Interview: Dax Shepard, Will Arnett stars of Lets Go To Prison

Based upon the cult classic novel by Jim Hogshire about how to stay out of jail or survive the slammer once you know you’re headed upriver, "Let’s Go To Prison" is an uncompromising no-holds-barred revenge comedy helmed by Bob Odenkirk, the director who brought sketch-comedy fans "Mr. Show With Bob and David." The film delivers a fresh, probing look at our penal system and gives new meaning to hard time as the locked up are set up before they even start to serve their time.

When felon John Lyshitski (Dax Shepard) learns the judge who sent him to jail is now dead, he decides to take his revenge on the dead man’s obnoxious son, Nelson Biederman the IVth (Arrested Development’s Will Arnett). John strikes gold when Nelson is wrongly convicted of a crime and sent to the same penitentiary he used to call home. He gleefully sells pot to undercover cops and gets sent back to become Nelson’s cellmate so that he can ensure that his new buddy gets the full treatment in the maximum security prison. When Nelson crosses the wrong cons, however, he ends up being sold to another inmate named Barry (Chi McBride) for prison snuggling. Barry, a ferocious con you would not want to cross in the shower, however, takes an unexpected fancy to Nelson and decides to reveal his tender side and show Nelson what tough love really means.

At the Los Angeles press day for "Let’s Go To Prison," Movies Online caught up with Dax Shepard and Will Arnett and asked them about their new film and what life was like behind bars. Shepard and Arnett are the biggest criminal masterminds in comedy and we appreciated their time although we had a hard time keeping up with them. Here’s what the comedy duo had to say about their zany misadventures in the clink:

Q: Is this what the entire movie is about? Just you two screwing around?

Dax: Yes. Just annoying everyone in sight. Who could be louder? We went through five crews. We’re like the Michael Mann's of comedy. You guys made a big mistake by giving us microphones. This is great.

Will: This is fantastic.

Dax: I lost some volume though. Is it because I moved so close?

Will: Potentially.

Dax: Look, can we compromise?

Q: Did you do improv on this at all?

Will: No. It’s like a game show.

Dax: Never. Improv is for devil worshipers.

Will: Yeah we did. We did a fair amount of improvising. We don't want to take away from the writers. I mean we do but.

Dax: If you like this movie, it's largely due to our improv and if you hate it, those writers need to be fired.

Will: It's pretty true.

Dax: We got to fool around. Not a tremendous amount. One of the producers Marc Abraham who's quite a hotshot producer was pretty adamant that we stick to the script. He liked the script quite a bit. So I'd say I had less lenience that I've had in most movies I've done.

Will: But we did get…

Dax: In all five movies I’ve done. I’ve been in this business for 18 months so…

Will: The better part.

Dax: The better part.

Will: We did shoot most scenes though the way it was scripted and then and then…

Dax: And then we got one to horse around with.

Dax: Actually Will and I would get into this game we'd call buttoning it up. We would see who could just add one little button at the end of the scene.

Will: So Bob would keep it rolling and we’d just constantly try to outdo each other.

Dax: And that's why she never came by.

Will: Yeah ever.

Dax: Because she got lost.

Will: That was her.

Dax: Better known as.

Will: You do a scene and sometimes you want to know the other guy's going to button it up and you yell cut and its like 'God Damn I didn't know you brought an extra pocket full of buttons today.

Dax: Yeah. Were they blowing buttons out on sale on the ride into work and you got a whole satchel of them?

Will: Oh boy.

Dax: Oh God, I’ve not performed at a Holiday Inn thus far so bear with me I’m still finding my feet. Spring grass.

Q: So what's this movie about?

Will: that’s a great question. I got it.

Dax: Oh please. Tell him it’s Roots, that’s a great place to start.

Will: The movie is based on a book by this guy Jim Hogshire that was titled 'Let's Go To Prison.' It was written as a handbook for people who knew incarceration was imminent.

Dax: It takes you through getting arrested to going to court to how you should behave in court, what kind of lawyers you get when you get to prison, what you should do while you're in prison, how to make different things.

Will: Basically how to survive. How to make your path the easiest and so these guys Tom Lennon and Ben Garant wrote a fictionalized account of a couple of gents who are caught in the system each on various sides of it. Dax plays a character who has spent the better part of his life incarcerated. He's kind of a bad seed.

Dax: When I get out, I decide to kill the judge who has sentenced me so many times only to find out he has passed away. So then I take aim at his son played by Will Arnett. Through a crazy course of events, we both end up in jail together with me plotting his demise.

Will: Dax's character organizes it so he can…

Dax: I wasn't playing a character so you can say Dax.

Will: You weren't?

Dax: No. I wasn't. I don't do much character work.

Will: You know what? I've seen the movie and that's bulls**t. You were playing a character.

Dax: Oh really. Thank you.

Will: Some tremendous work.

Dax: Thank you.

Will: Don't do this Dax.

Q: Did you do that for the radio people too?

Will: They were not happy.

Dax: No, they didn’t want us to overlap our talking.

Will: Yeah, we got into a lot of trouble in there.

Dax: I said ‘You’re not going to ask ole Abbott and Costello to not, you know…

Will: Right.

Dax: …get physical with one another at the same time. Why are you going to ask these…

Will: two…

Dax: …with the oral dexterity just overlapping and adding…

Will: …just tie our hands.

Dax: Seems silly to us but what do we know.

Q: What is your character in jail for?

Dax: All kind of low level petty crimes. The first time I'm incarcerated it was for stealing the publisher's clearance house prized patrol van at eight-years old because I thought there'd be a million bucks inside and I get arrested for trying to cash the oversize check. That is word for word from the commercial. That was pretty solid. The next time, I shoot up a mailbox in a botched…

Will: robbery attempt.

Dax: Yep and that becomes a federal offensive.

Will: That was real crap.

Dax: Which is kind of a story hole because why would I see Biederman? He’s probably a state court and that’s a federal… It’s movie magic. It’s called willful suspension of disbelief.

Will: Yup.

Dax: I think I’ve been in prison three different times because I say if I had a nickel for every time I’d been in jail, I’d have 15 cents.

Will: Yeah, that’s right.

Dax: And either my math is wrong or that adds up to …

Q: That’s just two. What’s the last one?

Will: The last one is….Oh! for stealing a police car. Right?

Dax: Good work. I didn’t know that. You did more background work on me than I did.

Will: He says next time you steal a car, be sure it doesn’t have lights on the roof.

Dax: Yes, and then I go… do you like that? Does that one get you?

Will: That’s right.

Dax: Yeah.

Will: That’s a real fun moment.

Dax: It’s a good movie. Will and I saw it together. I laughed so hard. I am such a sucker for my own material. We were watching it together and I was laughing at myself.

Will: He was laughing really hard. It really tickled him.

Dax: I am my own biggest fan.

"Let’s Go to Prison" opens November 17th.