Katie Crocker - Associate Editor
While shooting “Horrible Bosses 2,” Chris Pine sat down to chat with press about the sequel and joining the hilarious Bateman, Day and Sudeikis in the second round.
I wonder what it’s like coming into a movie in the second part, is it intimidating?
Yeah, it’s always hard stepping into a situation where people have a rapport. I’m just so excited that it’s not my film and I just get to come in and it’s a comedy lab for me. I get to learn from these guys, who are so great at it. I’ve never done, I’ve done comedy, but not at this level and this kind of speed, with as much experience as they have, so I’m really just learning how to operate on a set like this, where things are malleable and can change every day. So it can be intimidating but they’re great and they can keep that ball in the air, as long as I’m just following, I’m good to go.
You talked about exercising your funny bone, is it hard to keep up?
It can be and it was at first, it’s just like music, you have to get the tone of the music and the speed of the music and if you have good ears, I feel like you can kind of get in to what they’re making, otherwise if you don’t get into it, I can imagine it would be much scarier.
Can you introduce what character you play and how he fits into the film?
I play Rex Hanson, the son of Bert Hanson, the great American capitalist, which is Christoph Waltz, the true American dream come true. Rex is kind of a spoiled narcissist searching for his fathers love and gets continually emasculated by him and that’s pretty much the source of his psychosis. I see Rex as this guy with all this privilege but never really had many friends. The great irony is that he gets involved with these guys and completely screws them over but the whole time he thinks they’re actually best pals. Hopefully his humor is, he comes across, as sharp but also dull at the same time.
Did you have the opportunity to kind of workshop and find the dynamic that these guys have?
No, I mean we showed up yesterday and it was the first time I met them, just kind of do it. Usually, I use the analogy, it’s like music, you either find it or you don’t and if you don’t, it sucks and if you do really easily, thank God, it’s kind of, it’s improv. Even not on a comedy, it’s kind of always improv, you have to be loose enough to make it happen because if you come in too structured with ideas of who the character is, and how he walks, you’re setting yourself up for disaster I think.
Can you give an example of something like that? When you first got the script to now?
Everything, I think the script is 157 pages now. It changes all the time, I would say half of the stuff that’s happening now is shaving corners and the scene is a straight line, but they’ll go off, and then they’ll come and Sean will come back and say, ‘I really like that,’ and then you’re off on a different thing.
Did you see the first horrible bosses in the movie theater as a fan?
I saw it at home.
What did you think? What was your reaction? Did you think you’d be a part of this?
I’ve always wanted to work with Bateman; he is the master of deadpan. The dynamic is totally Bateman as father and his two kind of dumb, unruly kids. It was funny but I just wanted to do comedy like this, to see what it was all about because it’s so intimidating.
So it is harder, comedy rather than action or drama?
They’re just two completely different things. They’re so different.
Who do you find funny?
I loved Peter Sellers, the Pink Panther series; those were some of my favorites and the early years of SNL with Bill Murray. When I was an early teenager, I was all about Adam Sandler, so I kind of grew up on Adam Sandler. Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy…
How is it having Christoph Waltz as your Father?
Great, you know, I really love working with great talent, so I hope to continue my streak.
Worst boss you ever had?
I worked at a restaurant, I think at that point in my life I just hated everyone because I was doing a job that I didn’t like. So, I won’t name names, but the service industry is not for me, suffice to say.
