Lana Condor Talks Coyote vs. Acme’s Surprising Cameo & Honoring Her Mom | Interview
ComingSoon Editor-in-Chief Tyler Treese spoke with Coyote vs. Acme star Lana Condor about her role in the film, why it was more personal than viewers thought, and its rollercoaster road to being released in theaters this Friday, August 28.
“After decades of being blown to bits by bombs, demolished by dynamite, mangled by magnets, battered by boulders, trampled by trains, tricked by tunnels, sprung by springs, steamrolled by steamrollers, maligned by misfires, bedeviled by bungees, rattled by rockets, backstabbed by bat suits, rocked by rocket skates, upended by unicycles, quaked by quake pills, rubberized by rogue bands, and hurled headlong off every cliff in the Southwest, Wile E. Coyote (Genius) finally fights back. Teaming up with billboard accident lawyer Kevin Avery (Will Forte), he takes on slick corporate counsel Buddy Crane (John Cena) and ACME, Inc., the profit-obsessed conglomerate behind every one of the Coyote’s chaotic catastrophes,” says the official synopsis.
Tyler Treese: What was the biggest adjustment in filming Coyote vs. Acme? Because the cartoon characters aren’t actually brought to life. I know you had some stand-ins for certain characters, but that probably wasn’t always possible. Some of these characters are very odd shapes and sizes. How was that experience?
Lana Condor: It was awesome. I mean, we did have some stand-ins come in. We also had an incredible actor come in for Foghorn Leghorn, and he performed his entire role in a green suit. So that was great. We had a real person to work off of.
But all the other characters that there weren’t stand-ins or actors for. Honestly, truly, Tyler, there are so many more Looney Tunes characters in our film than I even knew as I was filming it. I genuinely was so delighted and surprised when I watched it for the first time. There’s so much to look at. You’re like, “Oh, Porky just—back there, Porky just fell. Oh, yep. Okay. Oh, over there, so-and-so is doing what?”
There were just truly so many more characters added to the film that I didn’t even know when I initially was doing it. But we also worked with an incredible puppet master, Dave Barclay, who puppeted Wile E. He built a life-size Wile E., and he would puppet him and kind of move him throughout the space and give us a general sense of where he would be in the space and his emotions. Then they would pull him out and put a tennis ball in.
But it was really fun. It’s a great challenge. When you’re working in CGI or animation or hybrid films like this, I always find them the most fun because it feels like you’re a kid again in acting class. You’re in a black box and you’re just imagining. You’re just using your imagination. So that’s kind of how I felt when I got to work with these characters that weren’t actually there.
I love that you mentioned being surprised. I can’t wait to rewatch this film. There are so many little touches and jokes. I read this great story where you didn’t know that you filmed a scene with Bugs Bunny because they changed it in post. How was that initial time when you were watching the film, and you were like, “What is going on? I didn’t know I had a scene with the most iconic cartoon character.”
Imagine my surprise. I was like, “Okay, I know this scene. We’re going to the carrot farm, whatever.” I was like, “We’re going to go see Elmer Fudd.” I think I was told, or it was scripted, that it was Elmer Fudd. But I definitely didn’t think, not for a second. So I was very, very—I was post-starstruck, you know what I mean? It was awesome. I never thought I’d get to share the screen with him. That’s cool.
This movie’s quite wacky, but you’re playing the straight woman in these scenes. Will Forte is a well-hearted guy, but a bit of a mess in this film. Others are literal cartoon characters. Actors usually match the energy of their co-stars and surroundings. So how is it staying more level and even-heeled when everybody else is being so goofy?
That’s such a good question, man. My entire motivator throughout this whole film was—or Paige’s entire motivator was—make Kevin believe that he is worthy of so much more and make him believe in himself. So my entire job really was to support Kevin and be like, “You need to be better. Be better.”
It was always to just apply pressure to him. Because that’s my want, it’s quite simple. I want him to be better. I want him to rise to the occasion and not settle in life and in cases, but to do something with the power that he has. He’s an attorney.
We knew the tone really well. We locked in the tone really well in the early days of this film. But I think it was really easy to stay the straight person because my want is very simple.
I also love your character’s persistence. She has her morals. She knows what’s right, and she’s passionate about it. What about this character did you really connect with?
Lana Condor: Truthfully, it’s a little personal. When I initially read the script, Paige reminded me so much of my mom. I remember pitching to Dave when I first sat down with him, our incredible director, and telling him my interpretation of Paige and how I would choose to play her if I was so lucky to be cast.
I had said, “I would kind of play my mother.” My mom was endlessly curious and kind and thoughtful and believed in the power of good and all these things. So I was like, it would be an honor for me to do this movie for so many reasons, but I also really feel like I would be able to play a character close to my mom.
Then my mom actually recently passed. Recent to me, but it was like two years ago. So I think what drew me to Paige—and what draws me to a lot of characters, because I do play a lot of characters that lean more kind and curious and delightful—is genuinely the type of work that I like to do. I also just really wanted to have the opportunity to kind of do that for my mom.
Well, first off, I’m very sorry for your loss. I think you really did wonderful justice to it and a tribute in this film as well.
While I was watching this film, I was really struck by how the plot mirrored the whole release situation. It’s also cartoonish and absurd, but it really did happen basically in real life here. It’s unbelievable. I’m sure that was a whole roller coaster of emotion for you. But do you feel like ultimately it was for the best because this film became more than just a release? It became a real rallying point, and it mirrors its themes so perfectly.
Absolutely. I mean, we did not plan this. Trust me. I’ve heard whispers like, “Did they plan this as a marketing ploy?” Because it literally mirrors the movie to a tee. Absolutely not. In what scenario would we ever want to go through the last four years of turmoil and self-hate and hate for everything? So no, we definitely didn’t plan it.
But it unfortunately, and to your point, kind of fortunately, is proving to be a blessing in disguise. It’s been crazy. It mirrors the movie almost exactly. But it was tough. It was definitely tough.
Will was the one that broke the news to me. Then we went to the funeral screening, which I didn’t even know funeral screenings existed. We went to the funeral screening on the Warner Brothers lot, and we kind of went into it thinking, “Well, maybe it’s a bad movie.”
Because so much of the film is CGI animation, when we were actually on set in Albuquerque, there was obviously so much that we didn’t actually see. So we were like, because we didn’t see a lot, maybe it wasn’t great. Maybe this is a blessing in disguise.
Then we left the funeral screening, and we were like, “Oh. Oh, this is really good. Okay, this sucks even more.” The movie that you saw is, to my knowledge, the exact movie that’s coming out. It was not changed. It was like, boom, this is it. So we saw the exact movie that you saw.
It was just like, yeah, the highs were high, the lows were low, but the highs were definitely high. More than anything, the cast and crew alike have so much gratitude toward the audience. We’re just so grateful it’s coming out at all. So we couldn’t be more excited and thankful.
Thanks to Lana Condor for taking the time to speak about Coyote vs. Acme.
Source: Comingsoon.net