Cheech Marin on Developing His Character 'Ramone' in Cars: “Actually, John [Lasseter] and I had a long conversation about the car, what year the car was. I said, ‘Well, it has to be a Chevy if it's going to be a low-rider.’ I wanted a '58 because that was my dream car. And he says, ‘But the look of the film was more the tailfin.’ He said, ‘A '59 came out with a tail.’ I said okay and so we settled on a '59 because it kind of went with the movie.”
Marin views Ramone as a nice tribute to the low-rider culture that he was a part of. “You know the low-riders for me were the coolest guys. I hung out with a lot of different social sets, but the low-riders, a couple of my friends were low-riders and it was just the coolest. There's a certain cool factor that comes out of going low and slow. …There's a certain 'in control' factor and that comes out of parading horses, and that's what the low-rider is the next eventual step from that. But it was cool. You know they had all the coolest sounds, and chicks dug it.”
Marin Analyzes Ramone: “This character had a lot of energy to him. He was very positive and he was almost like a salesman because he's, he's the inferior/exterior guy in town - and he was a lover,” explained Marin. “I mean, I think the most salient characteristic is that he was a lover because he was in love with his wife and he geared his life towards that. That kind of kept coming out.”
You Don’t Have to be a NASCAR Fan to Get Into Cars: Marin readily admits all he knows about NASCAR is that they go "round and round." But according to Marin, you don’t need to be into racing to appreciate this animated comedy. “I think you just have to be into a heartfelt story, which is what this is,” explained Marin. “I mean it's character-driven rather than, and story-driven rather than, you know, the particulars of NASCAR. But if you know anything about NASCAR, it really helps.”
Marin’s No Stranger to Voice Work: “It's what I was raised doing. I mean Cheech and Chong records were animation without the animation, so I grew up doing that. I really like doing it - you know, creating the whole world out of voice. It's a different kind of acting. It's like sculpting with a chainsaw, you know? The arcs you describe are real big. It's very broad and it's very loud. I've always found that you can't get too big in animation because you're competing with this huge image that you have to match a voice to. I found that other characters I've seen in animation where they try to do kind of a normal voice just… It just falls flat, you know? It's how to compete with that big rambunctious image.”
Marin continued. “It's a tone you have to get. It's pretty loud. It's like the difference between film acting and stage acting. With stage acting, you have to project out there. It's more akin to stage acting actually than film acting because the subtlety, it just doesn't work for animation. You're competing with this glaring image, this big bright colourful image, and you have to kind of match your voice to it. There's a lot of action in those.”
Looking Back on His Cheech and Chong Days: Marin said he never felt the need to bend the truth when it came to talking to his own children about his old ‘stoner’ days. “You know, kids are very hip, they know a lot more than I did at that age. My kids…I have 28, 21 and 14-year-old kids and they started listening to the records first and it was interesting to watch. It was a Litmus test [to] see what do they understand and what they didn't understand. The things they didn't understand they just didn't understand and they didn't laugh at. But things they did understand… Mostly it wasn't about any kind of dope or anything like those things. And so they know that there's a separation between the character and dad.”
Does he worry there are more avenues for experimentation available now? “There's always avenues for experimentation,” replied Marin. “You know, once your kid walks out the door, unless you have an electronic leash on them, what you want to do is kind of train them in good moral values and knowing right from wrong. I mean, that's the only thing I concentrate on. When I send my kids out the door, you know right from wrong, and if that's ingrained in you… They get it. They're going to mistakes. They're going to stick their fingers in the fan no matter what you tell them. To what degree is kind of what you want to concentrate on.”
Marin added, “You know, we never thought of ourselves as radicals and on the edge. We were just regular guys. This was what everybody's doing and this is what happened in the culture. We were looked at as rebels, but we weren't.”
