The House Bunny Press Conference
For each of you, have you ever been in a position where you felt like an outsider and do you recall any specific instances and how did you deal with it?
Katharine McPhee: "That’s kind of the question of the day. It’s a good question. …I’m not going to say I was a dork in high school, but I definitely had – I struggled with weight in high school. I had times where I didn’t really want to hang out with the cool kids. I was kind of like being a librarian and keeping to myself. So, I think, everybody has a moment in their life where they feel not so comfortable in their skin or connected to what we call the popular group or whatever. That was my extent of feeling like an outsider."
What made you come out of your shell?
Katharine McPhee: "Well, I was involved in a theater group, theater parts in high school, so that sort of kept me really busy and then swim team. So I’m not going to call myself a dork, I had friends and stuff, but I was friends with a lot of different people in high school. So, I guess that was my outlet, but it was always kind of my outlet growing up, being playing and acting, stuff like that."
Rumer Willis: "I was a dork. I was a computer nerd. I grew up and, Emma went through the same thing, we both had braces and glasses and this curly fro. And I wasn’t necessarily too active in getting in the social crowd, so I definitely understand the entirely not fitting in. But I think everyone has their own version of feeling a bit out of place, and one of the great things I think that we have the ability to do is show that it’s all right. You can have that awkward phase. It’s not about whether you’re the popular girl or the nerdy one. It’s just about feeling confident and comfortable with kind of where you fit and who you are and accessing that and making that your own."
Emma Stone: "When I was young I never really thought to judge it, really, to feel like an outsider. I sort of just always did my thing and it made me happy so I didn’t really think to think it was dorky or anything like that. I made a lot of websites, but I thought it was fun. But I kind of just, I feel like as I have gotten older, the more it just gets in your head. Not just the media, but kind of everything growing up. It starts to affect you older than it did when I was young. This really came in perfect time for me because I was 18 when we were shooting this and that period really for me, this has been the strangest period of trying to figure out who I am. So, the timing was really ideal. Just kind of to accept that what you like is what you like and who you are is who you are, and every day I try to remind myself of that. So it was a cool thing to be involved with."
Anna Faris: "I definitely still feel incredibly awkward. And I never quite get used to this stuff, but I’m really proud I made a movie because I feel in my movie experience, I definitely give up a sense of vanity so it was kind of nice actually to play like the pretty girl, But, I do want to commend the girls. All of them gave up their sense of vanity for the sake of the movie and they were all so game and eager to sort of, to be vulnerable on camera. Whether it was Katharine being pregnant. Rumer clearly with the neck brace. Emma wearing weird glasses…"
Emma Stone: [Laughing] "I was so uncomfortable."
Anna Faris: "All of them approached it with enthusiasm. There wasn’t a moment where I had to say like, ‘C’mon, just do it for the movie. You get to be hot later on.’ Everybody was so game and more excited to play those characters, sort of the true Zeta girls, then maybe they were to be super hot."
Katharine, can you talk about wearing that fake belly? And does that make you want to get pregnant soon?
Katharine McPhee: "Well, guys, I have great news… [Laughing] Well, I had two different bellies. One that was prosthetic and one that was like a pregnant pad, which I showed very graphically how it connects at the bottom. It was very uncomfortable in the dead of summer, so I wore that one more often than the actual prosthetic, because the prosthetic is really just specifically when there is a sheer t-shirt, where you can see the belly button and all that kind of stuff. Before I actually got married I was like I wanted to have kids right away and all this stuff. And then I got married and totally changed and was like, ‘No.’ And I think that has to do with wearing a pregnant pad for two months, so thank you House Bunny."
Anna, when you pitched the story were you able to imagine yourself as a Playboy Bunny and what was it like shooting in the Playboy Mansion?
Anna Faris: "It was really intimidating. When we went and pitched it, I would be in character and so I was starting to really have a clear vision of who Shelley was. Having said that, it was really intimidating. I kept feeling, ‘I don’t belong in this crowd.’ All these girls are really hot and confident and I felt really self-conscious for sure."
"I thought maybe the studio world wouldn’t see me as that, so that was intimidating. But when I floated the idea past my mom, who is pretty conservative, she was like, ‘You’re doing what?’ And now, of course, she’s like ‘I’m so proud of you!’ Which is nice."
Anna, it says it took 3 hours of makeup.
Anna Faris: "Shelley, you know, she’s got a lot of hair. She likes a lot of makeup. We had to do a lot of body makeup and makeup to make my cleavage look bigger. Getting into the wardrobe usually took a good 20 minutes or so. Strapping in. It was like, yeah, it was a challenge. The shoes I loved. As I think everyone knows, I kept them all. I still will put them on at night and trot around. I don’t go anywhere. But, I loved wearing those."
