Kristen Bell, Jason Bateman Couples Retreat Interview

MoviesOnline sat down recently with Jason Bateman and Kristen Bell to talk about their new comedy, “Couples Retreat,” directed by Peter Billingsley based on an original idea of Vince Vaughn’s. Vaughn, Jon Favreau, Malin Ackerman, Kristin Davis, Faizon Love and Kali Hawk also star.

After eight seemingly blissful years together, Jason (Bateman) and Cynthia (Bell) are at the crossroads. The once happy pair shocks their close friends when they announce that they are considering a divorce. In order to save their marriage, they’re making one last Hail Mary.

Jason and Cynthia have discovered Eden Resort, a tropical island paradise in the South Pacific specializing in extensive couples therapy. But the only way they can afford to go is through the “Pelican Package,” Eden Resort’s group rate. The overly analytical Jason uses a PowerPoint presentation to convince his friends to go with them to Eden arguing that it’s a win-win. While they get the counseling they need, their friends can bask on the white, sandy beaches, relax in the spas, ride jet skis and just enjoy themselves.

However, they soon discover that participation in the resort’s couples therapy is anything but optional and that their group-rate vacation comes at a price -- all of the couples must partake in the unorthodox counseling techniques of Eden Resort’s renowned “Couples Whisperer” – Monsieur Marcel (Jean Reno). It’s all or none. And if it’s none, they will all be sent home. What follows is a hilarious and heartfelt look at real-world problems faced by all couples.

Here’s what Jason Bateman and Kristen Bell had to tell us about their new movie:
 
Q: Do you have a PowerPoint for the interview?

JB: Oh my God.

KB: I know, they’re all set up.

Q: How much A type and control freak are you guys?

JB: I am not very A type. I like to sort of just let it go. My wife, on the other hand, is very good about organization and planning and, between the two of us, there’s somebody normal, right in between. Candy?

KB: Thank you, Jim. Cynthia’s probably me on my worst, worst day where if I’m very stressed out, I do like everything to be in order and it’s quite frustrating to see things that are not. But, I don't think I have been her or plan to be her in a long while.

Q: They were the relationship I wanted to have. I’d love to have someone schedule everything.

JB: We have an island for you to visit when that happens. Yeah, there’s nothing all that bad about what they do. I think that it’s a combination of their routine along with their inherent uptightness too which probably goes into their emotional life and perhaps their sexual life and spiritual life and all that stuff. So they need this island, they need this program to kind of shake things loose and lighten up a little bit.

Q: When they told you they were shooting in Bora Bora, did they have you guys at hello?

JB: They sure did.

Q: Was that one of the biggest draws?

JB: Yeah, with me it was a very easy yes. This was something that was born from two of my comedy heroes, Jon and Vince. It was just a great call to get. The location could’ve been Laughlin, I don’t care, on a bus but it happened to be the most idyllic situation you could ever imagine literally. If you could just run through all the travel brochures and find the one place you’d want to go, it really, really would be this spot and it would be that resort. We got to stay there for five weeks for free and get paid and shoot a movie that we love and with people that we love.

KB: There were no losers on this film. Everybody won.

Q: How was it working with Peter Billingsley?

KB: Peter’s lovely. I think that he knows that you can’t really make a comedy when people are unhappy. If people on the set aren’t smiling, you’re probably not getting that much funny material on film and people probably won’t be laughing when they’re watching it. He had a lot on his plate from taking a gigantic amount of equipment and crew and relocating them to Bora Bora and learning how to work with all the elements there, the heat and just the different situation everyone was not used to. And I think that he kept a smile on his face for the whole time. He had a very clear idea of what he wanted out of the film and he was just all around great to work with. I think he’s very experienced despite the fact that this is his directorial debut. He made it a really fun, collaborative set to work on.

Q: They say the best idea wins, so did you think of ideas for other characters?

JB: Yeah, I think we were all, like Kristen said, it was a very collaborative set. There were no bad ideas and everybody felt very safe to pitch in and it was kind of a free for all. The rehearsal process was never rushed or forced and there was enough time for everything to be worked out. That was important because there were eight of us. With eight people, if you’re all together in the same scene, those eight people need to make kind of one character so everybody has to be on guard to make sure that they’re playing whatever right element they need to, to make it all work.

KB: Well, it’s all about what moves the story along. It’s the best idea will win, the funniest idea, but also what gets the story told because we’re still doing it for an audience. It could be a very, very funny joke but it might get cut out because it’s not what the scene needs right then and there to move it along.

Q: What was the most embarrassing scene: dry hump yoga or naked on the beach?

JB: The disrobing on the beach was not really that tough for anybody except Faizon.

KB: Well, I think it was tough for all of us except Faizon is what he means to say.

JB: Yeah, that’s actually true too, because we were all basically in our bathing suits. I mean, the guys were wearing boxers and the girls were wearing underwear and bra but they were the size of a bathing suit anyway, right? So I would say, I don't know, the most embarrassing, I don't know. I certainly got off pretty scot-free. I didn’t have to do anything all that embarrassing in this movie, I don't think. You?

KB: No, I didn’t really have an embarrassing moment either.

JB: No, we got away with it.

Q: Where do you like to go to get away with your loved ones?

KB: Home. Staying at home is the most important thing for me because I get so little time there I think. Having people over, that feels very comfortable and where I truly can catch up with someone. I don’t really like to go out to that many places in Los Angeles because I don’t like to go places where I can’t hear or see the people that I’m going with. But, yeah, kind of home, I guess. I would definitely go back to Bora Bora.

JB: There’s a plane leaving tonight.

Q: Do you know friends who’ve had difficulty having a child so you could relate to the characters?

JB: I’ve got some friends that are having trouble with that and it is very stressful on the relationship. I didn’t need to talk to them about it, partly because I don’t like to do a whole lot of homework. I didn’t really want to weigh it down with stuff like that. This is a light, fun movie. I didn’t want to bore anybody in the audience with any sort of real acting.

KB: You didn’t, so…

JB: Thank you. I think everybody coming into this movie is looking for a good time and to eat plenty of popcorn and I think it definitely delivers that.

Q: Did you come away with any benefits from the counseling scenes?

JB: Did we learn anything through the whole - - no, not really.

KB: Partly because most of our therapy sessions were meant to be a little bit more for the comedy. They were definitely extreme in what our therapist in particular was telling us. He was talking about Puppy Death Syndrome or something. I don’t necessarily know how that was going to affect our relationship.

JB: It’s tough to get a good lesson from the Puppy Death Syndrome.

Q: How about the themes of the movie?

JB: Sure, yeah, just if there is any sort of message I suppose that at least I absorbed was just keep talking and stay connected as much as you can. Don’t just assume that person’s just going to keep waking up next to you every morning. You might need to talk to that person every once in a while, check in. If there is a message in the film, perhaps it’s that. I don't know.

Q: They hired writers on Hancock 2. Have you been involved in development?

JB: No, nothing. I know nothing about that project at all. No one’s called us or talked to us about it and that’s fine. I don’t really expect to be contacted about it. When you’ve got two characters that are immortal, and they don’t age, and they fly, you can place them anywhere on the planet at any time in history, present or future or past. So why they would choose to keep it in L.A. and in current time, which would be the only way that my character would exist, it seems to not really take full advantage of the two lead characters.

Q: That’s very big of you to volunteer that.

JB: Well, it’s just the truth. I’m a moviegoer like everybody else. If I was going to go see a sequel to Hancock, I would expect it to not be of the same time but maybe they’ve got a great idea for something to pick up right where it left off. I don't know. I’d certainly love to be a part of it.

Q: Did the girls meet early and have a bonding lunch experience?

KB: No, but we did click really quickly. The rehearsal process helped because we all met and sort of had some social time together while we were working out how our character would best be developed and best tell this story of all eight people. But I think that we were all a little bit intimidated clearly because they’re such comedy powerhouses, but I think the girls, with what they were given, pretty much held their own. I was really proud of the females in this film and we all got along really great.

Q: The yoga scene seemed real with women letting go. Did you have fun doing that?

KB: Absolutely. They’re both very easy to hang out with and we’re all kind of similar, so it just all fell into place.

Q: Astro Boy comes out next month. What do we need to know about the original to get ready?

KB: Nothing. You don’t need to know anything. It presents Astro Boy in the light in which I think he’s used to living in but also with a slightly fresh perspective. I think people that are familiar with the manga or how iconic he is overseas, I know they’re going to have high expectations and that’s a little nerve wracking knowing that people are so familiar with this character and I hope they did it right. I think they did. Our director, David (Bowers), was fantastic and he loves this story more than life itself. My character’s new to the story but I think that she helped move it along. I like they added a female so that the little girls and people that saw it might be able to identify with it as a girl. Also on a friendship level, they gave Astro kind of a best friend in this one which I think is really cute. I’ve seen it and I really like it. I think it’s really good.

Q: We’re seeing it next week.

KB: Nice. Oh, I hope you like it.

Q: Did you improv anything that ended up in the movie?

JB: I forget. I do know that I think my favorite line in the movie is Vince’s that he improvised when the sharks were chasing him and he yelled.

KB: “Take the French out of your mouth?”

JB: Yeah, he yells at Jean Reno to get the French out of his mouth and start shooting fish, I don't know if I’ve heard anything that funny in a long time. I do know that there were tons of things that were ad libbed that are not in the movie but you can’t have a 10-hour movie. So I do not envy the position of the editor or the director with this film. I don't know how you decide what goes in and what doesn’t.

Q: What about you?

KB: Not that I can remember. The lines of what was actually scripted versus what we came up with on the day or a week prior gets a little blurry, especially doing it that long ago. Yeah, there was a lot of funny stuff that wasn’t in it but there’s also a lot of funny stuff in it.

Q: How was working with someone as iconic as Jean Reno?

JB: It was pretty great. Not that the film needed classing up, but I think he does that with anything that he does and it was nice to be around him.

KB: He’s lovely.

JB: He set a great tone on the set the days that he was there, and his wife. He was just so kind. We were telling the guys next door that he did a very nice thing for us. The film that he shot there called The Big Blue, the dive movie that actually was shot right in that same location, he has stayed friends with the dive master from that movie and arranged a dive for all of us in the cast. So he paid for us to all go out with this guy on a boat and dive with sharks.

KB: It was amazing.

JB: Actually some of that footage is in the movie. I wonder if he could then expense that? He probably ended up making a little bit of money on that, that bastard. I knew he wasn’t that nice.

“Couples Retreat” opens in theaters on October 9th.