Madeline Carroll, Rebecca DeMornay and Penelope Ann Miller Flipped Press Conference
Do you think teenagers today will be able to appreciate a story like this?Madeline Carroll: "I think it’ll be cool for them to be able to see how it was back then. Kids are so obnoxious nowadays. I really didn’t realize it until I read this script and then it wasn’t just a script, people actually lived in those days. Wow, they were so much nicer and pleasant, I guess, to be around. Kids nowadays, I remember when I was in school, they were just rude - even to the teachers and stuff. The kids in the classroom are sitting up straight. I think it’ll be cool for them to watch just to see how it was back then."
Will they be able to relate to it?
Madeline Carroll: "I think in some ways. Especially, they can remember how they were when they were younger. But kids in middle school, that’s a far stretch."
Do you think showing a family like the Bakers in a movie could encourage real families to talk more and support each other?
Penelope Ann Miller: "Hopefully it’ll inspire families to be warm and loving and encourage children to have passion and follow their dreams and their beliefs. [Madeline's] character is somebody who really goes after what she believes in. That’s timeless, really. I think, hopefully, children will be inspired by that as well, her love of her sycamore tree and then her father being an artist. We’re a warmer family. You can tell my character kind of wishes she had that house across the street and the outfits Rebecca has in the movie, but I think at the end of the day she loves her family and there’s a lot of love in that family. So it’s a good thing that you felt that way and hopefully seeing the two juxtaposed opposite each other to see the difference, I think it’s interesting."
Madeline Carroll: "I think like Penelope said, our family’s just more wholesome. Rebecca was saying that her family has everything that we wish we had, but the love really isn’t there like our family. I love the Bakers. I love her dad. I love the part where we go and we visit my uncle. I think it really makes you feel even more bad for Julie after Bryce [played by Callan McAuliffe] threw away her eggs. I think our family, you think of how sweet [they are] and you really feel for Julie. When you see Bryce’s family, you feel for him in a way, even though you feel like he’s a jerk. But you feel for him because his family, he doesn’t really know the difference. His dad’s kind of a snob. It’s just a whole different setting. I think it’s really cool when John Mahoney comes in as the grandpa because he’s kind of, Rob was saying, the moral compass of the story. Until he gets there, Bryce doesn’t really know what to do with himself."
Rebecca DeMornay: "I really like how the writing, the story emphasizes how all of us as children, the family we come out of really shapes who we are. What Bryce comes out of with our family is there’s a lot of denial about whether or not our life is working, whether our family is happy or not. We’re trying to be in denial about that."
Every time the story flips, Julie sheds more light on the situation. Should we take that as the universal truth that girls just know more than guys pretty much at any age?
Rebecca DeMornay: "Yes. I would say yes."
Madeline Carroll: "Yeah, I think girls from a young age know what they want and boys kind of have to keep up and catch up to them. Even in kindergarten, girls are pretty much the ones that like the boy first and the boys are like, 'Oh, I want to play with my trucks.' They think it’s not cool. I think girls are definitely more ahead than boys."
Rebecca DeMornay: "I think it’s interesting in our society, which is very patriarchal - and Hollywood sort of mirrors society in general - that this is sort of a departure of really showing how much boys do have to learn from girls and what men can learn from women. It’s a different yin yang. There’s a lot to learn from the yin."
Penelope Ann Miller: "I just think emotional maturity. I think women...just we have the instincts. Just being women, we’re more in tuned and in touch with them. That’s kind of what drives them. Boys have the testosterone driving them. So I think that’s why Julie’s character is so evolved. Then Bryce learns from her, so I think it’s universal."
How did you first meet Callan McAuliffe and how did you get along while filming?
Madeline Carroll: "The first time we met was I read with him in an audition when we were looking for boys. That was the first time I met him. We got along good. We never really liked each other in a different way. We were just kind of friends, just so that’s clear. We were just friends, so I remember filming the scene where he tries to kiss me and stuff. It was just so weird because we were both laughing the whole time. He would lean in and I’d be like, 'Gosh, he looks so stupid.' It was horrible."
Had you read the book?
Penelope Ann Miller: "I wasn’t familiar with the book and came to know it from the script and liked the script. I love doing period pieces but to me the fact that it was early ‘60s, which is really like the ‘50s, I was so excited and then found out later that the book actually took place in the ‘80s. I was so excited that Rob [Reiner] had chosen to set it back in time because of that period. It was a time of innocence and it was right before everything started to change in our culture and our world and our society with the sexual revolution and Vietnam War and Kennedy assassination. So, to me, that time of innocence will never be the same, but yet the topics and the feelings are universal. Everybody remembers their first crush so I think a grandparent to a child will all say, 'Oh yeah, I remember when I fell in love with Tommy.' Everybody remembers those feelings, so the feelings are the same. It’s just bringing it back to a simpler life and I love that he did that. The nostalgia and the throwback, I thought it was really special."
Rebecca DeMornay: "I actually did know the book because my daughter, I have two daughters, and the older one had gone through [the book] when she was in fifth grade. She just finished sixth grade now, but it was a big book for girls in fifth grade that they were reading, passing around. I didn’t read it but then when I was doing the film and I read it, the book by Wendelin Van Draanen is extraordinary because the script is actually so exactly the book. He literally lifted, their gift was to lift just the pieces so it was cohesive for a movie, but in fact the dialogue, everything is exactly the novel by Wendelin. I think that’s unusual. Usually there’s great huge differences, liberties taken and this is very faithful, except for the period, setting it in a different period. But she didn’t write cell phones or anything anyway."
Madeline Carroll: "I was kind of familiar with the book. I had it in fifth grade too but I hadn’t read it. Then I just read the script and I loved the script. Like Penelope said, I think all people will be able to see this movie. I think adults will enjoy it more so maybe than the kids. Kids will like it but adults have those memories, a first love that they haven’t remembered in a long time. I think that’s the reason why adults will really like it. Same thing with Stand By Me. Stand By Me you wanted to be with those kids at that time. You get to have those memories. Kids will like it, but we’re kind of going through all that love stuff right now, first crush thing. I think that’s the reason adults will like it a lot."
Madeline, what do you have in common with Julie?
Madeline Carroll: "Just kind of small things, like she wasn’t exactly the popular mean girl in the school and she wasn’t really a nerd. I was always kind of in-between. I mixed with everybody dually. She has brothers, I have brothers. Just things like that I’m kind of similar with her, but obviously I didn’t live in the ‘50s and ‘60s."
Is there anything you’re enamored with from the ‘60s?
Madeline Carroll: "The clothes probably. The clothes were so fun to put on every day and weird too. We had like pennies in our shoes. Like, that’s weird. We don’t do that nowadays. Yeah, the clothes were awesome - and getting to see all the cars. The bikes were awesome too. It made me think that bikes are so ugly nowadays. Back then everything was decked out on the bike. Just everything around you really made you feel like the ‘60s was awesome."
