"MacGruber" cast members Q&A

Get ready for action, crude humor and one-liners that only the writers of “Saturday Night Live” could create.

The popular SNL sketch “MacGruber,” played by Will Forte, hits theaters on May 21.

Joined by Lt. Dixon Piper (played by Ryan Phillippe) and Vicki St. Elmo (Kristen Wiig), ex-American hero MacGruber sets off to diffuse a nuclear warhead whose mastermind is none other than MacGruber’s arch nemesis.

The Lonely Island’s Jorma Taccone directs and writes the 80s action-inspired comedy. The other two writers are Forte and “The Brothers Solomon” writer John Solomon.

Forte, Phillippe and Taccone sat down with the CU Independent to talk about the new movie. Solomon was present, but sat back and enjoyed the conversation.

CUI: You guys hosted WWE Raw last week. What was that experience like?

Forte: It was terrifying! So much fun! It’s an arena with (17,000) or 18,000 fans, and once you get out there, it’s like exciting and fun. But everything up to the moment we went out, I was just terrified.

Phillippe: Yeah, you were pacing the whole time.

Forte: Yeah, I had to memorize all this stuff, and I’m used to key cards, so having to use my brain to remember things (laughs).

Phillippe: It’s live also, so when you’re doing something that’s live, there’s that thing in the back of your mind, you can’t help it but have that be a filter of some kind.

Forte: But a bunch of those guys were in the movie, so we had gotten to know them over the summer in Albuquerque, and they were so welcoming. Not all of the guys we’d gotten to know were at the Raw event because of the volcano, but there were a couple of them that were there.

CUI: Speaking of doing stuff live, Ryan, you hosted “Saturday Night Live” a couple of weeks ago. What was it like to join the SNL family?

Phillippe: It was exhilarating. It’s something I’ve been a fan of since I was a teenager. I’ve seen almost every episode from the time I was 15 until now. I have such reverence for the institution, for the people who’ve come out of there. So it was a thrill for me. I felt like a fan. Everyone was so sweet and supportive. You know, there were aspects of it that were terrifying ‘cause it’s so out of my comfort zone and doing things that, you know, no one’s every really seen me do before. But that was such a thrill. The closest thing to an athletic event that an actor can get; when the show goes live, and you’re running through the studio, and you’re being pushed, and clothes pulled off of you – it’s like nothing I’ve ever experienced.

CUI: Jorma, what was it like for you to direct for the first time?

Taccone: It’s really scary in the beginning, in particular, like before we started because I really didn’t know what to expect. But, you know, it was a bonded film, so you had to talk to money people. You had to reassure everyone that, ‘Don’t worry, I’m going to make this happen! I know what I’m doing.’ But do I know what I’m doing? (Laughs). I would say the moment up until we started shooting, I was pretty nervous. I was trying to prepare as much as possible, trying to do as many story boards as I could and think through all the scenes we were going to be shooting. But then when we started shooting, it was like being on any other movie set. It just sorta kicks in, and you’re just having fun shooting comedy with your friends.

CUI: Why was there such a short time span [28 days] to film this movie?

Forte: We didn’t have a lot of money to shoot it with, but, coupled with the fact that we had to get back to SNL, we had a hard out-date.

Taccone: Kristen was making a movie already, so she couldn’t start until a certain date. We wouldn’t have been able to do it any longer than 28 days because of the budget. After the first week of shooting, we were shooting six days a week, so it was really crammed into a short period of time. And then the moment we were done shooting the film, we literally flew back to New York and went directly to Rockefeller Center to pitch it to the show.

CUI: So what was it like for you, Jorma, Will and John [Solomon] to write while filming for SNL?

Forte: It was hard because it’s a grueling schedule as it is. But if there was something about it that I will always look back on, it was a really positive experience. We were laughing so much and there were so many stupid things that we didn’t use. It was just a really awesome, magical time.

Taccone: I think all three of us were just surprised that we were even being allowed to write a script for the movie, so it really just freed us up to do whatever we wanted and just try to make each other laugh, so it was a lot of fun actually.

Forte: The last two days were the most stressful frantic days. I was on a run and thinking there was this section of the movie that was just giving us so many problems. We had a date we were supposed to turn it in, and somehow over the next two days, everything fell into place, and we made little discoveries here and there. It’s really fun when something like that happens.

Taccone: A lot of the writing process is like that. It’s a lot of chipping away at something, not having it work over and over, and then there’s some sort of breakthrough. And one of us would say something, and it was like, ‘Yeah!’ and then you piggy-back on what the other guy said.

CUI: Ryan, this is a different role for you. Why did you pick this role, and what was your favorite part about playing it?

Phillippe: You know, I was so excited about being a part of the movie because I’ve been a comedy fan for so long. Initially, they invited me to the read-through for the movie when it still wasn’t a green-lit movie. I had gotten a script and sat down and read it by myself and laughed every page. I was just so excited to go there knowing that Will would be there and Jorma and Seth Meyers and people that I had admired. After my read-through, I said to my agent, ‘I wish they would let me do something like this.’ I felt like I wanted to have a good time. You know, not that dramas aren’t fun or interesting, there was just a levity and a freedom. To go to work and laugh from morning to night is such a completely different experience, and it’s really healthy. It didn’t really feel like work. It felt like I was getting to play and getting to experience something completely new in my career.

Forte: I still can’t believe we got him to do it.

Taccone: I was just thinking of that as I was looking at [Ryan], ‘Well, shit, you’re with us!’

CUI: Do you think you’ll do more comedies after this one?

Phillippe: Yeah! I definitely want to, and I’m kind of finding my way into that world a bit. I did something for Nick Swardson’s new series on Comedy Central that’s premiering in the fall. I’m doing something with Funny or Die, and yeah, I got to host SNL. It’s a whole new world.

Forte: He’s got a very natural way with comedy. It’s hard to believe that he hadn’t been in comedies before because his role in the movie is probably the most difficult role, and he plays it perfectly. I’ve been saying it. I think he’s the MVP of the movie because it really is the most important role. Kristen and I are these…these boobs. (Laughs). And he really grounds the story, and he holds the whole thing together, and we could not have made the movie that we did without him. He did an awesome job, and…he’s so fine! (Laughs)

Taccone: Well, he’s that character that the audience can actually relate to and check-in with. It really is funny to have a character in the movie who really should be in charge, like really knows what he’s doing. So having to watch MacGruber go through this and make every mistake and him knowing the right thing to do is very frustrating.

CUI: Did you have to adapt the SNL version of MacGruber to the film version of MacGruber?

Forte: Very early on we decided we were going to not worry about the sketches at all. Just take the character, take the clothes and the hair and do whatever the hell we wanted with it. And it was very liberating to go, ‘Okay let’s not worry about the sketches; let’s just do whatever we think is funniest,’ and then we were able to create this fun story and go all these places.

Taccone: We were just so excited to have this character that we knew we loved—he’s obviously a very flawed individual, but somehow lovable—and stick him into a genre movie. Like a late 80s to early 90s action movie and basically play with the constructs of that. We do have scenes in the movie that you’ve seen in other movies where the badass walks away from a burning car and puts on his sunglasses, and then the owner of the car comes out saying, ‘What the fuck, man?!’

Forte: I think a lot of people think the movie is going to be the sketch over and over for 90 minutes, but it’s nothing like that.

Phillippe: Not at all. And one thing that I think these guys did so great: there’s a definite parallel, to me, in terms of “Austin Powers” lampooning the spy genre, and this film does that with 80s action movies. The 80s jokes are really hilarious; the fact that there’s references to or lifted indirectly from movies like “Rambo,” “Die Hard” and “Lethal Weapon”—that’s all very fresh; we haven’t seen something like that. I think that’s a fine complement to them with what they were able to do: parody and spoof and still be original.

Contact CU Independent Entertainment Editor Taylor Coughlin at Taylor.coughlin@colorado.edu.