In She's Out Of My League, a foursome of best friends plus one ex-girlfriend work as TSA employees at the Pittsburgh airport, abusing their power, driving the passengers crazy and somehow protecting our nation from terrorists in the meantime. And because the actors playing the TSA people were filming in an actual airport in Pittsburgh, and had to pass by actual TSA employees on their way to work every morning, they said they experienced a few extra patdowns and body searches the whole time they were there.
But that seemed to be the only bad side of what sounds like a hilarious experience filming on location in Pittsburgh, where only two cast members had worked together before-- Mike Vogel and T.J. Miller and Cloverfield-- but they had no choice but to bond, because what else will you do when you're filming in an airport for 10 hours? We got the chance to talk to Vogel and Nate Torrence, who play Jay Baruchel's buddies in the film, as well as Lindsay Sloane, who plays his psychotic and hilarious ex Marnie. No, we couldn't get Vogel to spill details on the Captain America casting-- but check out what he and his co-stars had to say anyway.
Did you guys have any incredible moment that didn't make it into the film?
Torrence: There were tons actually. That's what's crazy. Jim let us play around a little bit, with improv and stuff like that. We were always throwing things out. When you're allowed to do that, then there's always tons of things. You get to a point, I guess, when you're trying to get people to break in the scene. Then you're doing things that are so big that they'll never make the movie. Except for Lindsay.
Sloane: My entire role in the film was trying to make people laugh and break. But this is the first movie that I'm actually really excited to see the DVD extras. . I feel like there's a whole other movie that was filmed that didn't make it into the movie. S lot of stuff that I did that I never thought would make it into the movie unfortunately made it, and now it's on film forever. There's a lot of stuff I'm so curious to see, that I know Jim loved and wished he could use.
Were you surprised by how much fun you could have in an airport?
Sloane: Yeah, those were the only days when it felt like, "Oh, we're making a movie." There's just something about being in an airport. You almost feel like you've been waiting for a plane that's delayed, even though you're there for work. But up until hour 10 we were so excited, and by hour 10 we were like, "I just want to go outside for fresh air, but I have to go through security, so if I leave it's going to take me forever to come back." We literally could not leave the airport.
Lindsay, you and Krysten Ritter get to be really funny in this movie, and that's pretty rare. How hard it is to find roles like that?
Sloane: So hard. That doesn't get to happen a lot. I actually went in for Patty first, but the second I read the script fell in love with Marnie, and kind of begged to come back in and read for Marnie. To be able to do everything you feel like you would never do in a film, and to be able to do it and get away with it, seems like so much fun to me. I also feel like every female role in this script-- it never happens where the guys and the girls get to be funny. Jessica St. Clair, who plays Deb-- she had two lines in the script, but Jim was so open to everybody improvving and being free within the scene, she created this amazing, broad, funny role. It's so nice to see a movie where women are getting laughs.
Jay's character in the film does a lot of crazy things for love; what's the craziest thing you guys have done for a guy or girl?
Sloane: We're the married room. People ask us these questions, and I've been married for 5 years, [gestures to Torrence] he's been married to his high school sweetheart, [gestures to Vogel] he's been married forever, they have kids.
Torrence: People ask me crazy stories, and I say, "Well, when I was 13..." That's really my life. It's humiliating.
Well what was the story?
Torrence: Literally I was grading her spelling test. I was 14 years old, I had moved to this school, and I graded her spelling test. It's the most mundane story in the history of the world. We passed them back and I thought she was really cute, so I changed some of her answers. I handed it back and she was like, "You changed my spelling test?" And she told on me! And it was love.
So, the testicle shaving scene. What was the moment like?
Vogel: It's another moment of love.
Torrence: Well, one, it wasn't Jay. He got to choose his butt. He got on an iPhone and they said, "Which one do you want to be your butt?" It was covered with this odd Shakespearean codpiece, but it was still too close, and I could see too much. The guy's name who was doing it was Devon, which is my character's name. So it would be, "Devon! No, real Devon! Clench your buttcheeks, it hurts a little bit, clench your cheeks!"
You each had a moment in the film where you got to stand out, even you Mike, when your character was a little more low-key.
Vogel: The Jack character certainly was a lot more subdued. But again, to take it back to Jim Field-Smith, what's great about him in this is that being a first-time director, there's a danger where those guys go safe and cautious. It's script script script, we're going to adhere to the script. He didn't do that. He trusted his actors to take and elevate something beyond what was already a decent script. Every single take we were behind the monitors genuinely watching, because it was going to be funny. Someone was going to do something that made you crack. Just from a bystander's standpoint, it was great to be a part of.
Sloane: I think it's also something about being in a new town together, being in a hotel-- it does become like adult camp. The few experiences that I've had being on location, it really brings people together. You don't get to go home to your regular lives. You get to go home and have dinner with each other, and you really get to know each other, and you really get to be comfortable with each other. you get the freedom to act like an ass in front of each other, and I feel like that makes the funniest movies. When actors are comfortable enough and you release all your inhibitions and you stop judging yourself, you're suddenly so supportive that it's this wonderful team cheering each other on.
