Caffeinated Clint
There’s the fact that it’s a teenage comedy full of pooh and fart jokes, and then there’s the element of it fixing on a shy teenager whose out to lose his virginity, but Sex Drive star Josh Zuckerman says that’s probably where the similarities to American Pie end.
“I know some people are saying that there hasn’t been a teen film like this since American Pie and I also know that a comparison can be drawn from the fact that Jim [in that film] was also a virgin – but I think that’s a universal theme, a kid wanting to lose his virginity, I mean, we’ve all been a virgin at one time or another – but I think we have a different take on it in our movie than what they had in theirs. I think ours holds its own as its own film – it doesn’t, to me, feel like a copy of another film”.
Sex Drive tells of three friends (Zuckerman, Clark Duke and Amanda Crews) who hit the road in search of a woman – a woman who’ll supposedly sleep with Zuckerman’s character – and end up in Amish country.
“We shot it in Florida believe it or not! – yep, the beautiful sunshine state… that wasn’t always sunny, it got really freezing at times! It’s definitely not my favourite state- there’s some, um, interesting people”, he laughs. “But it was fun. It kind of felt like camp in the sense that we were away from home – and a long way from L.A. The fun things to do in Florida are search for gators and get drunk – I’m so sure we disturbed a few people in the retirement villages, I know we disturbed a few people in our hotel”.
What works about Sex Drive is that it doesn’t talk down to it’s audience – yes, it’s ridiculous at times, but a lot of it (the pressure of feeling you have to have sex by a certain age, and so on) rings true.
“It’s certainly not true-to-life in the fact that nobody would have a road trip like that, but the intention from the beginning was to come up with a story that was compelling because the characters were real”, the actor says. “It succeeds in that – despite all the pooh and pee jokes.”
Yet, pooh and pee jokes are becoming a staple of the successful modern-day teenage comedy too. But again, it’s not just about pushing the envelope, says Zuckerman.
“At the same time I think what separates our film from one that just pushes the envelope and tells crass jokes is that it has characters in it that audiences can empathize with and care about. It’s not just about the jokes, it’s about the relationships. But yeah, you do have to keep up the speed – seems you have to get a little bit more crass these days to attract that ‘internet generation”.
Thankfully, says the actor, “I don’t have any living Grandmother’s… so that’s definitely, probably, a good thing”.
There are quite a few racy scenes in the film – but believe it or not, they were the hardest scenes to film, says Zuckerman.
“Everything has his own challenge – but I remember that Amanda Crews had trouble getting the shoes onto the shoe tree”, he says, referring to a sequence where her character decides to donate her sneakers to a tree that’s already laced with other people’s shoes. “It doesn’t seem like it’d be that hard, but she couldn’t do it. Sean Anders, the director, bet her a large sum of money that she couldn’t make it on one particular shot – she didn’t win that bet.”
Clark Duke, the portly and bespectacled star of TVs Greek, plays totally against type here as Lance, a ladies man. The question remains… who is the real Clark Duke? Is he geek or sheik?
“Should I ruin the mystery?”, asks Zuckerman. “Well, let’s just say Clark Duke is a ladies man. I kid you not. He has a very sweet side, but he’s also incredibly funny. I would say he’s a lot like Lance. Some people have trouble with those scenes in which he gets the ladies but I’ll tell you, he’s a ladies man. He’s quite the suave fellow. He’s a James Bond-of sorts. I’m telling you, Clark gets all the girls”.
Duke’s not the only one of the cast to be playing a totally different character than usual here. Before Sex Drive, Zuckerman’s most notable role was playing young Dr. Evil (the character played by Mike Myers) in Austin Powers in Goldmember. Not that anyone would recognize him from that role -what with the bald cap on and all – right?
“You’d be surprised”, laughs Zuckerman. “I was at an airport once and the ticket agent said ‘Are you in the movies?’, I said ‘Yeah, why?’, he replies ‘Were you young Dr. Evil?’ And what’s funny is I had a full head of hair and I think I was even wearing glasses and had a beard!”
Another Austin Powers veteran appears in Sex Drive, Seth Green – who played Dr. Evil’s son in the films.
“Yeah, it’s kinda a family tree – just a little reversed”, chuckles Zuckerman. “It was really, really awesome to work with Seth again – especially considering we didn’t actually get to share any scenes on Austin Powers.”
Zuckerman, who recently finished a stint on TVs Kyle XY, says he’s got to carefully think out his next move before making it so that he doesn’t become a staple of a bunch of teenage comedies – but that’s not to say you won’t see him in another one of those.
“If you work in one thing, people like to put you in that thing again and again and again. And there has been a little bit of play in that. I’m trying to take the next step wisely and I have some really good options on the table – and I might have to cater a little bit to what other people want to put me in; there might be some compromising. I’ll probably do something more dramatic, then another comedy, and I’m really looking now at the possibility of doing some theatre.”
Surely the producers of Sex Drive have the cast locked in for a sequel though?
“There is a sequel clause in our contracts but nobody has talked about one at this point”, he says. “Sean Anders, the director, was saying that if there would be a sequel it wouldn’t be like the American Pie sequels where it’d just be all the same cast – he’s actually talked about it centring on Andy and Randy (the all-talk teenagers from the film) and following them on whatever adventures they’d be undertaking. And instead of [Amanda, Clark and I] popping up as the same characters again, in cameos, we’d appear as different characters!”.
– CLINT MORRIS
