Yarrrr!

[fan_elune]

So. There's this movie not yet out in France, you might've heard about it, seen the trailers, or actually seen it already. It looks like a movie I'm gonna spend two hours groaning and bitching at, but I will spend those two hours of my life in front of it. It's called Firewall. And it stars Paul Bettany as a bad guy.

In the same vein, I've just watched Dodgeball. Which, much as I sorta like Vince Vaughn, I never ever in a million years would have watched if not for Alan Tudyk as the lovely, ever so blasted adorable Steve the Pirate.

Yes, this is going to be another one of those fangirly posts. And then a lot of Alan quotage about the movie. Because I said I would. ...I think I might even picspam, yes. Very much not dial-up-friendly, or people-who-can't-stand-fangirls-friendly. All pictures snagged from alan-tudyk.com, definitely the best Alan resource out there as far as I'm concerned.

So without further ado.



So, you know, fake tattoos. I love that he has fake tattoos. It's a stupid little thing but it's also kinda incredibly cute. And, also, the belt and the cuff. I love that cuff. I want the same one. Badly. And his is totally the best chest. Looove the posture.



I love Angry!Alan. When he's Wat, when he's Steve... Look at that face. (When he's Angry!Wash it hurts. Because Wash should never have cause to be angry.) Point is, don't insult Steve's pirateness.



How do you call those things in front of his shirt? Ruffles? Ruffles sounds like a good name for them, but, anyway. They make me giggle. And, again, the cuff. And the forearms, I adore his forearms, all the time, for no reason I can pinpoint but oh boy do I.



Steve in S'n'M gear! With a close-up on the tat. And for the record, his was really not the worst outfit. I simply wish the leather had been dull instead of shiny, and that, yes, that would've been more than enough for me to perv. I'm a sucker for leather, especially when it comes in the form of long coats.



So I might've slightly wanted to thwap Pete on the back of the head because you do not hurt Steve okay? 'Course he's a pirate. Tch.
At the same time, though, I sort of wanted to be the one slamming him into the wall. Just sayin'. And if you zero in on his left hand? Rings. I spent the whole movie staring at the cuff and the rings and Joey will tell you how much I squeeed over them.



And here is me wanting to cuddle Steve. And talk in pirate linguo with him. Of course he's a pirate.



And again with the urge to cuddle. And steal that cuff. And look at those eyes. I could rant about Steve's backstory that Alan cooked up and he and he only seemed to give a damn about, but that'll be taken care of in the quotage section of this post.



Even Joey squeeed over his adorableness in that last scene. He's just. So. Precious.



Cuuutie. 'Course you're a pirate.


And now, it's Alan quotage time.

Tudyk found himself walking into the audition with a bunch of actors in full costume. "It was very intimidating," he recalls. "We're talking full-on dark eyeliner, earrings.... One guy had a gold tooth. I had a colorful shirt and cowboy boots. I decided that was enough of a suggestion, which is how I was taught to audition -- you suggest something, but nobody wants to see you coming in dressed like that. But everybody was. But I got the role, so I guess I wasn't wrong. It sort of suggests a certain kind of desperation, I think. If you can do the character without all that crazy makeup on, once you put it on, you're in good shape."

...excuse me a minute while I chuckle over the cuteness of Alan in cowboy boots. Chuckle because yes, to this French lady, it's very endearing with a hint of ridiculous. I'm sorry. We just don't wear cowboy boots.

And, also, I very much like what he's saying here. This is again proof of how good he is at what he does. He doesn't need a costume, a costume isn't what makes you act. First year of "serious" drama I did, our show was extracts from different plays. We all had a few different characters, and we were all dressed in jeans and a shirt, with not one button more or less done if this character was more or less strict than that other one we played, for instance. It wasn't about the costume, it was about the acting.

"So I guess I wasn't wrong." Stop being so modest, Alan. Thou rockest. ...ye rock, I suppose, in pirate-talk. (Hey, if pirates can say "this suck" they can say "ye rock".)

For research, he even attended an actual pirate convention in Ojai, complete with dancing girls, parrots, and craftsmen selling knives. "I learned so much from the people there," he says, praising the kindness of the attendees. "They were all great. When you're a pirate, you drink a lot of rum, so everybody was really chill."

Okay, he went to a pirate convention to research the role. He couldn't just, you know, play the pirate. No, he went and did research for a Stiller and Vaughn movie. So, so much love, Alan.

Although I have to admit that as far as "research" goes, drinking rum with a bunch of pirates doesn't sound like too much of a drag. Oh, to be a pirate wench at that con.

Once cast, Tudyk also had to resist the temptation to constantly mug and make faces. "Who doesn't want to do that in a big, broad comedy?" he says. "I wanted to ground him in a reality. My reality was that he had worked the Pirates of the Caribbean ride [at Disneyland] and gotten a head injury. One day the swelling went down or something, but he made a conscious choice not to go back because he enjoyed it too much. He has to come to terms eventually with the fact he's not living his life in an honest way. It's a great theme, like the Pirandello play about the guy who thinks he's Henry IV. Everyone around him says, 'You can't go around pretending to be Henry IV.' But he says, 'It's my reality, I'm happy, I'm not hurting anybody, so why not?'" Asked if he ever shared any of this intricate backstory with writer-director Rawson Marshall Thurber, Tudyk just laughs. "I may have mentioned it," he notes. "And he probably said, 'Yeah, that's great, Alan. Let's throw some balls at your face.' He seemed far more interested in doing that."

First off, he resisted the temptation to constantly mug? Because man, some of the faces he makes... but okay, point, those weren't overdone. They're just. Perfect.

Now - again, let's remember this is a Stiller and Vaughn movie, and Alan plays a guy thinks he's a pirate. And he made up a whole backstory for him. And compares it to a Pirandello play! *fangirls like crazy* It really shows, though, and that's why Steve is so touching when he walks off, and even more so when he shows up not Pirated-up anymore at the end. Because it shows how much it costs him to let go of that pretend, and then when Peter actually offers him the chance to still be a pirate, it's just. Aw. It all shows in his acting, and I don't care that it's a Vaughn and Stiller movie, it does, it shows.

Aaand the story about telling that to the director is just cute and funny.

As for the deeper question as to why a guy who thinks he's a pirate spends all his time hanging out at a gym, the actor can only say, "Hey, swashbuckling takes a lot of work!"

"The deeper question"? Heh. Of course. And I agree. Steve needed to spend all his time at a gym. If only to get those arms of his.

In the original script, Steve the Pirate was set to stumble upon the pirate-themed Las Vegas casino Treasure Island and have a big action sequence in which he took over the stage show, complete with ripping sails and swinging on ropes. The chaos causes him to be arrested, which is why the character misses the climactic dodgeball finals. "That was another script cut where they said, 'You got the job! Here's your new script!' And I was, like, 'What happened?'" Still, he enjoyed "garr-ing" his way through the hit film.

Why did they not shoot that scene? I want to see that scene. Honestly. And I like that he's so "oh well," about it. Like in Into the West, most of his story got cut. But, "oh well." They offered him a way out when he was cast in Into the West, and they told him most of his stuff from the original script was out, but he still did it.

"We used to play a game called scene stealer. We had a song, [He begins singing] 'Sceeeene stealer. I believe I can make this close-up a tight twoooo!' Because people would try to get close to Vince to make it into a tight two. It was, like, who stole the scenes that day, because, [with] all those clowns, everybody was so good..."

And again with the praising everybody. I cut it but just before that quote he was praising the hell out of Vince Vaughn, too. And man, how I would've loved to be on that set. Because those must have been some funny, funny moments.

"I threw out my arm playing dodgeball. I am definitely a better player, but I'll avoid it if I can. It's still not right. Everybody. We smelled like Ben Gay, we were all slathered up, ice packs and things between shots."

Alan why must you keep on doing movies that hurt you? I mean, physically hurt you? By that I don't mean Serenity, I'm talking of I, Robot and Dodgeball, which he actually did back to back. He had one day off between the two. They killed him with the working out in I, Robot, and then he goes on to play Dodgeball? Crazy, he is absolutely and completely batshit crazy.

About a Dodgeball 2: "That would be like a Bad News Bears kind of thing. I like the idea of it. It's definitely, as far as a business venture, looks like a good idea. That's usually what makes things happen in Hollywood. Somebody said something to me last night, but it was more of a, 'We may be doing a 2, it's doing so well.' I said, 'Cool, I'll put on my leather boots and grow my scruff back out.'"

Leather boots and scruff? Yes please. That said, I have to say, please Alan, don't. Just don't. If you must be in another sequel than Ice Age 2, let it be A Knight's Tale. (Or, you know, SERENITY. But let's not dream too much.)

What did you base the pirate character on? "This is so sad. I usually do a lot of work on the characters that I play, especially vocally, accents and things. I based the vocal stuff for the pirate, when I first thought I was going to be a pirate, Yeah, poirite, a poirette. Yeah, gar, a poirette. Poirette, poirette, all right. That's good. So every other word we'll use that same amount of inflection on everything. Before I would do my scenes, I'd go, yar, gar, poirette. All right, I'm ready."

...so, yeah, when I said he was batshit crazy? *loves him up*

"I always wanted to have him talking on cell phones, like Gar ar gar Yaaar. Then hang up."

Why didn't they let him do that? Heh.

And okay, that's it. Remember that it was all your fault for encouraging me after I did the I, Robot quotespam. If my flist wasn't so Alan-friendly this never would've happened. ...now just admit you all just can't wait until I get my hands on Into the West. (Okay, you're going to have to wait a while, I think, unfortunately.)

Now don't forget everybody, tomorrow's Nathan's birthday. ...I might be convinced to picspam. Are you interested in a Nathan picspam?