Movie Galleries Movie Galleries
 Best Sellers
Erotic Posters
|
License to Wed Picture 19
|
 More Movies
|
|
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
|||
|
|
|
|
|
|||
License to Wed Full Production Notes "First came love... then came Reverend Frank."
|
|||
 Chapter 4 - Precisely Coordinated and RehearsedDesigned by makeup and special effects company Drac Studios, the animatronic babies were controlled remotely via radio transmitters. Eye movements, hand movements, mouth movements, and even bowel movements were controlled independently. Each function was precisely coordinated and rehearsed for each shot.
Moore recalls, “Handling the babies was pretty difficult. I would hope that they are actually more temperamental than real babies because they required a whole lot of maintenance...and battery changes. They were also really heavy and smelled funny. I was surprised at how much effort it took to make them work behind the scenes. There were four different people controlling one baby. Poor John...he had to do more scenes with the babies than I did.”
Krasinski agrees, “There’s a scene where Sadie and Ben are in a department store creating their wedding registry, and while Sadie’s picking out dinnerware I’m stuck with the two babies, who suddenly decide to have a complete breakdown.”
Unbeknownst to Ben, the tot-sized terrors are being controlled remotely by Reverend Frank’s right-hand man, a precocious minister-in-training, referred to in the script as Choir Boy. Played by Josh Flitter, Choir Boy adjusts the “Robo Mood” of the animatronic babies by flipping the switches on the remote control from “Calm,” skipping the intermediate stages of “Cranky” and “Berserk,” and going directly to “Meltdown.”
“The toughest role to cast was Choir Boy,” Kwapis notes. “He’s like a miniature thug, a little henchman who does all Reverend Frank’s heavy lifting. Most of the candidates read the part as if they were little cherubs. When Josh Flitter walked into the casting session, it was as if he was channeling every Hollywood tough guy from Edward G. Robinson to James Gandolfini. The idea of Josh as a marriage enforcer was too irresistible to pass up.”
Flitter says, “Choir Boy is enrolled in Reverend Frank’s ‘Ministers of Tomorrow’ program, and his life goal is to become the greatest reverend ever when he grows up. He wholeheartedly believes in the prep course that Reverend Frank created and is the one who gets things done behind the scenes.”
Choir Boy has covertly bugged Ben and Sadie’s bedroom with a mini-microphone that gives Reverend Frank around-the-clock surveillance of the couple’s conversations. In one instance, the bug serves to prevent a violation of Reverend Frank’s muchdreaded Rule Number Two.
Rule Number Two notwithstanding, perhaps one of the more stress-inducing tests in the Reverend’s course is the word association exercise with in-laws. Under the guise of a wine and cheese tasting, the test is designed to open the lines of communication between Ben and his future relatives, including Sadie’s older, jaded, and recently divorced sister, Lindsey, played by Christine Taylor.
Taylor offers, “Having just gone through a nasty divorce, my character is very sarcastic and bitter. She has no faith in marriage, or men for that matter, and is very wary about Sadie getting married so suddenly. She’s definitely feeling like the black sheep in the family being surrounded by her parents’ and grandparents’ successful marriages—and now Sadie and Ben’s engagement. She can’t help but act a little standoffish towards Ben, and it becomes really apparent during the in-laws exercise.”
Also invited to the wine and cheese tasting is Sadie’s attractive, sophisticated, wealthy—and male—best friend, Carlisle, played by Eric Christian Olsen. “Carlisle is Sadie’s B.F.F. They grew up together, took baths together, and know everything about each other. He’s definitely part of Sadie’s family. This presents an interesting dynamic for Ben, who should be made to feel very territorial by Carlisle’s mere presence. I mean, you can’t really blame Ben for feeling a bit insecure when Carlisle’s around because, besides having a good relationship with Sadie’s family, he’s also very charming, very talented, and has great teeth and cheekbones,” smiles Olsen.
While Sadie confides in Carlisle for advice on just about everything, Ben seeks out his best friend, Joel, who provides Ben with a slightly different point of view. Played by actor-comedian DeRay Davis, Joel has been married for some time—complete with two children and a lawnmower—and can perhaps be best summed up as a man’s man, or as Davis puts it, “the everyman who thinks that men should be kings again. Joel knows that, for him, the days of being the master of his domain have long passed since he got married. So, living vicariously, he secretly wants Ben to reign as a free man just a little bit longer.”
As Ben and Sadie get caught in the crossfire of conflicting influences and endure the demands of the prep course, their true personalities materialize, putting their compatibility to the ultimate test.
Krasinski states, “Ben and Sadie had never fought prior to enrolling in Reverend Frank’s class, but as soon as the course begins and they’re feeling the pressure, Sadie’s type-A personality really begins to emerge. She’s someone who is very organized, gets things done, and needs to have them done a certain way, whereas Ben is happy to wake up with a smile and just sort of get through the day. Then, when Sadie starts showing favoritism towards Carlisle’s opinions, and Sadie’s sister starts in on Ben’s passive nature, he can’t help but feel like everyone is teaming up against him.”
Sometimes the truth hurts, but other times the truth can be really funny. Taylor notes, “When Reverend Frank asks Lindsey to word associate with Ben, she, in her sarcastic, cutting way, calls him ‘assertive,’ which is the complete opposite of how she really feels about him. She actually thinks Ben is a big pushover, and not necessarily the right guy for Sadie. When Ben is asked to word associate with Lindsey, he calls her ‘blonde,’ which she takes as a cue to attack him right back. It was a really fun scene to shoot. We kept blowing takes because everybody around the table was making everyone else laugh so much.”
With a comedic dynamo like Robin Williams on the set, Kwapis encouraged everyone to expect the unexpected. “With Robin, who has an inexhaustible desire to invent, you have to make sure there’s plenty of film in the camera and you have a group of actors who can hold their own when the ad-libs start flying.”
“My favorite thing about working with Ken is the fact that he just hands you the ball, and gives you the leeway and the freedom to get into the moment,” says Moore. “He doesn’t call ‘Action’ to begin a scene. Instead, he simply says, ‘Go ahead.’ It’s so relaxed and conversational. Even though Ken was very supportive and gave us a lot of freedom on the set to improvise, I was still terrified to try things in front of Robin because he’s such a comic legend. But I was really impressed with him because he was so considerate of all the other actors and so collaborative.”
The chance to work with Robin Williams was also an incredible highlight for Krasinski, who reveals that when he was much younger he had written Williams a fan letter asking for, and receiving, an autographed photo. “I was a big fan of Robin’s, and had seen all of his movies. Even before I wanted to be an actor, I just loved, loved to watch his work. So to act in a film with him now is nothing short of surreal. And, he’s even funnier and more enthusiastic in person than he is on film.”
Too funny, perhaps; as Kwapis says, “The great hazard of putting together such a group of nimble comic talents is that it was often impossible for them to get through a take without laughing. Keeping a straight face became a Herculean task for John in particular, faced with Robin’s onslaught of quips.”
Additionally, both Kwapis and Krasinski enjoyed an “office” party of their own while shooting scenes featuring co-workers from “The Office,” including Brian Baumgartner as Jim, Ben and Sadie’s potato skin-loving prep course classmate; Mindy Kaling as Joel’s demanding wife, Shelly; and Angela Kinsey as Judith, a jewelry store clerk.
Next Page: No Palm Trees in Chicago |
|||
Sitemaps, RSS Feeds & Social Networks
|
|||||||
 |
 |
|
|
|
|
||
Interested in Arts? 