At the LA press day for Adventureland, Reynolds explained what sets Mike apart from characters he's played in the past. "He’s a guy that's broken a little bit. He lives in a fantasy world. I mean, he’s inserted himself into a position where he’s the biggest fish in the smallest pond he could find. I think he’s lived up to absolutely none of his hopes, dreams or potential. So he’s in effect kind of broken, and that's what I loved about him," revealed Reynolds. "It’s also, I think, the most redeeming component to the character is that he’s this guy who’s ostensively a lothario a--hole and he’s in the end just really a kind of broken, damaged guy that I think suffers from his villainous behavior as much as anybody else. And I think that that was the most charming thing that Greg created for these characters, is that for everybody in the movie there are no villains and no heroes really. It’s much like life, you know? People are a little bit more complex than that."
Adventureland has a real '80s vibe to it, as it should being that it's set in that interesting decade. It's just bizarre to think 1987 was 20 years ago and 32 year old Reynolds says to him it's weird to hear what people label 'classics'. "Something like U2 is considered classic rock and I'm, 'Wait! What? No, those aren’t classic rock. I just was at the concert,'" So, you know, yes. Things start to…they're moving that way, you know? I have a friend that's, I guess he’s about twenty-five, and he saw a Volkswagen Bug, but the Volkswagen Bug from the '60s and '70s, he was like, 'Oh, that's a cool classic car.' I was just like, 'That's just a Volkswagen Bug, man. That's not a classic car.' And I just thought, 'Wow, you really consider that to be like a Studebaker, don’t you?' And he was like, 'Yes. I don't know, I've never seen one before.'
Reynolds was born in 1976 and so he experienced the '80s, but he was young enough then that he didn't have to worry about that decade's fashions. Not that, according to the actor, he would have cared much about making a fashion statement as a kid anyway. "I miss those days where really clothes just represented a way to hide your genitals, you know? And now it's like, 'Oh well I've got to wear this with that or this with this,' and it’s all this other thought that's involved. But I mean I like that Einstein used to have one outfit so he didn’t have to think about anything else, you know? When I was a kid I was pretty much that. I’d wear pants until they walked away on their own," admitted Reynolds, laughing.
Because he was still so young when the '80s – thankfully – gave way to the '90s, Reynolds should have missed out on the way-out hairstyles of that decade. But when asked if he ever had bad '80s hair, his answer was surprising. "Oh yes, I've had bad '80s hair, you know, like this year a couple of times. Yes, I definitely had ‘the step’, if you remember. You know, just place bowl, shave around, release child. I had that a little bit," said Reynolds. "No mullet. I started to grow one a little while ago and I remember… Well not a little while ago but I was about 20 and I remember my girlfriend at the time just said, 'That’s not a good idea.' And I cut it and that was kind of it."
Comedy Roles and Future Films
Reynolds has built up a solid resume in comedies over the past 15 years, including playing a party animal who extends his college years beyond the norm in Van Wilder. But now he's past that sort of role, and Reynolds seems kind of okay with that. "I haven’t really done that since probably Just Friends and that left such a great taste in my mouth because I loved doing the movie. I had so much fun shooting that movie, so I would love to do that again. But it’s really hard to, you know, when you're out of your 20, it’s pretty hard to do that. I’d be lying if I didn’t say miss doing that kind of humor, but there's so much more available to me as I've grown up a little bit more," said Reynolds."I have another film coming out that's, I would say, kind of a more of a broad romantic comedy with Sandra Bullock and I loved it. I mean, you can play so much more as an adult. You have real problems, you know? I mean when you're a guy who has a wealthy father and you're in your eighth year of college or whatever the hell he was on, you know there isn’t a tremendous amount of relateability there or empathy for the character, which is kind of why I really insisted on making him a nice guy. I remember reading the script and he was a little bit course and a little bit mean to people and I was like, 'No, no, no. You lose the audience if this guy doesn't at least care about people. At the very minimum he should care about people.' And so it’s always fun to add a little bit dynamic than is on the page."
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Adventureland hits theaters on April 3, 2009.
