Martin, Ephron mix it up for ‘Mixed Nuts’ release
Star, screenwriter discuss negative bias directed at comedy
By Mike Horowitz
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
Nora Ephron and the star of her soon-to-be-unveiled film Mixed
Nuts, Steve Martin, are in town to talk about their proud
collaboration. And though they would make a pretty lousy comedy
team based on the banter in their talk with the Bruin, they do team
up for a side-splitting dance in the new film.
Martin plays Philip, manager of a barely successful suicide
hotline in Venice Beach who creates and endures crises on this
Christmas Eve. He breaks a rule and gives out the center’s address
to a caller and ends up forgetting their immenent arrival. When
Chris (Liev Schreiber), a depressed cross-dresser walks in, Philip
has no idea how to react, but soon falls back upon unhelpful
anecdotes and plentiful platitudes.
Soon they’re slowdancing.
"I went home after the day we shot the dancing scene," says
Martin, "and told a friend, ‘I think we filmed the funniest scene I
have ever done.’" Although he is a poorer dancer than Schreiber,
the scene belies any weakness on his feet due to the fact that
Martin leads. He says Schreiber struggled to adjust.
"That’s the way half the population dances," reminds Ephron,
misinterpreting Martin’s remark as sexist, "and some of us still
dance that way."
Yet the chance to dance was far from Martin’s only motivation to
act in Nuts. "Many things attracted me to it," he says, "starting
with Nora, and the cast, and the script and it’s a place to call
home for three months too. I just trust Nora and I know that when
we get to the set, it’s going to end up funny."
Ephron agrees. "Sometimes you shoot a funny movie and you hope
it’s funny," she says, "I think we all had a sense that this was
funny. It wasn’t like we were trying to make Dances with Wolves.
Our ambitions were low in the best sense."
Adapting it from the French movie Le Pere Noel est une Ordure,
Ephron and her sister finished the script before Ephron’s hit
Sleepless in Seattle. She enjoys it’s mature angle in a season
filled with family fare and cute kids galore. Yet Ephron holds that
the original was much darker in tone than she had wanted. "It’s not
a Christmas movie," she says of Le Pere Noel est une Ordure , "and
it’s not a love story. No one falls in love though several people
do have sex in it."
"Isn’t that love?" jokes Martin.
The character of Philip was especially engaging to Martin. "I
like my character in this," he says, "he’s a little thoughtless, a
little bit goofy, naive, and doesn’t see what’s right in front of
him. A bit selfish  it gives you something to play rather
than Mr. Nice Guy."
"The worst thing you can be given to play in a movie is Mr. Nice
Guy, because there’s nothing there. When you think about all the
nice people you know they all have foibles. All you have to do is
play those foibles and let your own personality stay. One of the
biggest mistakes in writing screenplays is asking ‘Is he likable?’
Because then he can’t do that, because he’s not likable, and yet in
Silence of the Lambs, at the end of the movie you kind of like
Anthony Hopkins."
Although he’s never challenged himself to that extent, and
mass-murdering cannibals have been recently suffering low
popularity, Martin would probably be a fairly likable villain. He
has produced some of the best comedies of the ’80s and shows no
signs of stopping. Father of the Bride II and Sergeant Bilko lurk
in the future and a new play from the creator of Picasso at the
Lapin Agile starts in New York this spring. He calls it "a surreal
look at a family in the ’50s."
Thus it is a thoughtful proposition when this ultra-successful
laugh-getter decrys a critical bias towards comedy. "I remember
recently reading a review of Jim Carrey for the Mask," he says,
"and the reviewer said ‘he also proves he can act in one scene when
so and so.’ I said, ‘What’s he doing when he’s being funny?’ That’s
not acting? There’s a prejudice against comedy as acting and it is
acting."
"People say because somebody cries, ‘oh look, he can act!’ But
the fact that Jim Carrey can do a ten minute ad-libbed bit walking
across a roof that’s just comedy."
"What is that expression?" asks Ephron. "’Tragedy is easy,
comedy is hard?’"
"No," corrects Martin. "Dying is easy."
"Ohhh!" she blasts out and then thinks for a second before
embarassing herself again. "But is it true?"
Martin laughs, "I don’t know yet."
He believes, and he should know, that the responses garnered
from great comedy are just as difficult to gain as they are in
acting. "When you’re doing a play and it’s dramatic, the audience
sits there going," he crosses his arms and looks intense, "and the
actor’s going ‘Yeah, I’m really getting to them.’"
"But if you’re doing a comedy, if they don’t go ‘Hahahaha,’
you’re dead!"
Martin sums up what he calls "the fun art" that is comedy:
"You’ve got to get that to win. And people don’t just give it up.
They have to be made to laugh."