Orange County (2002)

1. Hello, DVD fans.

2. I'm Jake Kasdan, sitting here with Mike White.

3. I'm the writer of the movie Orange County.

4. And I'm the director.

5. And that's the Spaceman.

6. There's Colin Hanks. The incredible Colin Hanks.

7. The first and last image in the movie,

8. and most of the images in between.

9. He's in almost every scene in this movie.

10. For those of you don't know, Orange County is a somewhat beach community

11. south of Los Angeles, where—

12. Which got off pretty easily by this scathing critique.

13. Come on, Mike, it's pretty scathing.

14. The original title of this movie was Escape From Orange County

15. but I think people thought it would end up being a horror film or something.

16. Which was the original intent, but somehow...

17. Somehow it didn't come out as quite a horror movie.

18. - It came out as a light comedy. - Yeah, it came out a light comedy.

19. Although this is the dark part.

20. This right here is the dark part.

21. It is the one digital sequence in the movie.

22. It was my first experience with digital effects,

23. and all of these shots, even these that seem pretty straightforward,

24. are altered and treated in some way.

25. This thing— This is the big shot right here.

26. We shot in the tank at Paramount.

27. The great, big fake tank.

28. I mean, it's a real tank, but it's for shooting fake water stuff.

29. Took about eight months and many different versions.

30. Cinesite is the name of the people who do that.

31. And it was a really interesting learning experience for me.

32. Fake water, which is still really challenging,

33. even after Perfect Storm and stuff.

34. It's really hard to get fake water to look real.

35. This plot point, where the friend dies,

36. was quite a controversial one during the development of the script.

37. One executive said, "I don't know if the kids would recover

38. from his friend dying in a surfing accident."

39. And we don't know that the kids have recovered, actually.

40. There are traumatized kids spread out all over the country

41. still trying to get over this.

42. I thought it was one of the great jokes I'd ever read.

43. It's just one of those Mike White things where you go,

44. "Yeah, this is third page of the movie.

45. The kid's dead. That's the transformative experience.

46. I'm gonna go make this movie.“

47. And I'm really glad we kept it in there

48. and convinced everybody we needed to convince to let us do it.

49. This whole sequence really sort of falls into that category.

50. ThiS— It's like this—

51. In the final film, it's only actually about five minutes long.

52. In the script it was a little longer.

53. Just this really direct telling of the backstory,

54. the pre-story that gets us into the main action of the movie.

55. And it's just, I think, so funny and...

56. I'm not really sure that I fully did justice

57. to how amazing this was on the page.

58. - But it is just a great, great sequence. - Oh, Jake. Oh, Jake.

59. No, it's true, Mike. I wonder sometimes.

60. It's only five minutes on the screen, but it only took five weeks to shoot.

61. Oh, my God, it's Mike White.

62. That's the writer right there.

63. - Mike White. - That— No.

64. No, not him. Him. Him. That's Mike White.

65. Mike White, who plays the teacher, Mr. Burke.

66. Since then, I've had major facial reconstructive surgery,

67. so if you see someone who looks like that on the street,

68. that's not the same person.

69. And that, of course, is Jack Black puking on Shaun's story.

70. It was not easy to get Mike White to play that part, by the way.

71. We had to beg— me and Scott Rudin, the producer.

72. And I went way below my quote.

73. I'm still waiting for that residual check.

74. Yeah. There's Schuyler Fisk.

75. Sweet Schuyler Fisk.

76. This is the scene, actually, that she read in the audition,

77. and we thought, "Well, there it is. That's her. We can stop looking."

78. We saw these two kids read this scene...

79. and it was a little bit, for me anyway, like the—

80. There's the movie moment where you go, "Okay, I get it."

81. It's the, "I think it could be a movie." And him, the way he was reacting to her.

82. And it's pretty much like that in the movie.

83. The brilliant Lily Tomlin,

84. who was the first person who signed on to this movie.

85. The first person who said, "Yeah, I'll be in it."

86. We just sent her the script and a letter begging,

87. and she agreed to come aboard.

88. Longtime hero of Mike's and mine.

89. There's a lot of people like that in this movie.

90. This is a song— Band called Cake.

91. Really cool band. Great song.

92. My music supervisors, Manish Raval and Tom Wolfe, played me this song,

93. and it felt to me like, "Let's design a title sequence around this."

94. Seemed like a great way to start this movie.

95. And I always wanted to do a movie with a late title sequence.

96. When I wrote this script,

97. Jack Black actually lived next door to me,

98. and I can tell you that he does hang out in his underwear all day long, every day.

99. Although that's a wig.

100. Can you believe it? It's a wig.

101. And he doesn't hang out in a wig all day long, every day?

102. Usually, I'll just bring over the wig and he'll put it on.

103. That guy's name is George Murdoch.

104. He plays Bob. He's really funny.

105. I read a lot, a lot of people for that role.

106. And it's one of those parts that when you're auditioning people to play Bob,

107. you go home at night wondering what you're doing with your life.

108. And then George Murdoch came in

109. and managed to make this totally perverse, sicko aspect of Mike's script

110. really funny, as it should be.

111. And, of course, Catherine O'Hara.

112. This I would like to ask you about, Jake.

113. Yeah, this is a good opportunity.

114. Is this what she's saying?

115. Because right here at the end here,

116. it says, "What if we doubled your salary?" And she says, "Okay."

117. She just says one word, and there it says, "Time and half on Saturdays?"

118. Yeah, that's not actually what she's saying.

119. The rest of it is, but that one thing—

120. It was actually...

121. Super Scott Rudin thought,

122. "Maybe we could make that a little funnier,"

123. and that was his line.

124. And I think it's really funny, and it gets a laugh.

125. It may not be exactly what you wrote.

126. I just wonder what the Spanish-speaking members of the audience think.

127. They think it's hysterical.

128. - They loved that. - It's very postmodern.

129. Yeah, I thought it was a good line.

130. This is probably the only autobiographical moment in the entire movie.

131. Well, I don't know, but my mother was slightly traumatized

132. when I told her I was going to a college far away from home.

133. So this place, and I promise not to talk too much about locations,

134. but this place is kind of an extraordinary location.

135. It actually is a high school in Diamond Bar, California,

136. which is near Pomona.

137. We wanted to find something that was sort of unusual-looking,

138. kind of very modern high school.

139. And then my location team took me out here

140. and just couldn't believe what it was like.

141. The only other people who had shot there at the time that we shot there

142. were The Cell.

143. So this, like, super sci-fi movie, and then us.

144. And now there's a Jack in the Box commercial.

145. Stole our Diamond Bar high school thunder a little bit.

146. So that joke in the beginning of this scene

147. of the two guys overlapping each other—

148. Another sort of great, great thing on the page.

149. Hard to execute.

150. It's enhanced ADR to get them overlapping each other appropriately.

151. It makes me laugh.

152. That scene looks like it's taking place at sunset.

153. Thanks.

154. You think that's easy

155. to make it look like scenes at 9:00 in the morning are at sunset?

156. So here's Chevy Chase.

157. I still kind of can't believe he's in here.

158. I think this scene's hysterical.

159. We sort of took this attitude casting this movie

160. that, like, we'd just try and get the dream person to play every role

161. and then just send them the script with these love letters,

162. sort of saying, "Will you come do this?"

163. And he came, and I'm so glad that he did.

164. He's really funny.

165. And this, of course, is the best scene in the movie.

166. It's hard having the best scene in the movie

167. only like ten minutes into the movie.

168. 'Cause then what do you do?

169. But this is— this is the best scene in the movie.

170. I've never actually seen this scene before.

171. But I'll take your word for it.

172. Yeah, see, it's funny.

173. It's like a perfectly built joke.

174. And actually delivered in person by the writer.

175. We shot all these promos for MTV...

176. right before the movie came out so that we could try and get people to go.

177. The concept is, you shoot these little skits

178. that kind of seem like the movie, but aren't actually in the movie,

179. and they run them on MTV a lot.

180. We did six or five different ones

181. with Mike teaching class about different things

182. that will be on the DVD here.

183. No!

184. You can watch him when you get done with this movie.

185. - Oh, my God. - That's one of our special features.

186. I think they're so funny.

187. - Mr. Burke was really happy for her. - He was so happy for her.

188. He certainly took some pride in her accomplishments.

189. He feels responsible for her getting into Stanford.

190. I was actually supposed to play this part.

191. Yes, I hate to break it to our audience out there.

192. I don't know what you're talking about.

193. It would have been a much different movie.

194. Certainly a different ad campaign.

195. It definitely would have been an entirely different ad campaign,

196. but it would have been a funny version of this movie.

197. But a different version of this movie.

198. Instead, we ended up with this version of this movie.

199. There were never any parts I was supposed to play.

200. This— When I actually found out where I was going to college,

201. the day that I was supposed to get all my responses—

202. This is true. This is true.

203. I know this is a place to exaggerate, but this actually happened.

204. The mailman got in a car accident with his mail truck,

205. and the mail did not arrive the day

206. that all my college acceptance letters were coming.

207. And I was hysterical.

208. I had made my father drive down to the post office with me—

209. To the hospital where the guy was recovering.

210. No, I don't think he was injured, but anyway.

211. - So I didn't find out till the next day. - On his deathbed.

212. I was in a panic.

213. That's the biggest laugh in the movie, by the way.

214. No pride there. Just telling you.

215. Seen it with an audience 20 or 30 times.

216. That's, by an audience meter— Laughometer—-

217. That's the funniest thing in the movie, that vase falling on Bob's head.

218. What I find funny is that they cut out any sort of attempt to say,

219. "Bob, are you okay?"

220. "They"? Like, Who's "they"?

221. "They," meaning the goblins.

222. "They," like, me?

223. No, I think it was a good call.

224. - Yeah. - It's a heartless world.

225. - Yeah. - And this movie reflects it.

226. That's really what this—

227. We wanted something scathing.

228. Maybe you saw that little portrait behind them.

229. Behind Colin.

230. It's the funniest piece of—- No, actually,

231. it's the second funniest piece of set dressing in the movie.

232. I'll show you the funniest piece when we get there.

233. That's something to look forward to.

234. But that portrait was—

235. Chris Spellman, who's the set decorator,

236. who's totally great,

237. did this movie, did a TV series with Mike and I.

238. Mike and I worked on this show called Freaks and Geeks together,

239. and Spell had this great guy

240. who does these portraits that make kids look sort of slightly Asian.

241. So we called out that guy for this.

242. My favorite line in the movie just happened,

243. where she says, "Is Bob dead? Did something break?"

244. And yet, I've never heard it get a laugh

245. in the few times I've seen it played in front of an audience.

246. Just goes to show you.

247. And I've wondered why.

248. I think it's because it's in the same scene with the biggest laugh in the movie.

249. It's, like, after you have the vase fall on the guy's head,

250. subtle verbal character jokes can't register quite the same way.

251. There was one time it did actually, Mike...

252. - That was when I was there. - ... get a laugh.

253. - Yeah. - Me laughing.

254. Oh, it was you.

255. This scene was much longer at one time,

256. and it had all kinds of great stuff in it.

257. But as the movie got more, sort of,

258. brisk and efficient and muscular...

259. it became necessary to make it a little less.

260. I really like what's here now though, I have to say.

261. I think it's super funny.

262. Isn't this the scene where Lily Tomlin came to the set

263. saying today was her birthday, her character's birthday?

264. That was the first scene,

265. and there are actually balloons in that scene.

266. In the opening, when you meet Lin,

267. you'll notice that the room is dressed as though it's her birthday.

268. Here it is. Classic Mike White joke. Right there.

269. Shane Brainard did get into Stanford.

270. You get that one place.

271. Mike White.

272. Okay, coming up on the single ugliest cut in the movie.

273. There it is.

274. He's standing in a completely different corner of the room.

275. It's the one, like, horrifying jump cut.

276. Tara Timpone, who is the queen, who is my editor,

277. my right and sometimes left hand and closest collaborator,

278. probably has a minor heart attack every time she sees that moment.

279. And no one hardly ever mentions it.

280. These are cheerleaders

281. who are, like, the most popular part of the movie, and some sets.

282. They are so cute, and really good.

283. We shot this, like, 10,000 times for several days,

284. 'cause it kept starting to rain, and we'd have to start over again,

285. and some of the extras would not be back.

286. It was kind of a nightmare.

287. It was also, like, ten times longer than this.

288. And he had a little meltdown

289. that also got cutout in the effort to get into the movie a little faster.

290. By the end of it, by far the hardest thing in the movie to shoot physically,

291. was reduced to about two and a half lines

292. that we probably could have done in one shot in an hour and a half otherwise.

293. That's what editing does.

294. We cut this movie for a long time,

295. which could be considered an opportunity to really get it right.

296. In retrospect, I think that's the way that I need to think about it.

297. Not like I was sitting in a dark room doing the same thing for nine months.

298. We cut it for a long time, though. When I say “we"-- Tara, myself.

299. Mike would come and contribute

300. when I could pull him away from his other responsibilities,

301. and Scott Rudin, who's a really brilliant editorial mind

302. and taught me a lot of stuff in the process of this.

303. I had a cat named Poody.

304. I don't know why I decided to name his pacifier Poody.

305. I do, because it's a little cringe-factor word, kind of.

306. There's something about hearing someone say "poody"--

307. And particularly, like, multiple "poodys"...

308. Gives you that special feeling.

309. Here's Leslie Mann playing Krista.

310. She is really funny.

311. This was— I think I can say it.

312. I think we've reached a moment in this process

313. and in our relationship, Mike, where I can say

314. Krista was by far my least favorite thing in the movie

315. when I signed on to it.

316. It was the joke that I didn't get.

317. And Leslie—

318. Again, like, I read hundreds of people.

319. It's often the case where the character that you least relate to

320. is the hardest to cast.

321. I read so many girls to play Krista,

322. and it was hard for me to wrap my head around how that would work.

323. Leslie is a friend of mine, and I think she's hysterical.

324. And she kind of made that really funny to me

325. by just being very real.

326. Talk about this scene, Mike.

327. This is a great scene.

328. - Well put. - I wrote a hundred versions of this scene.

329. We decided on this one.

330. Better each time.

331. This was in the script.

332. But Mike had been through a lot of process with the script

333. prior to my arrival on the scene.

334. It had been around for a couple of years and with different people,

335. and Scott and Mike got this script to, basically, what it is now.

336. And then there were a couple scenes after I arrived

337. that we worked and reworked many times,

338. none more than this.

339. But I think it ended up really funny.

340. And Lithgow's totally great.

341. - And the nicest man in the world. - The nicest man in the world.

342. At least the nicest man in the first act.

343. There's someone equally nice in the second act.

344. And, again, we have that to look forward to.

345. That phone ringing back there is my favorite sound effect in the movie.

346. You can push the little rewind thing,

347. go back about 60 seconds and you can hear my favorite sound effect in the movie.

348. She's toeing his blower.

349. That old thing.

350. Feels obscene, but you can't tell why.

351. It's PG-13, but it's kind of disturbing.

352. The gardener, by the way, was our caterer Orlando...

353. in what was definitely his best day on the shoot.

354. This is one of those scenes where you see the reflection

355. of the parents in the child.

356. Yeah, that's true.

357. Who knew casting Sissy Spacek's daughter and Tom Hanks's son

358. would prove to be so controversial?

359. It was oft...

360. wrought about.

361. And we all said that kid is somebody who has done a lot of work in Hollywood,

362. and at the time of the release—

363. My dad is a director. I don't mean to be so vague about it.

364. His name's Larry.

365. But at the time of the release,

366. we sort of knew people would find it noteworthy.

367. It's a subject that runs out of steam pretty fast,

368. so it kind of was a little bit of a surprise

369. just how much ink there was to spend on it.

370. People always assume that it drives me crazy,

371. like I'm sitting there seething like,

372. "Damn it. Talk about me, not my dad."

373. It's not really that.

374. The part of it that does get on your nerves, though,

375. is that you just feel like they're skipping the big picture

376. and they're skipping a lot of the people,

377. specifically, Mike and Jack are the ones that I just felt like...

378. "Hello? It's not three of us. It's—"

379. Or five of us. It's kind of hundreds of us, and it's like—

380. You get tired of the conversation being so small.

381. I have something to say about this scene, which is—

382. This was supposed to take place in front of a water polo—

383. I don't like where this is going.

384. Through the development, we were accused of having—

385. It was that it was a sex-free movie. There wasn't a lot of flesh.

386. So I was like, “Well, let's put one scene in front of a water polo swimming pool,

387. and they could be having, you know, a lot of kids in bathing suits."

388. But it was raining the day we were supposed to shoot the scene,

389. so we decide to come indoors.

390. And Jake, in a moment of inspiration,

391. decided to make all the volleyball players take their shirts off.

392. Maybe we should add

393. that my only instructive from Mike,

394. who I listen to in all things, all the time,

395. was, "If I don't start seeing some kids in bathing suits soon,

396. I'm going to start getting pissed

397. 'cause we've been shooting in this house for three weeks."

398. And that's it. Shirts and skins.

399. And they all just do it immediately.

400. Like, as if that's ever happened in high school.

401. Volleyball practices.

402. - Shirts and skins volleyball practice. - And somehow still totally sexless.

403. There they are.

404. That sequence, by the way,

405. which I just think is a hilarious idea, that blackmail—

406. That's like one of those sequences—

407. Another "This is why you do the movie" kind of sequence—

408. Was, of the sequences like that,

409. the hardest to get popping in the cut.

410. I don't know if I shot it quite right, although it's shot—

411. It's very pretty.

412. Greg Gardiner, who shot the movie and did a ton of things so right, and I

413. came up with that concept that that sequence should all be moving,

414. which is maybe not quite the right way to do that.

415. It ended up much reduced, but I do think really funny

416. and we eventually found a version of it that played big in the theater.

417. That was the dog bite.

418. That's the second biggest laugh in the movie

419. after the thing falls on Bob's head.

420. And it was not intentional.

421. It was an actual flip-out on the part of that very cute little dog.

422. When you kiss him,

423. he tries to eat your face— turned out, the first day.

424. We didn't know that at the time.

425. It was actually Schuyler's first setup and had that—

426. And it caused a— People have talked about it a lot.

427. It might be the moment people talk about the most, actually.

428. She just went right with it and didn't break.

429. Catherine's fantastic here.

430. Whether she likes it or not, she is fantastic here.

431. Both these scenes.

432. It's everything I thought it would be to have her in this part.

433. And she's hysterical and so specific and real,

434. but big character and...

435. totally great.

436. There's the funniest piece of set dressing in the movie.

437. It's that little statue on the bed.

438. It'll come back if you missed it. You don't have to rewind.

439. There's something so gross about the thought

440. of not only having sex with him, but having sex with him four times.

441. It's somehow worse than, like, hundreds of times.

442. It's just so specific.

443. But the scene is the thing, Mike, and it's hysterical.

444. It's an amazingly written scene.

445. It's an amazingly written scene with the tennis instructor

446. and the wine at the end.

447. There it is. That's the shot that really features it.

448. Funniest bit of set dressing in the movie.

449. It's all downhill from there in terms of set dressing in the movie,

450. much the way it's all downhill from Mike's scene

451. as the teacher ten minutes in.

452. It should be said...

453. I think this will be the moment when I say something about Jack Black.

454. Jack is—

455. I think he's absolutely hysterical in the movie,

456. and I think America agrees.

457. He is as much fun as anybody I've ever worked with.

458. He's a relentless perfectionist,

459. asks to do it again after you've done it ten times.

460. No two takes are the same.

461. People would ask if it's all improvised. It's not. Mike writes like this for him.

462. Mike just writes in this voice beautifully and Jack plays this character beautifully.

463. Everything in Jack's bedroom in this sequence—

464. That thing of going to say, "The people are coming,"

465. and the scene that follows it, which I'll point out in a second—

466. Was all his first day of shooting.

467. Just bringing the heat for 12 hours.

468. Absolutely genius comedy.

469. And I will say that, at the risk of being overly earnest,

470. I do feel very lucky to have had that opportunity to do that with him,

471. 'cause he's really something to watch.

472. Now, this is...

473. the nicest man in the second act.

474. That burp was Catherine's idea, by the way.

475. She cracked many people up on the set.

476. She was a little bummed because we enhanced it slightly in post-production,

477. wet it down.

478. There's this moment in the mix where you're standing there on the stage

479. for two and a half hours.

480. Like, "Can you take out one of those parts and wet it down a little bit?"

481. I think we need a little bit more room on the burp.

482. We discussed the burp analytically for two and a half hours.

483. Those were the dark— Those are— Not why people become a director.

484. But it was her idea.

485. Dana Ivey and Garry Marshall.

486. And they're super funny.

487. Dana's like an absolute genius stage actress

488. and film actress, obviously, but she's...

489. Everyone who's ever met her adores her.

490. She travels the world in her free time.

491. She's been everywhere, she's seen all kinds of stuff.

492. Nicest lady, and so much fun with her. And she's so funny.

493. And then Garry Marshall,

494. who a lot of people think is actually the funniest person in the world.

495. I pulled Dana aside while we were shooting this scene and I said,

496. "You know, when I was a teenager,

497. I saw you in Sunday in the Park with George in New York,

498. and I came by afterwards and, you know, congratulated you."

499. And she's like, "You were a stage-door johnny?"

500. - "Yeah, I was a stage-door johnny." - I'm still recovering from her tone.

501. Have we talked about these two guys?

502. This is R.J. Knoll and Kyle Howard.

503. From left to right, R.J. Knoll, Kyle Howard.

504. Chad and Arlo, in that order.

505. Super funny dudes. Fake tattoo.

506. Had to do it every morning for three hours.

507. Kyle I had worked with on a TV show...

508. called Grosse Pointe- I had shot a couple of episodes of,

509. and I just thought he was fantastic and real and super funny.

510. And the chicks dig him.

511. R—--J...

512. just came in and nailed this thing.

513. Mike and I both thought he was hysterical.

514. We read a lot of guys to do these two guys,

515. read 'em in pairs and combinations.

516. And I was always happy to see those guys show up in the morning.

517. They also work just so much.

518. Somehow, Chad and Arlo were like—

519. There's always somebody in the cast list on a big movie who, like,

520. is just on the set all the time, waiting around, and they were—

521. In this movie, it was those two guys, and they were so great about it.

522. Fun hanging out with them.

523. This is kind of the definitive "Jack in his underwear" moment.

524. There's a couple of, like, underwear teasers prior to this,

525. but we saved the full effect for this moment.

526. That's my favorite thing in this sequence,

527. which is Jack is pissed that he's been asked to leave the room.

528. "'Protose' a toast." That's a little O'Hara-ism.

529. Some people's favorite line.

530. It's always lines you don't write that are everybody's favorite lines.

531. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

532. It's a hard life, being a writer.

533. This was such a great view.

534. It wasn't in Orange County, but it said "Orange County."

535. - Yeah. - This is the other scene

536. that was the first moment of Jack on this movie.

537. It's hard to explain what it is when you show up at your first day at work

538. and there's a hundred people standing around, watching you,

539. and, you know, you have people saying, like,

540. "Have you thought about maybe a cartwheel?"

541. He's monstrous.

542. Yeah, we didn't shoot in Orange County at all.

543. Another controversial tidbit.

544. Particularly in Orange County.

545. The reason...

546. Here's the most boring thing I'll say.

547. The reason is that there's a union— Their labor laws—

548. You know, the union that all of the people on the crew belong to

549. has rules about where you can work if you're staying in town.

550. And Orange County is outside what they call "the local zone."

551. So we kept it local.

552. The truth is, I don't think it makes one single stinking iota of difference.

553. You get what the movie's about.

554. These places look like the places that they're modeled after.

555. It's the magic of the movies.

556. Here's the first— Well, it's actually the second use,

557. but the first big use of the great Brian Wilson.

558. The song's called "Lay Down Burden."

559. It is the first piece of music I put in the movie and in this scene.

560. Nothing could ever come close.

561. This is— What are they doing? That's what I want to know.

562. He's cleaning up the piss and she's watching.

563. Looks like they're in the middle of some bizarre, like, "spank mom dot"--

564. son-spanking ritual.

565. I don't wanna think about that.

566. Here's the fish tank, which is the first Graduate reference.

567. Very small Graduate quote.

568. The meme, The Graduate.

569. And here comes the big one.

570. Just load them all into one moment.

571. Brian Wilson, sort of the thematic musical center of the movie,

572. even though it's sort of an MTV soundtrack.

573. There's this and one other major Brian Wilson use

574. and I always love 'em.

575. That was Jack Black taking off his socks before hopping in the pool.

576. That was an idea that he's always quick to credit

577. to Joe, the costumer— "You should just take off the socks."

578. 'Cause I think they didn't have backup socks.

579. This is one of my favorite scenes in the movie.

580. This is another one on that list

581. with the opening sequence and the Tanya sequence of, like,

582. "This is one of the funniest things I've ever read. I wanna make this movie.“

583. This is actually the other scene that I don't—

584. That I think was in the original script.

585. - Yeah. - Shocking when that happens.

586. This is one of those scenes people always say,

587. "How much of this is improvised?" Almost none of it.

588. This is Mike.

589. For better or worse.

590. That was not mine.

591. The shape of the hat.

592. The... was Jack's contribution.

593. I'm not trying to take away from Jack. Jack's brilliant here.

594. I mean, I think he's brilliant here.

595. This right here, this shot right here, I was operating this shot.

596. - I don't do that that much. - Beautiful.

597. 'Cause I'm not good at it. Thank you. Thank you.

598. - Do you really think so? - I do think so. It's very—

599. It's the moment that I leave him that makes it funny.

600. The other thing about that scene is,

601. it is very subtly, beautifully edited by Tara.

602. That's the hardest kind of comedy to cut.

603. It's the kind of thing, like, almost nobody can do,

604. where you maximize the jokes,

605. find the right stuff—

606. It's just, that is, like, a real gift to be able to cut that kind of comedy,

607. and Tara is so good at it.

608. The way it appears in the movie is almost identical

609. to what I first saw in the assembly, which is very rare.

610. Usually I go in and really work on it over the course of nine months editing.

611. And that scene in the car is pretty much as it was written,

612. and exactly as it was first assembled.

613. Tara is all over that. And like all great editing, you would never know it.

614. This is Jane Adams.

615. - So funny. - She made a mountain out of a molehill.

616. - Yes. - Literally.

617. Jane Adams, who's one of the funniest actresses in the world, I think.

618. She's in that— We've got a few of those, between Lin and Catherine and Jane.

619. To me that is seriously three of the funniest women in the world.

620. She's awesome here.

621. And just so real.

622. Don't forget Herb Gains's wife, who's in the following scene.

623. That's true.

624. She's never worked before, but this is the beginning.

625. That's something we have to look forward to.

626. Herb Gains is the physical producer of the movie.

627. He's credited as executive producer.

628. He did an amazing, complicated thing

629. that sort of made it possible to have all these actors.

630. It's a great triumph.

631. He and Carey Dietrich, my first AD.

632. This was a scheduling nightmare.

633. That's what is the hardest part of getting all those people.

634. It's just hard to get 'em all in the right place at the right time.

635. What do you say about this?

636. It speaks for itself.

637. Oh, man, should we talk about that?

638. First of all, here it comes. Here it comes. The last Graduate quote.

639. There it is.

640. That shot is, you know, the leg and the doorway.

641. Harold Ramis, the other nicest man in the world.

642. Yeah.

643. - Herb Gains's wife. - Herb Gains's wife.

644. Harold is one of my heroes since I was a little kid.

645. He's involved in almost all of the comedies that I love.

646. I've always wanted to work with him.

647. I think he's hilarious on camera and he doesn't do it enough anymore.

648. He was one of the first people called up.

649. You know, sent him the script, wrote him a letter, called him up,

650. said "Please come do this."

651. "What would it take to convince you to do this?"

652. He said, "It doesn't take that much. When is it?"

653. And was just totally great and so supportive.

654. Came into the cutting room at one point and gave me some notes,

655. which is, like, a real gift from somebody

656. who's cut that many comedies and made that many jokes work.

657. He's just absolutely fine-as-they-come human being.

658. And he's so funny in the movie.

659. This was Mr. Lithgow's first moment on the movie.

660. Tough scene to start with.

661. He's great.

662. And Catherine's great here.

663. This is probably my favorite music cue in the movie.

664. Score cue, I mean.

665. Just...

666. puts you right—

667. Puts me, anyway, you know, right in her head in a sympathetic way.

668. It's kind of what you want the score to do is, like,

669. you know, help you identify what aspect of the character you're sympathizing with.

670. Biggest verbal joke in the movie is coming up.

671. Harold just totally going for it here.

672. There it is. Biggest verbal joke in the movie.

673. You want to get bigger than that,

674. you're gonna have to throw something at somebody's head.

675. I think he's totally hilarious here.

676. It's just a monster powerhouse comic performance

677. from the great Harold Ramis.

678. He was Egon.

679. He wrote Animal House, Caddyshack.

680. And now he's in Orange County That makes me so happy.

681. They're not smoking a joint here.

682. She's so funny here.

683. So is he.

684. There was a big, scandalous sex scene between them.

685. Cut it out really early.

686. It was just too hot.

687. This is also the area of the movie—

688. Greg Gardiner, who I talked about, who I worked really closely with,

689. the cinematographer...

690. He did a really nice job and we had fun together.

691. This is the area of the movie I think is just—

692. Every time I see it, I just think this is really beautiful photography.

693. He does these nighttimes at this campus really nicely.

694. He's just, like, the weirdest—

695. I love the weird Japanese wrestler hairdo.

696. Yeah, it's sweet.

697. And they're holding hands.

698. He's considerate. He's a considerate lover, Lance.

699. Stiller. Star of my first movie.

700. Zero Effect.

701. He'll do this sometimes.

702. Ben actually called me up and said, "If you've got anything I can do

703. for, like, a few hours a day, I would love to do it."

704. Which is pretty solid for a huge movie star.

705. There aren't a lot of them who say that.

706. But he's my buddy, and he's hilarious here.

707. Just come in and be the straight man.

708. I love this scene, though.

709. That look he gives him, like, this guy has no pants.

710. That's the Stiller move.

711. And that's the Jack Black move.

712. And that's what's fun is that it is, like, these two—

713. Just two of the funniest guys in the world right now

714. doing exactly their thing for one odd moment in this movie.

715. I always feel like this scene feels like a scene

716. from a different movie starring Ben Stiller,

717. where his fireman character—

718. You know, it's like the sequel to Backdraft or something—

719. Runs into the arsonist.

720. I always sort of feel like I'd kind of like to make that movie too.

721. This is when the movie takes a serious turn, unexpectedly.

722. It's unexpected.

723. The only way you could possibly know it was coming

724. is the beginning of that music cue.

725. How about Colin Hanks just, like, scene after scene, totally great.

726. If he's got to deliver the joke, he delivers the joke.

727. If he's got to be quiet and respond, he does that.

728. If it's got to be really true, it's that. If it's kind of broad and comical, it is.

729. He's a movie star.

730. It's so hard when you're in every scene of the movie.

731. He's a young guy and he's done some work, but he's used to being in, like,

732. three scenes, five scenes, maybe eight scenes.

733. When you're in every scene, it's like you're exhausted all the time.

734. Your preparation is limited to, like, what you can fit in in the makeup trailer,

735. you know, in the 45 minutes before you pass out at night.

736. It's athletic to be the star of a movie.

737. It's not like—

738. It's a whole different deal when you're— when you're the guy.

739. And he's just so good in so much of this.

740. It's really hard to find someone who can do that much different stuff.

741. I read literally hundreds of kids to play Shaun.

742. Could not find anyone.

743. I mean, like, getting close and getting scared,

744. and, like, if we don't have this guy, we don't have a movie.

745. And then Colin Hanks walks in.

746. And it was like the jokes are funny to me again

747. after I'd heard them 5,000 times, and here we go.

748. And then he happens to be, like, the nicest kid you've ever met.

749. The most well-adjusted, levelheaded, approachable guy.

750. Love that Colin Hanks.

751. Schuyler fits almost exactly the same description.

752. To me, this is one of the funniest scenes in the movie.

753. It never plays big in the theater, but...

754. I think she's so funny here, and he's funny with her.

755. It's just real little character comedy

756. in the middle of a movie that's sometimes really broad,

757. and sometimes this subtle, and it's cool.

758. It's the Mike thing.

759. She's just celebrating her divorce from the nicest man in the world.

760. This is the obligatory "walk around and think“ as a—

761. The only reason this isn't totally humiliating to me,

762. instead only partially humiliating to me,

763. is because this song is pretty bitchin'.

764. Pete Yorn.

765. And it's a lot of people's favorite song in the movie.

766. But something about this series of shots and dissolves is just like...

767. I can remember seeing it put together in the cutting room for the first time.

768. I was like, "Could I have made this any more clichéd?“

769. I got the guy on the bike. I got the guy walking down the path.

770. We're descending out of the trees on a crane.

771. It's just, like, one stock shot after another.

772. I felt like I had been possessed by, like, the spirit

773. of some schlocky director from the late '60$.

774. Luckily, Pete Yorn comes in, saves the day.

775. This actress is a friend of mine, Monica Keena,

776. who I met while writing on a show called Dawson's Creek.

777. A little show called Dawson? Creek.

778. And at her request killed off her character

779. so she could go on to other things, like...

780. A little show called Undeclared.

781. And a movie that you're watching.

782. I worked with her on a show called Undeclared

783. She's funny.

784. And she's ridiculously beautiful.

785. Makes her fun to shoot.

786. And she's funny, which makes her fun to shoot.

787. These two girls— On the left is Lizzy Caplan,

788. who is in a bunch of Freaks and Geeks and she's absolutely hysterical.

789. On the right is a girl I know named Sarah Loew, who's also totally great.

790. Here's the big follow-through on the "Butterfly" setup.

791. And there it was. That was the big follow-through.

792. "That's a type of small cherry tree." Here comes Nat Faxon.

793. There he is.

794. This is a really, really funny guy.

795. Nat Faxon is a well-known secret that everyone will know pretty soon.

796. He's one of the great improvisationalists around.

797. You may have recognized him from the Bally's commercial,

798. where he interacts with the ladies from Survivor.

799. - Does he do that? - Yeah.

800. Really?

801. He's funny in this, but he's insanely funny in the Bally's commercials.

802. I worked with Nat on that show Grosse Pointe, where I met Kyle Howard.

803. Nat is... He's incredible.

804. He's one of those people who you can say to him,

805. "Okay, before I call action, be telling her a story about Scrabble,"

806. and you do 35 takes,

807. and there's a slightly different story about Scrabble on every take.

808. Or, you know, stories about his carburetor breaking down,

809. and, like, you'll just— You know, you could—

810. He's unbelievable.

811. Colin didn't actually do that.

812. I'm going to let the cat out of the bag.

813. We found this guy to double Colin,

814. who just looks so much like him, it's almost scary.

815. This incredible stunt double named Jacob.

816. These two could work together for a long time.

817. That's how it works a lot of the time,

818. is actors will find somebody to double them,

819. and it'll be like a 25-year relationship.

820. Jack found an amazing guy too, named Jimmy.

821. Although, Jack ended up attempting almost all of his own stunts

822. and almost everything in the movie.

823. He's the most durable actor I've ever worked with.

824. The unbreakable Jack Black.

825. Colin did a lot of it too.

826. But when you throw somebody off the roof, you need a professional.

827. There he is. The great Kevin Kline.

828. Just awesome.

829. Exactly what you want in this part.

830. Quick diversion.

831. There's this unbelievably beautiful music cue that Mike Andrews wrote.

832. It just makes me cry every time.

833. This scene was shot at Caltech,

834. literally across the street from where I went to grade school through high school.

835. And for some reason— Well, for that obvious reason,

836. when they were shooting the scene, I was like,

837. "Gosh, it happened. I wrote a movie. It's getting made.

838. It's being shot right across the street from my high school,

839. where I imagined maybe one day I would make a movie."

840. I think this is my favorite scene in the movie, if I had to pick one.

841. Of course, it was shot at 3:30 in the morning, freezing.

842. And I kept trying to, like, get into the nostalgia of the moment,

843. and I was too cold to really enjoy it.

844. There was something very emotional about executing this, though.

845. The combination of what Mike's talking about,

846. and just the subject matter of the scene,

847. you know, which is, if you're a writer, which both Mike and I are,

848. it's very personal.

849. Everyone has that parallel experience.

850. For me, you know, Kevin Kline,

851. who is one of the great actors in America...

852. Kevin is in several of my dad's movies...

853. and I've known him for a long time.

854. He's kind of the only one like that in this movie.

855. I've been careful through my career

856. not to work with too many of the same people that my dad...

857. made the center of his movies.

858. At the same time, you know, eventually I realized

859. that by sticking to that too rigidly,

860. all I was doing was eliminating some of the best actors in the world.

861. But it was very emotional this weekend

862. to have Kevin there, playing this part

863. as the sort of aesthetic father figure,

864. and look at the monitor and see his face, and...

865. Just felt like, I don't know, a lot of resonance.

866. And this material is so beautifully written, this scene.

867. Both these scenes.

868. I disagree.

869. All this crap about hope and shit.

870. Beautiful.

871. Please don't curse. - I'm sorry.

872. This is an amazing speech.

873. Which was brutally edited.

874. Yes. Elegantly.

875. This isn't edited. What are you talking about?

876. There's that close-up. That's just like— That's the shot, man.

877. No, not br—

878. Brutally edited in a—

879. You know what I mean.

880. Not really.

881. Totally, man. I'm with you.

882. Kevin is wonderful.

883. I've probably seen the movie 800 times.

884. Not exaggerating, probably 300 times.

885. And...

886. I always fall into that thing, man. Every single time.

887. Just those two scenes.

888. I love that stuff.

889. So, like most movies that get made in Hollywood,

890. we went back and shot some more stuff

891. months after we shot...

892. the body of the movie.

893. And this sequence right here was additional photography.

894. Unlike most movies, it wasn't a process of destroying the movie.

895. Usually reshoots ruin things.

896. Occasionally, they make them better. I do think that on Orange County

897. the reshoot material made the movie a lot better.

898. And this scene, which is super funny, seeing both guys just totally fantastic,

899. I think made it a lot better.

900. You come out of Skinner, which is sort of the soul of the movie,

901. the thematic climax of the movie,

902. and then it quickly becomes a comedy again.

903. And I think they're super funny here.

904. It was a long process figuring out what exactly we were going to do.

905. It was a process that was mainly Mike...

906. and myself and Scott Rudin

907. trying to figure out, like, "What's our fix here?“

908. It was grueling.

909. There were many versions of it on the page.

910. Mike just nailed it eventually.

911. Like, perfect.

912. And I will credit Scott with identifying

913. that this is the type of scene we needed here.

914. Smart dude.

915. I love this scene, though.

916. And it finally let us get Jack's ass into the movie,

917. after somehow making it through the entire principal photography without it.

918. And this scene coming up was also additional.

919. Seeing how we get Colin and Schuyler back together.

920. And I love this scene too.

921. There's a little carburetor story in there.

922. Little bit of Nat Faxon magic to kick it off.

923. This was a thing where we were actually changing, sort of structurally,

924. how the story resolved a little bit.

925. And that was why we changed how they get back together.

926. And the scene that this replaced was actually a very good scene,

927. but wasn't serving...

928. the ultimate end of, like, carrying the thing out

929. with as much momentum and fun as we could.

930. That off-camera "Get in the car" kills me every time.

931. I was standing there on the mix stage saying, "Louder! Make it louder!

932. I want it to distort."

933. A joke you can see coming a mile away that kills every time.

934. There it is.

935. The eye.

936. See it coming a mile away, and it's still funny.

937. And he's kind of happy that they're making out.

938. Lithgow is so funny here.

939. That's the voice of Mr. Jake Kasdan.

940. It's my vocal cameo.

941. I have almost a—

942. I have a very similar type of vocal cameo in my first movie, Zero Effect,

943. and in both places it's providing

944. some bit of story exposition in order to end the movie that, like—

945. No one can even remember, after the movie, what that story point was,

946. much less what the cameo was.

947. Like, "What? They're negotiating about the medicine ball?

948. What was that?"

949. Here's a song that we put into the movie,

950. and between the time we put it into the movie

951. and the month later when we final-mixed the movie,

952. the song became this huge hit,

953. and we could no longer get it on the soundtrack, and—

954. It's a cool song though.

955. This amazing video of hundreds of kids in their underwear

956. that I think will make this band a huge hit.

957. Bob is now inexplicably better.

958. Okay, see, in that one shot where the kid jumps down— You can freeze-frame it.

959. You can see an additional paw there.

960. That's a dog that was entirely out out of the movie

961. and digitally removed from a couple of other shots.

962. But there's one paw still in there.

963. So when Jake hops down off that table, go find the paw.

964. No, really. Go.

965. Now.

966. "Came together." Double entendre. Another ratings fight.

967. That is the, like, Jack thing.

968. He moves his eyes and it blows the roof off the theater.

969. In full control of his instrument.

970. Schuyler is just so unbelievably great in this movie.

971. There's the effusive, proud moment.

972. But she is just mind-blowingly good,

973. and she's so sweet in this final sequence.

974. Like, trying to be happy for him, but she's crushed,

975. and she's so in love with him.

976. It's heartbreaking. She's great.

977. 80 real and so unusual for an actress in a movie like this

978. to be that real, that authentic.

979. She cannot tell a lie.

980. That kind of actress.

981. I hope I make other things with her.

982. And here's the other major Brian Wilson use.

983. "Love and Mercy“ is the name of this song.

984. It's a great song...

985. that I'm so sick of, I could puke.

986. This is such a nice scene, Mike.

987. Everybody's so happy. Even the dog is happy.

988. Even the maid and the little kid are happy.

989. Yeah, look, look, look, look, look. See?

990. They're really happy. Stanford sucks.

991. Everybody's happy.

992. This coda was something we came up with later.

993. We went through a lot of different versions.

994. We argued.

995. We fought.

996. Got bloody between Mike and I.

997. Not really. But I love what this is.

998. It's a great little ending.

999. We went out and shot it one day,

1000. and Greg Gardiner was shooting Men in Black II.

1001. And the great legendary cinematographer John Toll,

1002. who I'd never spoken to or anything—

1003. I called him up the day before and said,

1004. "Is there any way in hell you'd come shoot the end of my movie with me tomorrow?"

1005. And he said, "Yeah, sure."

1006. I mean, I just called him up literally like that, out of the blue.

1007. It's great-looking.

1008. Interesting. And he just came and worked with me for a day.

1009. It was a cool move.

1010. And they're going surfing, even though there's no waves.

1011. But down there, down the beach where they're going,

1012. there's waves, and they're surfing.

1013. Herb Gains. The great Herb Gains. And Carey Dietrich.

1014. I've shot about three days of my whole career without Carey Dietrich.

1015. She stands right next to me, and she's the other queen.

1016. I'm lost without her.

1017. Who didn't we talk about?

1018. Carly Pope, who plays Tanya. Hilarious.

1019. Natasha Melnick from Freaks and Geeks.

1020. She came and did a little thing.

1021. David Doty, who's the cop who takes Harold into the car.

1022. Doty's heavily featured in our deleted scenes.

1023. He's in everything I've ever done.

1024. Back there, you see our stunt coordinator, Gregg Smrz,

1025. who spells his name S-M-R-Z.

1026. Which confuses people all over the place

1027. when they're doing the spelling check on the end roll.

1028. Great guy, Gregg Smrz. Did a really nice—

1029. Helped with a lot of stuff.

1030. Jacqui Clay, my script supervisor,

1031. I've sat next to for thousands upon thousands of hours.

1032. Another person— I don't think I've ever worked a day without Jacqui.

1033. I don't know what to do without her.

1034. My women.

1035. Robert Grieve and Joel Shryack, our supervising sound editors.

1036. Bob Grieve is the only person in the world who's worked on every Kasdan movie.

1037. And he's a mad scientist,

1038. and a genius and an artist and good friend.

1039. Deana Albers and Parker Swanson, our fearless prop team.

1040. Like, delivering obscure items, ten minutes notice.

1041. It takes so many people to make a movie like this.

1042. Lisa Layman, my makeup artist who did the TV shows with me.

1043. So wonderful.

1044. The assistant squad.

1045. Sarah Hendler works with me. 80 great.

1046. Melvin Mar, who works with Scott Aversano.

1047. The two of them just did so much work for this movie for a year and a half.

1048. Todd Burke records the score.

1049. Worked on everything I've ever done.

1050. Works with Mike very closely, and he's fantastic.

1051. Mike McAlister, effects supervisor.

1052. I didn't talk about Debra McGuire, who did the costume work on this movie.

1053. Just this wonderful designer.

1054. Major, major TV designer

1055. who I was able to convince to come and do this.

1056. She did Freaks and Geeks and Undeclared with Judd Apatow and me.

1057. And...

1058. her great crew, Joe and Katrina and Wini and Dan.

1059. Ton of song titles.

1060. Lot of songs in this movie.

1061. It's a big, long process dealing with the soundtrack

1062. and the licensing for a movie like this,

1063. and Manish and Tom did a great job.

1064. It's hard to do a big soundtrack movie like this and not have it be embarrassing.

1065. And I'm not embarrassed by the music. I think it's really good.

1066. This song is Phantom Planet.

1067. They were my buddies.

1068. We couldn't quite figure out where to put it in the movie,

1069. but it's a great way to watch the and roll.

1070. Bravo. Bravo.

1071. It was pretty fun to make this movie,

1072. but it was the hardest thing I've ever done.

1073. It was fun to shoot Mike's script.

1074. Thanks for watching.