Well, this movie I've been working on for a while. I had the idea for the movie like twenty years ago when I was doing 'Empire of the Sun' in 1987 because at that time that's when all these Vietnam movies were being made and my friends and I were going on auditions for these Vietnam movies and my friends were getting them and going away to fake boot camps.
Ben StillerIt was a mixed blessing to have famous parents. It was tough to go to auditions and be bad, since I couldn't be anonymous.
Ben StillerI don't think know if anything's going to translate anywhere. You're making a movie, you hope it's going to be funny, you can't think about how it's going to go over.
Ben StillerI don't think it's ever easy to be funny. I find it easy to amuse myself with a certain sort of cynical dark humor that tends toward the meaner side, like my character in Happy Gilmore. Those kinds of characters come easily to me.
Ben StillerI studied Tom Cruise running in all the Mission Impossibles. I think he's one of the best screen runners.
Ben StillerI was staying on [writer/director/actor] Eric Schaeffer's couch in New York, and he said, "I've got this movie [If Lucy Fell]. Can you do five days on it?" And I was like, "Yeah, anything. Twenty-four hours times five is 120 hours. Oh, great, I'll fill 120 hours of my life with something." So I did that and it was fun, and then I did Flirting with Disaster.
Ben Stiller