Boxoffice-April.2001

Sneak Preview
THERE'S SOMETHING
ABOUT "FREDDY"
46 BOXOIFKF
i
g
Ever
Comedian Tom Green Writes, Directs and Stars in
His Feature Film Debut, "Freddy Got Fingered,"
and Offers Insight Into His Mad Shenanigans
the prankster, comedian Tom
Green begins his interview with BOX-
OFFICE by reading from the label of
his Crystal Geyser water bottle. ""Bottled at
the source,"' he says.
'"Crystal Geyser Alpine
Spring Water is always bottled at the
source to maintain the quality and freshness
of our remarkable spring water.'
"I guess what they mean is their bottling
plant is right by the spring, right by
the alpine," he hypothesizes. "Oh, here it
explains the difference. It says. Taste the
difference. Bottled at the crystal geyser
rocks and source in California's Sierra
Nevada Mountains.'"
"So can you taste the difference?"
BOXOFFICE asks.
"It says right on there, 'Taste the difference,'"
he replies coyly.
"But can you?"
After taking a sip and smacking his
lips dramatically, he responds. "Yeah. I
can taste the difference. I can definitely
taste the difference."
Through with pleasantries. Green goes
on to say that not only is he still in the
process of mixing his new comedy.
"Freddy Got Fingered," due
out from Fox on April 20,
but "we're actually still
editing
the film, we're still
shooting
the film, and we're casting
as well. And my friend Derek
[Harvie] and I are going to go
out and have a little breakfast
meeting over coffee, and
we're going to continue to
write the film." He expects to
be completely done with the
movie by six that evening and
can't yet comment on the
post-production process on
his feature film debut
because, he says, "I'm doing
that between three and 3:45."
But just when one starts to
think that Green is one of
those funny guys who not only actually is
funny in interviews but feels the need to be
funny all the freakin' time, he gets serious.
by Annlee Ellingson
Well, sort of—at least serious enough to
get a straight answer or two out of him.
At
first glance,
"Free 'Freddy Got
Fini e r e d "
could be a page out
of Green's own book.
As Gord Brody (the
eponymous Freddy is
his more grounded
younger brother).
Green plays a wannabe
animator who
HOOK, LINE AND SINKER:
Marisa Coughlan snags
Tom Green's heart in "Freddy.
resides in his parents'
basement while honing
his craft. His
father (Rip Torn) is
suspicious, however,
and urges him to go
out and get a real
jot>— perhaps work
ing at the pulp mill like he does. Gord is
determined, though, and continues to
pursue his dream while the battle with his
father escalates.
Green has been known to torture his
well-meaning parents on his
MTV show and before that
on his Canadian cable access
show, both named after him,
but he insists "Freddy's"
underlying themes are more
universal than just the complex
relationship he has with
his own parents.
COLD FISH: Tom Green examines his lunch
in "Freddy Got Fingered. "
"Ultimately at the end of
the movie, [Gord's] really
doing it because he wants to
impress his father and make
his father proud of him,"
Green says. "It's kind of this
weird cateh-22 situation that
a lot of young people find
themselves in. especially
today where they want to do
something that's their personality
and something they believe in
and maybe it's one of these new, new millennium-type
jobs, whether it's the
Internet or working in computers or working
as an actor or as a comedian or as a
writer or one of these things that wasn't as
accepted when our
parents were kids
and trying to go with
it while still fighting
off this negative feedback
that you get
from the people that
you want to impress
the most, which is
your parents, or, in
this case, the father in
the movie. ["Freddy"]
turns into this basically
'War of the
Roses'-type of thing,
except it's all ultimately
about, at the
end of the day,
[Gord] wants to make
his daddy proud of him."
Marisa Coughlan, who co-stars in the
film as Gord's horny, handicapped,
rocket scientist girlfriend, agrees. "It's
funny because you read [the script] and
you think it's just a bunch of craziness,
just Tom being crazy and funny and
kooky and trying to push the envelope
and the shock value," she says. "But I've
seen some cut footage of it, and it's really
amazing that he's managed to tell a
story that's actually poignant, and in the
midst of all this insanity, you're touched
by the truth of this guy who's constantly
being pushed down by his dad and
being told he'll never [achieve his
dream]: 'What are you thinking? Who
do you think you are?'
"It's actually a much more universal
theme and more touching than you would
maybe necessarily think Tom's vision
would be. [about] your own insecurities
and [how] you've been raised, what's been
told to you in terms of what you're capable
of, and then trying to reach past that."
That's not to say that Green's bigscreen
shenanigans will be a watereddown
version of what fans of his TV