BEVERLY HILLS Calif. (Reuters) -
Comedian Melissa McCarthy and her husband and writing partner Ben
Falcone team up for the first time behind and in front of the camera
in "Tammy," a Midwestern road-trip comedy about a woman's desire to
start over.
The Warner Bros. film, which opens in U.S. theaters on
Wednesday, is Falcone's directorial debut and stars McCarthy as
an endearing buffoon character alongside Susan Sarandon as her
boozing, man-chasing grandmother.
McCarthy, 43, and Falcone, 40, who have been married for a
decade, spoke to Reuters about being small-town Midwesterners in
Hollywood, their writing process and why the creative spark
often occurs while driving a car.
Q: Do you have a method or formula for working together?
Falcone: First of all, whenever we have good ideas, it's
almost always in the car because you drive a lot in L.A. ... And
you just say stupid things to make your spouse laugh, and that's
usually when we come up with something that's maybe fun.
So that's our idea place. And then the best way that we write is
when we both are sitting there, there's a computer, we start
writing, and we trade off typing.
McCarthy: I'll do a bunch of dialogue, and then he'll say
we're not doing that yet. And I'll be like, "Yeah, but I think
this is what I say." And so we'll type that out and keep all
that stuff further down the script until we're ready for that
scene because I'm a little more scattered.
Q: Do you record your conversations while driving, or can
you both remember the details?
Falcone: We have long voicemails.
McCarthy: Sometimes when it's a run, and it'll be a
really scatological thing, I do try to record it because if I
say it once, it's gone. I can never get it back.
Falcone: I've taken to just writing on the notes section
of my iPhone, which is like a sad thing to do, but it's been
very effective.
Q: Does collaboration come easy?
McCarthy: It always has ...
Falcone: Because I'm boring and slow. It's very true.
Falcone: Once in a while I'm funny. But I'm a boring,
slow, structure guy: "This all makes sense. This is a good
beginning, middle, end." And she's just the funniest person in
the world.
But once in a while it can almost be too funny in too many
different places at once. And we're like, "Well, it's good that
there's this boring slow guy that says, 'This goes here and this
goes here.'"
Q: You both are from small-town Illinois. Do you ever
feel like reserved Midwesterners out of place with the Hollywood
set?
McCarthy: I don't feel like an outsider because I've been
finding everyone so much more pleasant than I thought. I think we
thought, "OK now somebody actually wants to do 'Tammy,' is this when
the hammer drops?"
Falcone: I kept thinking somebody with a monocle was going to
step out of the shadows and be like, "Now it's time to get serious."
McCarthy: We're wildly non-Hollywood.
Falcone: I enjoy so many of the people we've been lucky
enough to hang out with, but I certainly don't feel like, "It's
another Hollywood party tonight!"
McCarthy: If you like to be in bed by 8:30 because you're
tired and your kids are up early ...
Falcone: If you like to have one glass of red wine and go to
sleep, you should party with Ben Falcone!
McCarthy: 'Cause we swing Hollywood style for the elderly
set!
(Reporting by Eric Kelsey; Editing by Patricia Reaney and Lisa Von
Ahn)
