 "Photo:")
Michael Cera plays maracas. "Marimba, kalimba, Calypso," Cera said with finality. Kat Dennings plays the cowbell, just like Will Ferrell. Do you listen to the Jungle Brothers? If the answer is yes, Dennings would be proud.
After spending weeks on a press tour, Cera and Dennings sat down for a phone conference with journalists from the United States and Canada to discuss their upcoming movie Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist. Both a tad tired, Cera and Dennings discussed music, acting, and New York. Of course, they didn't forget to talk about the upcoming movie.
Bursts of giggles came from the 22-year-old Dennings throughout the interviews, while the 20-year-old Cera put to use his own sarcasm and wit, supplying jokes throughout the conference call. Bundled up in a scarf with her feet on the table, Dennings played along with Cera, who is currently growing out his hair into "a kind of mane" that he wanted to reveal to the whole world during this press tour. Despite their obvious comfort with each other during the phone conference, Cera and Dennings met for the first time on set, and this meeting captured all of the awkwardness in the movie, Cera said. Considering the circumstances of their movie meeting, it makes sense: The way they meet in the film involves Dennings' character walking up to a stranger in a club and asking him to pretend to be her boyfriend.
Nick and Norah's is a comedy revolving around a nighttime adventure, a world of youthful fun, live music, and the late-night city. A chance encounter throws the two characters together, and from there the chemistry of the two takes over the screen. Together, the two actors seem to work perfectly. The wise demeanor that Dennings lends to many of her characters complements the overly endearing qualities of Cera and his onscreen clumsiness.
Since playing George Michael on the cult series Arrested Development, Cera has defined the role of awkward-teenage-boy-whom-everyone-wants-to-be-friends-with-slash-marry. Always a hit with audiences, Cera won over both the blockbuster audiences of Superbad and the highbrow critics of Juno by coloring outside the lines of the geek stereotype (watch out Adam Brody). The enduring character of puberty-shaken tween boy could become a cliche, but it hasn't for this Canadian import.
Cera's characters have their own life and individual charm. George Michael did not impregnate Juno McGuff, and Seth's homeboy, Evan, definitely was not trying to sell his pilot for a television series. For Nick and Norah's, Cera builds off what could be seen as a type-casted resume to create the broken-hearted indie musician, Nick. Although still along the same lines of his previous characters, Nick has a hint of cool that George Michael only dreams about. During the phone conference when asked whether he wanted to branch out and play other types of characters and which types of characters he would want to play, Cera joked, "I'm currently working on a project where I kidnap a young boy and proceed to smack him around."
Although Sex and the City addicts may remember Kat Dennings as the oversexed 13-year-old who made even Samantha blush in the episode "Hot Child in the City," her real claim to fame came when she played Marla, the rebellious daughter in The 40-Year-Old Virgin. Dennings' characters are characterized by their sarcastic remarks and cynical views. Where Dennings succeeds is in her ability to give these gloomy characters a sense of vulnerability, removing them from the category of jaded youth. As Norah, Dennings brings along some of her sarcasm and plays off Cera's own brand of humor.
At the phone conference, Dennings talked a lot about the differences between the character she was playing and herself. Dennings said she thinks of acting as just a career. "I don't think of it as a genre of life," she said. Despite the adventurous night her character experiences in the movie, Dennings said she is nothing like her character; instead she sees herself as a real homebody. "I avoided nights like this on purpose, I still kind of do…the prospect of running around looking for something I don't know where to find, is a little daunting," Dennings said.
In the movie, music provides a voice for the youth and serves as an aural representation of the city. Although Dennings and Cera were not part of the music selection, the director Peter Sollett and the film editor Myron Kerstein picked songs that both actors enjoy. Cera said his favorite artists from the soundtrack are Vampire Weekend and Bishop Allen, while Dennings said she also loves Vampire Weekend and also Devendra Banhart. For all Vampire Weekend fans, the band wrote a song just for the movie called "Ottoman." "It's really great. You'll love it," Dennings said.
The music in the movie is part of the film's young vibe and hip sensibility. With guest appearances by Andy Samberg, Devendra Banhart, Bishop Allen, Seth Meyers, and the movie's screenwriter, Lorene Scafaria, the movie reaches out to many different kinds of audiences. And though it focuses on the indie music scene of New York City, the movie lacks the pretentious air of the hipsters who frequent Williamsburg, Va.
Cera attributes this genuine appeal to director Peter Sollett, who was the main reason why Cera chose to star in the film. "I think Pete has a really authentic directing style and he really captures this kind of tone of like a one-night adventure kind of thing. He does it really truthfully, I think," he said.
"One thing that is really cool about watching the film, that Mike and I both think, is it feels when you watch it, like it felt making it. It just feels really joyful and fun and adventurous when you watch it," Dennings said.
The movie's tagline is "Press Play," but Cera and Denning suggest you put down the remote and go check out this film. If for nothing else, you'll certainly be drawn in by Cera's joking suggestion for the tagline, which appears a little higher on the movie posters: "Michael Cera/Kat Dennings."
Be the first to comment on this article!