Now, if you watched FSM you might be wondering how Hill's character (a waiter at a Hawaiian resort) is suddenly the guy charged with chaperoning Aldous Snow and making sure that he doesn't get into too much trouble on his trip from England to California. If you're were wondering that, I have an answer for you. Hill is not playing the same character in Get Him to the Greek that he did in Forgetting Sarah Marshall.
On the set of the Universal Pictures comedy, Hill explained to journalists gathered why he's taking on a different role. "It was done early on because my character in Sarah Marshall is so weird and stalkerish, I wanted to play a normal [person]. I wanted to be the audience’s perspective. It's like these people are f--kin' crazy. I'm you. I'm the people watching. Like, 'Whoa, what if I was in that position or what if I was in this position?' It would be weird to watch a weird stalker guy be the main character of a movie. It'd be kind of just hard to get an emotional depth to that at all."
Well said, Mr. Hill.
On the set of Get Him to the Greek, Hill went out of his way to make sure he answered every question completely, and wouldn't even let the publicist drag him away after the standard 15 minutes of questioning. Hill volunteered to sit with the media, including Fred Topel who covered for About.com, for a good hour. No subject was off limits, and after answering every conceivable Get Him to the Greek question (that didn't contain a spoiler), he even opened up about one of his future projects: The Adventurer's Handbook. But for now, we'll stick to the Get Him to the Greek portion of the Q&A.
Jonah Hill Get Him to the Greek Q&A
Are there any jokes about you playing a different character?Jonah Hill: "Not besides the one we’ll make right now. I do find it funny. It’s weird but when you watch the movie, hopefully you just won’t notice it because it’s just a different story."
Is there any Sarah Marshall reference?
Jonah Hill: "There’s a little reference to it that I think is funny. I don’t want to give sh-t away. It’s better doing these interviews once you’ve seen the movie because it’s like, 'Oh, I know what you’re talking about.' I don’t want to give away a secret. People would read it and then be like, 'Why should I see the movie? I know all the fun shit that’s going to happen.'"
Who do you actually play?
Jonah Hill: "I think Aaron, the character I’m playing, is just representative of a 25 year old guy who's really just trying to be in the music business and doesn’t really know what that means yet. I think this is a taste of what the music business is actually like, sort of the seedier side of it and what seems all fun in making music and being a part of something big. Then you see kind of the darkness of it and what it takes to be a famous person and a rock star. The sort of, I guess, dark habits of some of these people."
Such as?
Jonah Hill: "Like drug use and womanizing and no stability and no home life and no family. He wants excitement but then he gets excitement and he’s kind of like, 'Oh, maybe being normal isn’t the worst thing in the world, and being wild and crazy is maybe not the best thing in the world.'"
Was this your idea for the script?
Jonah Hill: "Nick and I went to Canter’s Deli one day, and we’re friends and were just talking - and it was right after Sarah Marshall. He’s like, 'What do you want to do now?' Because I was having a hard time finding a movie that I wanted to be the lead in after Superbad, because I love that movie so much that I kind of took smaller parts and writing and producing jobs because I didn’t want to jump out in front of a movie that I wasn’t going to be as proud of, because I really appreciate that movie. So I didn’t want to jump out to starring in movies and have them be not good. It’s scary to do a movie that people like, because what if your next movie just sucks?"
"He’s like, 'I think you and Russell are really funny together. I have this idea that we have 72 hours, but he’s off the wagon and f--kin’ crazy. You kind of have to deal with this insane person.' I was like, 'I can see that being really funny.' So I was like, 'Yeah, you should write it.'"
"We kind of pitched around ideas, and four or five of the main set pieces we kind of came up with during that lunch. And then he just went off and wrote a million drafts of the script."
What’s the beginning of the journey? You’re sent to London from LA?
Jonah Hill: "All over, London, New York, Las Vegas. We detour from all these places we’re supposed to be going. He’s fully off the wagon on heroin and I’m a guy who’s used to normal people, so he just takes me through the f--ckin’ mud. He just drags me through the mud with him and I’m not used to it."
But it was your character’s idea. Is he pissed off?
Jonah Hill: "I don't think he’s pissed. I think he’s just like, 'F-ck, I don’t want to get fired, I want to do well and I love this guy’s music.' I’m like a fan of his and I want him to succeed, but he kind of learns what a mess this guy really is underneath the persona. It’s like a lot of times when you meet some of these people that you really look up to, they’re a lot darker and weirder than you want them to be - and not as interesting. They say you shouldn’t meet your heroes because they’ll usually let you down. So it’s like this guy’s meeting a guy he really looks up to, part of the reason why he’s in the music business, and he’s a complete wreck."
Talk about working with Sean Combs.
Jonah Hill: "Now that’s interesting. We can talk about that."
He’s been Twittering.
Jonah Hill: "Has he really? He’s always on that thing. I don't know. I’m not on Twitter. I don’t go on it or anything like that, so I don't know much about it. But he’s always on his phone. Like, 'Hey, 100,000 people just read this message that I wrote.' I’m like, 'Cool. I’m playing WII in my trailer.' I don't know."
