Feb 25, 2008 - Will Ferrell hits the hardcourt as Jackie Moon, owner of the ABA team the Flint Michigan Tropics, in the New Line Cinema comedy Semi-Pro. Ferrell’s no stranger to stripping down to his shorts and as one of the star players of the Tropics, Ferrell once again gets to show off a lot of skin. But that wasn’t what drew him to Semi-Pro. “I love kind of combining sports and comedy together,” said Ferrell at the Los Angeles press conference where he joined co-stars Andre Benjamin, Woody Harrelson, Will Arnett, and director Kent Alterman to discuss the film. “It’s a great framework to kind of do comedy in. You can parody the sport, in this movie you can parody the era. And, at the same time, you have a built in arc that’s fun for the audience to watch this team of losers try to attain the lofty goal of fourth place.”
The Flint Michigan Tropics are the sorriest team in the ABA and with the league about to fold, are on the verge of dissolving. But if the guys can pull together and place at least fourth, they have a shot at being one of the teams that’s absorbed by the NBA.
Benjamin stars as a hotshot player who could actually have a shot at NBA glory. Harrelson co-stars as a veteran player brought in to boost the quality of the team, and Arnett throws out scathing one-liners from the sidelines as one of the team’s announcers.
Semi-Pro Press Conference:
We’ve seen you ice-skating in Blades of Glory and driving racecars in Talladega Nights. How hard was it to shape that beautiful body of yours into a basketball physique for this film?
Will Ferrell: “Well, I pretty much stereotypically have a basketball physique to begin with. So, it didn’t take that much sculpting. I hear some laughter over here, I don’t know why…”
Andre Benjamin: “No, I’m laughing at him because he didn’t think you had a body.”
Will Ferrell: “But, you know, Jackie Moon is a – he’s a player from a different era when players were a little more voluptuous. He’s a voluptuous player. Curvy.”
Director Kent Alterman: “You know, he put sexy back in basketball. Not that it ever left.”
This is primarily for the two Wills, I was curious how your improv backgrounds work into a film like this? And also I’d like to hear from Andre what it’s like to be around these guys when they are going off on the improv.
Will Ferrell: “Wow. I was not expecting that question [laughing].”
Will Arnett: “No answer for it.”
Will Ferrell: “Will and Andy got to sit at the scorer’s table and just…”
Will Arnett: “Andy Daly plays Dick Pepperfield very well. He’s an awesome improviser and has a long history with the Upright Citizen’s Brigade , and we were kind of in the cheap seats. We had the benefit of being just bored a lot and just kind of throwing remarks in, so that’s how…”
Will Ferrell: “So, they were kind of in a contained situation where you could just roll the camera and they could come up with 8,000 things that we’d cherry pick as to what worked for the scene. I mean, this was kind of the typical pattern where we’d start filming the scenes written and then slowly throw some zingers in there. I really try to change it up whenever I can in my personal life.”
Andre Benjamin: “I wasn’t too intimidated.”
Will Ferrell: “What?”
Andre Benjamin: “No, no, because when I had to audition for the film, I had to walk into a room and audition with Will. So I guess once I got over that, it wasn’t too bad. And then with music you freestyle a lot and you kinda just throw ideas out. You know, when you read the script and want to make your character as real as possible, sometimes you just go off on a tandem and you keep going. And you’ve got film [so] why not? So keep recording it.”
Most of you are too young to remember the actual ABA, but did you watch tapes of these teams back in the day?
Kent Alterman: “We did look at a lot of stuff. HBO did a fantastic documentary a while back called Longshots and that was very inspiring to us. It had a lot of historical footage. Will, do you want to make that funny?”
Will Ferrell: “Let’s see, [turns to Arnett] did you look at any footage?”
Will Arnett: “No, I didn’t look at any footage.”
Kent Alterman: “But I personally grew up in that time. I was in San Antonio when the Spurs became the Spurs, because they were the Dallas Chaparrals in the old ABA. My family and I went to all the games.”
Will Ferrell: “Kent was known as ‘the kid.’ He was this guy who was famous for his heckling, no kidding. Didn’t Dave Cowens try and charge you one time?”
Kent Alterman: “He did.”
Will Ferrell: “He wanted to kill him. Good story.”
Kent Alterman: “That was after the ABA days, after the merger. He was known as a hot-headed, fierce competitor, so I went for it. [He] came into the stands a few seats and threatened me, which was terrifying. I was a teenager and I said not another word the rest of the game. And when Bill Walton came to set to do a piece for ESPN, we were talking and he said, ‘I remember San Antonio was a crazy place.’ There is this group in San Antonio called the Baseline Bums and he said, ‘Yeah, Dave Cowens went after one of the Baseline Bums one time.’ And I said, ‘That wasn’t a Baseline Bum, that was me.’ He said, ‘No way!’ And then I did the math in my head and said, ‘You weren’t on the Celtics then. Why do you know that story?’ And he said, ‘Are you kidding? In that day and age? That was a sacred line no one crossed. That story was famous around the NBA.’ So, I’m not proud of it by the way.”
Page 2: On Short Shorts, Hairdos, and the '70s
