The Toronto Sun interviews Reese Witherspoon on her role as “Ginormica” in Dreamworks’ CGI film, Monsters vs Aliens which opens in theaters Friday, March 27th:
“It definitely is the most action-packed movie I’ve ever been in,” Witherspoon said in a Canadian exclusive telephone interview. “(Being animated) makes it a lot easier to kick butt. And the best thing is, I didn’t have to diet to fit into that cat suit.”
[The] requirements of her voicework for Monsters vs. Aliens didn’t actually require Witherspoon to knock out alien robots or lift sections of the Golden Gate Bridge, [but] she did have to sound like she was doing it — which is pulse-raising activity itself.
“We worked pretty hard on those scenes. Initially, they wanted me to do a voice like a Schwarzenegger/Stallone-type action voice. And I had no idea how to do it. It’s not like anybody ever asked me for that before. As for the action-packed stuff, they’d just play out the scene for me, and I’d have to give them grunts and groans and jumping noises.”
Continue reading: Reese’s giant step [The Toronto Sun].
In related news, MvA co-director Conrad Vernon (who also was the voice of The Gingerbread Man for Dreamwork’s Shrek trilogy) talks with Newsarama.com about working with the voice cast:
“We…found that everyone of them could ad lib like crazy,” said Vernon. “For instance, Steve Colbert would come in, read the line straight. Then he would say ‘wait a minute’ and sit there in the booth for a minute. Then he would giggle and ad lib. To top it, he would keep it on point. The whole thing where he was being carried into the helicopter shouting, ‘I’m brave! I’m a brave president!’ is a total ad lib. We are actually trying to get Dreamworks to put in all the ad libs Colbert, Rainn Wilson and Will Arnett and Seth Rogen did in their sessions for the DVD. Many of it we couldn’t use in the movie, but it was incredibly funny.
“Kiefer [Sutherland] told me how he came up with the voice of General Monger. Rob and I, when we first thought the character up, thought of George C. Scott from Patton. Kiefer looked at him more like the drill sergeant from Full Metal Jacket with Yosemite Sam.”
Continue reading: Talking w/ Monsters vs Aliens Co-Director Conrad Vernon [Newsarama]
Additional source: ToonZone.net
Previous Monsters vs. Aliens report: 3.21.2009 — Seth Rogen is a Monster.