutes. If this is 10 minutes longer than that, I don't think that's that crazy. There's a lot more story in this movie than Knocked Up. There's a lot more characters so you think of it in those terms and it's not an obscene amount of time. It's shorter than The Watchmen.
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