Pixar’s ‘Soul’ Interviews With Jamie Foxx, Tina Fey And Angela Bassett

Cinema Blend

‘Soul’ cast members Jamie Foxx, Tina Fey, Angela Bassett, Phylicia Rashad, writers/directors Pete Docter and Kemp Powers, and producer Dana Murray discuss their new Pixar movie in this interview with CinemaBlend Managing Editor Sean O’Connell.

Transcript

00:00My kids watch it, you know, my kids, super critical,

00:02you know, because they watch a lot, you know,

00:04they dabbed, you know, the third act, you know,

00:06that, so they have that type of,

00:08but they just watched it and loved it.

00:09And so I think it's a beautiful Christmas gift

00:12that we can continue to unwrap for days to come.

00:15You're still alive?

00:17Can you help me get back?

00:18No way!

00:20There I am! What are we waiting for?

00:22Wait, not me!

00:23Aah!

00:25Aah!

00:27♪♪

00:29The relationship between Joe and 22,

00:31to me, is so extremely special.

00:33I'm curious, did you get to voice with Tina at all,

00:35or was it all stuff that...

00:37Yeah, I actually got a chance to be in the same room with her,

00:39and I was just blown away, man, just looking at Tina Fey,

00:41like, wow, that's Tina Fey.

00:43And, you know, as a comic, you know, she's a technician.

00:47I mean, you know, she knows how to, you know,

00:49she knows how to get it, get the characters,

00:50and I know her history as being a writer

00:52and things like that, so just being able to have that, man,

00:55means everything, you know, for the experience of the movie,

00:58to be able to meet someone that you really respect

01:00and admire and are a fan of.

01:02What do you want to be remembered for?

01:05Probably for doing this funny cowboy dance.

01:08Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

01:09I need to start with this rumor that's going around

01:12that you and Amy Poehler are trying to destroy me

01:15emotionally through your contributions

01:17to Pixar's library.

01:18It is not a rumor. It's true.

01:21It is? Mine, too.

01:24We're trying, Sean.

01:26There's a line that made me laugh,

01:27where you talk about using her voice,

01:30and it says, I just use this voice because it annoys people,

01:33but yet it's your voice.

01:34Do you ever stop and say, wait a second?

01:37Yeah, when we talked about that, I think I was,

01:39maybe, I don't want to misremember,

01:41but I think that was something

01:42that we all talked about together,

01:43of maybe naming, finding a joke way to name the fact

01:46that, like, why does this unborn soul

01:49sound like a middle-aged white lady?

01:50You can't crush a soul here.

01:52That's what life on Earth is for.

01:54Everyone's least favorite kind of person.

01:56Right.

01:57I universally despised middle-aged white ladies,

02:01and that was kind of the joke that came out of it.

02:02The music that Joe plays is so pivotal to the character.

02:06I'm really curious, at what point in the process

02:07did you get to hear the music they were going to use for him

02:09and was it important for you as you figured him out?

02:12Well, you know what?

02:13They let me hear some of it here and there,

02:16which, you know, I mean, Baptiste is just,

02:19I mean, come on, man.

02:20You're in high grass right now.

02:22You're in high grass.

02:24So anything he touches is amazing.

02:26Just being able to sort of take that music,

02:28use it as inspiration, use it as a mindset

02:31so that when we're saying those words,

02:33you know, they really mean something.

02:34You know, Joe is really passionate about this, you know?

02:38You start out on a goal or a dream

02:39and then your dream turns into something else

02:42that is just as fulfilling.

02:43So it was amazing.

02:45I'm curious if you got to hear any of that music

02:47as you started to prepare to play her.

02:51Not one note.

02:53You're kidding me, really?

02:54I kid you not.

02:57And that's so insightful that you would say that.

03:00Now I'm wondering why not?

03:02Well, no, no.

03:04I only heard it when, you know,

03:07when I was able to see the film

03:09and I was surprised and blown away.

03:11It was lovely.

03:12It was beautiful to see Dorothea get into the groove,

03:15into her own zone.

03:16In order for your story to start,

03:18you need to kill your main character.

03:20And I don't imagine that that's something

03:21that a lot of animated features get to say.

03:23So I'm just really curious

03:25what kind of conversations you had about

03:27how do we kill Joe and how much can we show?

03:30We had a couple of thoughts

03:31of maybe he was so into rehearsing

03:34that he gets hit by a truck or something.

03:36It needed to be kind of comedic

03:38because you don't want to horrify people right off the bat.

03:41We talked about a piano falling on him.

03:43Yeah, yeah, that would have been good.

03:46Well, we had the one boarded version.

03:47Remember when he banged his head on something

03:50dangling down and didn't know he was dead?

03:52Oh, yeah.

03:53He was still walking,

03:54then turned around and looked back

03:55and he was dead behind him.

03:57So his stomach got knocked out

04:00and kept walking down the street.

04:01Is this heaven?

04:03No.

04:04Is it H-E double hockey sticks?

04:08Hell? Hell? Hell?

04:09Hell? Hell? Hell?

04:11Bye, Coyote.

04:13You know, the consensus is that the brand of Pixar is,

04:17you know, whenever they come to you

04:18and say, we'd like you to do this,

04:19you would immediately say yes.

04:21I'm curious what your relationship was.

04:23Have you been trying to do a collaboration

04:24with them over the years?

04:25Is this something you were actively pursuing?

04:26I mean, in my mind, yeah.

04:28I was pursuing it with, like, Jedi mind tricks.

04:32But I was thrilled.

04:33You know, years ago, I was asked to revoice

04:36the American version of Ponyo,

04:37which I was thrilled enough to have been a part of that,

04:40which is another incredibly visually beautiful film.

04:44And I'm just a general Disney park nerd.

04:46So other than me just kind of telling anyone

04:49I met at the parks that I would be open to,

04:52working on any Disney project.

04:54Right.

04:55It wasn't something I was seeking out.

04:56However, it was something that I wanted.

05:00And I've wanted to voice in an animated feature.

05:04Oh, I've wanted to do that for so long.

05:06And this is my first.

05:07I loved it.

05:08I'd go in the studio.

05:11Of course, you know, well, I'm in the studio

05:14and everybody's on the West Coast

05:16and I'm on the East Coast,

05:17but we're talking to each other

05:19and we're seeing each other through a screen.

05:21And the lines are there and, you know,

05:23you read the line and because they're so expert, Peter,

05:27and, you know, they're so good at what they do,

05:31they hear things, subtle things.

05:33Okay.

05:34Like subtle intonations that give another clue,

05:37that give another feeling,

05:40that give another indication of what's happening.

05:43And I didn't find it tedious at all.

05:45I really enjoyed it.

05:47I'm curious, what aspect of the afterlife

05:49was the hardest visually for you guys to conjure

05:51or to settle on?

05:53Well, I mean, one of our board artists,

05:55Trevor Jimenez, boarded a lot of these kind of surreal scenes

05:59where he's falling through these weird spaces

06:02and they just seemed like that clicked pretty quickly.

06:05On the other hand, the great before,

06:08this area where we all get our personality,

06:10our sense of who we are,

06:11that took a couple of years really

06:16to be able to nail down.

06:17This isn't the great beyond.

06:19It's the great before.

06:21The great before?

06:23Because we wanted it to feel nonspecific culturally,

06:26because everybody in the world comes from this place.

06:29It should hopefully be visually obvious

06:31what's happening here,

06:32where we're being bestowed, you know,

06:34different kinds of, you know,

06:36adventurousness, resourcefulness,

06:38whatever kind of personality attributes we have.

06:41So that was very hard.

06:42I'm curious if you had a Dorothea yourself in your career,

06:45someone who you felt like you needed to impress

06:48to almost prove your talents to yourself.

06:50So we're down to middle school band teachers now.

06:54Oh, I always wanted to impress my dear aunt in my life

07:00because she would say,

07:02don't waste that education on theater.

07:05Don't do that.

07:06You know, so every time I got a job,

07:08it's like, I'm eating auntie, I'm eating, look, you know?

07:11So she was much like, you know,

07:12Jamie's mother, the mother character in there, the Libba,

07:15but she was supportive,

07:17but she wanted you to be practical.

07:19She wanted you to survive.

07:21But certainly for members of our community,

07:23I heard that speech,

07:25you gotta have something to fall back on.

07:28Oh no, no, no, no, no.

07:30Oh, that's not really a solid career.

07:32Well, that's very nice that you like to do that,

07:34but you know, you gotta face people don't really,

07:36it's a toss up, you know,

07:39but that's not why artists

07:42engage in the work that we engage in.

07:45We engage in the work because the work is in us to do.

07:49This morning, I was able to pause on something

07:52because I figured there'd be an Easter egg buried in it

07:54and it's all the, hello, my name is stickers.

07:57Oh yeah.

07:58I saw Joe Ramf's name in that.

07:59That was a very beautiful tribute.

08:01Joe was one of our great, great Head of Story collaborators,

08:06great actor, and we all learned a lot from him.

08:08I do feel like he's one of my mentors.

08:11All right.

08:15Sorry, I the zoned out a little back there.

08:18This movie visualized something

08:20that I've been able to experience

08:21a couple times playing music.

08:23The idea of The Zone.

08:26Have you experienced The Zone before in acting or comedy

08:29and how does it come about?

08:30What does it feel like for you?

08:32The Zone is amazing.

08:33Like, you know, acting, of course, Ray Charles

08:37doing stand-up, doing stand up in Oakland, California

08:40in 1991, comedy competition.

08:45I go up and it was a magical moment in Oakland, California.

08:48I will never forget Oakland for that,

08:51at the, I think the Paramount Theater.

08:53And it was just a moment, you know?

08:55Yeah, I mean, I think it's such a real thing.

08:57I think of it as a writer too, of being in the zone

08:59and you're like, oh, I'm finding some stuff

09:01that I didn't expect to find.

09:02And then you kind of lose sense of time.

09:05As an actor, as an improviser in comedy,

09:07I would say there's a moment where you're like,

09:09oh, I'm improvising with this person

09:12and we're kind of mind melding or whatever.

09:15I think it's a very real thing.

09:16I think so much of creativity is knowing

09:18that it's gonna come and go and then not panicking

09:20that you're not in the zone all the time

09:23and that you can work with other people

09:25to help keep you afloat when you're not in the zone.

09:28But yeah, I think it's a really real thing

09:30that they've tapped into there.

09:31Is that something you've experienced acting?

09:33Have you been able to find the zone acting?

09:35Oh yes, and that I guess is what,

09:39kept drawing me back, drawing me into it.

09:43Going into the zone, you just feel at one with it.

09:46You feel so peaceful and powerful and out of the way

09:52and in the center of it.

09:55It's the most glorious of feelings and it's rapturous.

10:00It happens, yes, it does.

10:01And it's magical when it happens

10:07and you can't describe it, you know?

10:11You can't quite put it into words,

10:15but it's a place of stillness.

10:18This weed.

10:19What is it?

10:19151,000 souls go into the great beyond every day

10:23and I count every single one of them.

10:26That counts off.

10:30Huh.

10:31Do when they love, they late.

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