1999

Election: an interview with Matthew Broderick

By Prairie Miller, All-Movie Guide

Looking pretty exhausted from his current stage performance in Night Must Fall, Matthew Broderick took some time off to meet up and talk about his new movie, the dark but hysterical Election. Broderick, who has made a smooth transition from his student days as Ferris Bueller to a burnt out teacher in Election, recalled getting an unwelcome lesson or two in the movie from a cheerfully devious coed, played enthusiastically by Reese Witherspoon.

What's your character all about in Election?
I'm a teacher in a school in Omaha, and as the film begins he's pretty happy with his life, or at least he thinks he is. And then everything falls apart. As the movie progresses, he comes up against Reese Witherspoon's character and gets destroyed by her. But then he comes back at the end.

Do you personally have anything in common with him?
Everybody does. I think he's a very human being. He has a lapse in judgement half way through the film, which everybody can relate to. I don't know what I have in common with him. He's complicated, which people are. I'm not sure how to sum him up.

Why did you get a little chubby for the movie?
Alexander told me the character should have gone to seed a little bit. So basically, I just ate normally. I didn't cut my hair. I wore almost no makeup, and they added gray, actually. I didn't want to look like an actor, I wanted to look like a mid-thirties teacher from Omaha.

By the way, what was Omaha like?
It was very good. It's like the center of America. I've shot in a lot of places throughout the country, but they seem to be getting more alike. There's the same Arby's and Starbucks, whatever, and the same malls and highways. At first they all seem the same, but Omaha's an old town and really does have it's own character.

The people were very nice to us. Alexander Payne, the director, is from there so he showed me around. His parents are there, and he showed me some Greek restaurants. It was interesting to see his hometown.

What got you excited about Election?
I think I got the script and my agent said it was really good. So then I rented Citizen Ruth just to see Alexander's work, and I loved it. Very shortly after that I met Laura Dern, whom I didn't know before that. I thought she was spectacular in it and I told her so. She said, 'he's really a brilliant director.' Then I read the script and had lunch with Alexander, and desperately wanted to do the movie.

After Ferris Bueller, how did it feel being on the other side of the desk? You've made all these exceptional movies like Glory and Brighton Beach Memoirs, but everyone so closely identifies you with Ferris Bueller.
It was fun. It was interesting to look at school from a teacher's point of view, because so many movies look at it from the student's perspective. This movie is really from both. There's voiceovers from Reese and from me, and you kind of get a very balanced view of what's going on in that school. That was a neat little gimmick that was interesting. It's ironic because I went to a small school in Manhattan, Walden. And both Ferris Bueller and this are very large schools in suburban settings, so it was very unfamiliar to me.

Do you feel like a seasoned vet since you went from one extreme to the other as Ferris and now Jim?
Well, I'm sure it sounds like it. But I never thought of this as being related to that. They are both great parts but they couldn't be more different. Ferris gets away with everything, he's a very carefree person. Jim stresses and frets. One wrong thing he does, he gets caught immediately and really pays a price for it, so it's really different. I played a colonel in the Civil War, and I played a student. They are all to me unique.

You go back and forth from stage to screen. Some actors get lazy, because theater is so physically demanding. How do you re-energize yourself?
It is and it isn't to me. I find with movies that you have to spend so much time waiting around. It's very demanding, because you have to be ready for this little window of time where you'll be performing. You're literally lying around in this camper for hours, or throwing a ball around, ping pong, anything to keep from killing yourself. All these different diversions.

In the theater that doesn't happen. You get there at 7:30, and you're going to be leaving at 10:30. It's high energy, but it's concentrated. Although you have to do the same thing over and over again, and somehow keep it from going stale.You have to really take it seriously all the time, and think about it.

Was it crazy trying to shoot the movie during school hours?
Yeah, sometimes. We mostly didn't. We shot on weekends a lot. Sometimes we'd have to stop between periods when everyone went shouting down the halls! Then they'd get very quiet when they were in class, so we'd have this little window to shoot. There's that little strip of glass on the doors, and you'd see all these people staring out, vaguely terrifying looking teenagers! But they were nice to us. I guess sometimes they got frustrated about having their school invaded. But it was a good experience, I think the students were glad to have us there.

Will there be a Godzilla sequel?
There's no really talk that I've heard. If there is, I'm signed.

Does that mean you have to do it?
No, you don't have to do anything. What they basically means is that you've already agreed on what you'll get paid, in the ballpark. That said, I'd love to work with those people again, it was a total pleasure.

Was it a disappointment to you that Godzilla didn't get raves?
Yeah, I guess so. I don't know what people were expecting. After all it was a monster movie. But I think it's very entertaining. I liked the movie. I don't like to spend too much time worrying about what other people think of a movie, because I could spend my life doing that, and I don't want to.

What's your favorite movie starring Matthew Broderick?
It would be hard picking a favorite, because there's a bunch that I've done that I like. I like The Freshman, Ferris Bueller, Glory...

What was Marlon Brando like on the set of The Freshman?
I think it was a really luck chance in my career, because not many people get to work with Brando. He's a legend and he doesn't work that much anymore. It was great to meet him. He's a fascinating person, and obviously a great actor. So it was a huge treat to watch him work.

Was your father a big influence on your decision to go into acting?
Yeah. He never told me I should go into acting, but I grew up around theaters and watching him. That's how I got to know what the job was, so he was a huge influence. I guess I basically took over my dad's shop.

In Election, your character never seemed to be too happy even when his marriage wasn't on the rocks. By the end of the movie do you think he's made peace with himself?
Yes, at least for now. In some ways he thinks he's happy, but he's not. He likes his job, the students, but right beneath the surface he doesn't really like what he's doing. I think he's tired of teaching, so in some ways that's why he self-destructs. Often instead of saying I want to do something else, you screw up what you're doing to get something else. In relationships too, you don't want to be with someone, so you do something wrong. It's a way of making a change, and that's what happens to him. I really don't know if he'll be happy in a few more years in that department.

Tell me about your other big movie coming up, Inspector Gadget.
The movie is based on a cartoon. It begins with me as a security guard. A robbery happens, and Rupert Everett's character later becomes Claw. I chase him in my Pinto, some little car, and I chase his limousine. We have a wreck and then he throws his cigar and blows me up. In the accident, I have a bowling ball in the back seat of my car, which goes flying and crushes his hand.

So he gets fitted with a claw, and I get totally rebuilt with these arms that reach out. My head can pop off. I can fire rockets out of my toes and shoot flames out of my sleeves. I can make oil slicks, pretty much anything. I have springs on my feet, roller blades, a helicopter that pops out of my head. And somehow it all fits! I don't know what kind of movie you'd say it is, maybe an action movie.

Did you watch the old cartoon?
As much as I could! There are two brains. There's every character from the cartoon. Rupert designs another Gadget to look like me, but he's evil, pure robot. So I get to play him.

Was it hazardous or did you really have to use your imagination?
Some of it was afterwards, but most of it, about 90 percent was real, mechanical effects. Stan Winston designed all the gadgetry. I had to make impressions of my hands, ten different hand positions. I spent two weeks just having molds taken. My body was visually scanned. My face and then my body.

I used to get there very early to have an ear or something glued on. And a lot of fake hands, but there would be someone controlling the hands with a stick. It was nice, it wasn't digital because it's happening at the time, not later. So you got to act. There would be several people poking. I'd have a phone in my hand and an antenna would pop out, so a guy would have to move the phone. So it was like magic tricks.

How is your wife [Sarah Jessica Parker] doing?
Very well. She just starting shooting her HBO series "Sex in the City" again. This is her second week.

Reese's character in Election steps over people in the movie. Did that remind you of Hollywood?
[Mock surprise!] What, that people step over people?! Oh yeah, but not just Hollywood. I think that's the world every day. There's millions of people in very powerful positions that got there by unscrupulous means.

Has marriage changed you at all? Like are you less hungry professionally?
I don't think so. No, I still work hard and want to keep doing better. But it's nice, it kinda gives you a little safety when you get home. I never thought work was the most important thing anyway. I've always been very involved with my family, and now my wife. Before that we lived together. My personal life has always been important. I never just thought of myself as a beast who works.

You always have your own personality no matter how many Tonys you've won. I won two. You can always whine, but I guess over the years I'm a little more confident. It's funny, when you start out you're confident because you don't know better. Then you start to worry. Now I'm fairly confident telling directors what I want to do.

How about directing for you?
Sure. A couple of years ago I directed a movie called Infinity. And I would like to do it again. I've been trying to develop something, but I haven't found anything yet. In the last couple of years I haven't taken the time. I've just been doing a lot of movies. I've worked almost nonstop for I don't know how many years. I did How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying for over a year. I did Cable Guy right in the middle of that. And right after that I did Addicted to Love and Godzilla, then Inspector Gadget and the play. That's three years right there.

So where would you say you are right now?
I don't know where my life is going. I guess I am driven.

You probably hadn't had any time to sit there and think. Do you get restless between projects?
Yes, yes I do. I'm a little uneasy that I don't have anything after July, but I try to fight that. There's no reason to be working every second. There have been some breaks in between. What's nice is when you have a job that starts several months after the one you have. Then you have this block of time to do what you want. It's almost like having permission! But sometimes if there's nothing coming up, you start worrying that you'll never work again. I heard Henry Fonda said that once.

Who are you more like, Ferris or Jim? You know, the one who can't get away with anything, or the one who gets away with everything?
I guess I'm more like Ferris. I've had more days like that, I've been lucky. But probably both, it all depends on the day. Yeah, but I think I have moments of both.

How do you keep your performance fresh night after night when you're on stage?
There's no easy way. You try to find something that's interesting and fresh, and then try to keep getting better at it. You always find new things from the other actors. And musicals in some ways take care of themselves, because they are driven by the score. It's like a moving train, there's literally a beat to it so you have to an energy.