By Alicia Malone
“Ryan has no idea, and he’s going to think that I’m really stupid if he ever hears this,” Emma Stone giggled to FilmInk back in 2001, when she was just 22. “I watched an interview that Ryan did at Cannes, where someone asked him how he chooses his characters, and he said that it’s like that feeling where he’s got to dance. There are songs that can play, and you don’t feel the need to dance, but then that one song comes on, and you’re like, ‘I’ve just got to dance.’ So to quote Ryan Gosling, whatever script makes me want to dance, I’ll do whatever it requires.”
Emma Stone was explaining why she wanted to join the cast of Crazy Stupid Love, a romantic comedy about soul mates and second chances. The story centres on forty-something Cal (Steve Carell), who, on the brink of divorce, gets a makeover and a new lease on life from young lothario, Jacob (Ryan Gosling). Jacob steps in to (begrudgingly) help this sad stranger when Cal’s moaning begins to ruin his time with the ladies at their local bar. One of the few girls to resist Jacob’s charms is Hannah (Emma Stone), a law student stuck in a boring relationship.
It was the smart script which first made Stone and Gosling’s toes tap, but the major draw to the dance floor was the chance to work with Steve Carell, not just as a co-star, but also as producer. “I thought that producing was the next logical step for me, and it was fun,” explained Carell. “This is our first movie for the production company [Carell’s Carousel Productions], and I liked having a hand in hiring directors and great, great actors. When I met with Ryan, I just felt lucky that he would be intrigued enough to want to jump in on this. It was rewarding in that context.”
On the surface, Ryan Gosling obviously appears ready-made for romantic leads, but this actor has never been one to rest on his looks. Prior to the bubbly Crazy Stupid Love, his interesting choices included commercial hits such as The Notebook, and independents like Nicholas Winding Refn’s cult fave, Drive. Back in 2011, the actor was very humble about his career trajectory. “I have more opportunities now than I used to, and maybe a little more control over the final product or who is involved,” Gosling told FilmInk. “But, I’m not trying to specifically tackle all genres!”
Gosling first met Steve Carell years ago when they worked on a pilot for a TV show called The Unbelievables. “We had no scenes together, but Steve was so funny that one time the boom guy dropped the boom to laugh during a take,” Gosling smiled at the memory. “I was on set just to watch Steve. He and Tim Curry were doing a scene where they were villains and they’re trying to get Superman to do a book signing, so they can finally get him. Steve started improvising, and he was like, ‘Well, we should get a shark tank, and we’ll open the door when he signs the books and Superman will fall into the shark tank.’ Tim Curry was like, ‘We can’t afford a shark.’ Steve said, ‘Okay. What about a halibut? They’re weird…they have two eyes on one side of their head. That will really creep him out.’ Everybody started laughing, and then Steve was like, ‘Oh, well, I don’t think that’s going to work…what if we just put soap in the smoothies? That would be awful, like there’s soap in his smoothie.’ Steve was just so funny.”
During this freewheeling press chat, Steve Carell shook his head and looked at Gosling in amazement. “I can’t believe that you remembered that,” he laughed.
Of course, Carell is a master of improvisation, and some of the funniest moments in Crazy Stupid Love were adlibbed, including many scenes that he shares with Gosling. “Ryan is a great improviser,” Carell explained. “He improvises within character and on story, on point. In a lot of movies, people just improvise to try to say something that they hope will be in the film. It’s different when someone can improvise from their character’s point of view, and within a scene. That’s so much fun. My battle was to not laugh because he was always surprising.”
Gosling looked over at Carell. “You taught me about ‘set-funny,’” he said. “When you do things that are funny on set, but they’re not really funny in the context of the movie. You told me that it’s easy to fall into this trap of being ‘set-funny.’ That was really good advice.”
Carell said that the improvised moments he loves are between Gosling and Emma Stone. “Those are my favourite scenes in the movie, because they are so natural and organic, and between two people who are clearly connected,” the actor says generously. “Even with the stuff that was scripted, they were so seamless.”
The two young stars (who, of course, would go on to star in La La Land) clicked at Stone’s audition, with Gosling championing her casting, even though she acted the scene mute. “I had no voice at the audition!” Stone remembered. “I’d gone to the Academy Awards the night before, and I was invited to an after party at Madonna’s house. So I was like, ‘Wow! Yes!’ Then I woke up with no voice. I didn’t get too crazy though, I swear! I have nodules, so I lost my voice in two seconds, and just couldn’t speak. I went into the audition, and I was like, ‘I have no voice.’ They said, ‘That’s all right.’ So Ryan and I were trying to talk, and we made each other laugh. And that was that.”
2022 was a big year for Emma Stone. As well as Crazy Stupid Love, she led an impressive cast in The Help, and was gearing up for Sony’s The Amazing Spider-Man. “It’s been an incredibly exciting and mind-boggling time. I’m in a pretty happy place. It’s really exciting, but it’s just the moment right now. Time will pass, and things will go, so I’m just trying to appreciate the present and live in the moment. If I don’t, I’ll regret it later on. My parents have always helped me keep things in perspective and understand that everything in life – the good and the bad – will go. The good will pass, but the bad is going to pass too. Impermanence is kind of a nice thing.”
Joining Gosling, Carell and Stone in the cast of Crazy Stupid Love is an impressive list of names, including Julianne Moore, Marisa Tomei and Kevin Bacon. Carell explained that the script attracted the cast, as well as his choice of directors. “When John Requa and Glenn Ficarra came on board, they set a tone as to what the movie was going to be and what we wanted to achieve with it. I liked the fact that they were able to multitask. For example, after a take, one of the directors might have given the actors notes, while the other might have given the camera or lighting crew notes. It was nice to have two sets of eyes on everything, and two interpretations that were both coming from the same perspective. It broadened my horizons as an actor.”
Stone described the directing pair as “soul mates in a non-romantic way. They met in college, and look at what they’ve created. [Their 2009 directorial debut] I Love You Phillip Morris is one of the greatest comedies ever, and Bad Santa [which they scripted] is unreal. They’re a really great team.”
“It’s less stressful too,” added Gosling. “That’s what we needed in order to feel that we could put ourselves out there. In these bar scenes, it’s supposed to be night, and we’re supposed to be drunk, but it’s 8:00am, there’s no music, we’re yelling, pretending like there’s music, and everyone expects us to be funny. It was pretty scary sometimes.”
Another frightening prospect for Gosling was the pressure of a certain shirtless scene. “I re-read the script, and there’s a line where Emma’s character says to me, ‘You look Photoshopped.’ I was like, ‘Wait a second…oh, no!’ I trained with the same guy who worked with Chris Hemsworth for Thor. I thought that I was doing well until he showed me a picture of Chris, and I was the size of his arm. I was in this competition in my head with Chris. But as you build muscles, you start to realise how ridiculous they are. They’re just kind of goofy. You get them from doing a lot of one thing, lifting a heavy thing in a certain way. You don’t really feel stronger. You just develop these bumps on your body.”
So what is the craziest or stupidest thing that Steve or Ryan have done for love? “I dressed up like the Easter Bunny and hopped out in front of my girlfriend’s apartment with a basket of eggs,” Carell revealed.
“Hey, I can’t top that,” Gosling laughs.
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