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Actress creates role of Playmate cast out by Hef to showcase her comedic chops
By Angela Dawson
Entertainment News Wire
Published on Thursday, Sep 04, 2008
HOLLYWOOD: Can Anna Faris become the next Reese Witherspoon?
Tired of waiting for good scripts, Faris decided to develop her own movie projects (just as Witherspoon did with Legally Blonde 2 and Penelope). She met with Legally Blonde writers Kirsten Smith and Karen McCullah Lutz a few years ago to propose a concept she thought had potential: What happens to a Playboy Bunny when she gets too old to live at the Playboy Mansion?
Smith and Lutz liked the idea and set out developing a script as a starring vehicle for Faris. Adam Sandler's production company Happy Madison got on board, as did former Saturday Night Live writer-turned-film director Fred Wolf. The result is House Bunny, starring Faris as Playboy Bunny Shelley Darlingson, who suddenly finds herself out on her tail after hitting the ripe old age of 27. (A rival has duped her into thinking Hef wants her out.) The movie, which has been in theaters for two weekends, has earned about $30 million, finishing fourth over the Labor Day weekend.
With no marketable skills beyond knowing how to look good, Shelley lands a job as housemother to a college sorority populated by a group of misfits. The house is on the verge of being sold and the sorority shut down if the girls can't draw in some new pledges. Shelley gives the girls makeovers and they in turn teach her how to be herself.
Faris, who starred in the 2000 horror spoof Scary Movie and its three sequels, hopes House Bunny can be a successful female-driven comedy that will help establish her as a leading lady.
She co-stars with up-and-coming members of young Hollywood, including Colin Hanks (Untraceable), Emma Stone (Superbad) and Kat Dennings (Charlie Bartlett). Rumer Willis (the eldest of Bruce Willis and Demi Moore's offspring) makes her feature debut, as does American Idol runner-up Katharine McPhee.
Each of the girls plays a character with a shortcoming that makes her an outcast. Willis wears a body brace. McPhee is a hippie-dippy expectant mom. Stone wears Coke-bottle glasses. And Dennings has issues with men.
Faris admires her costars for their willingness to appear vulnerable on camera.
''All of them approached (their roles) with such enthusiasm,'' she gushes. ''All of them gave up their sense of vanity for the sake of the movie, whether it was Katharine being pregnant, Rumer with the brace or Emma wearing the weird glasses.''
Faris has played her share of offbeat, quirky characters since her breakthrough role as Cindy Campbell, the naive teenager, in Shawn and Marlon Wayans' Scary Movie.
''In my movie career, I've definitely given up a sense of vanity,'' she says. ''So it was kind of nice actually to play the pretty girl.''
At 31, Faris is the senior cast member among the girls. Not surprisingly, she adopted the role of den mother to her young co-stars, cajoling and coaxing them to comic performances.
''I think we naturally fell into the roles we played,'' she says.
Willis, who turned 20 on Aug. 16, says she learned a lot from Faris while making House Bunny. Acting was an exciting new gig, she says, though she has spent much of her life hanging around her parents' movie sets.
''It's very different to be an accessory than to actually go in
front of the cameras,'' she says. ''I was lucky. I got to work with Anna Faris.''
Willis says her A-list parents support her career choice. ''That's the only thing any parent can do for a kid,'' she says with a shrug.
Twenty-four-year-old McPhee, also making her big-screen debut, feels equally pleased with the outcome.
''I'm hearing from people that this is really a rare experience — you don't always love your co-stars,'' she says. ''But for me it was the perfect first experience.''
McPhee, who is working on her second album, was married to actor Nick Cokas in February but doesn't have any plans to start a family soon — not after wearing a prosthetic belly for her role in House Bunny.
''It was very uncomfortable in the dead of summer,'' she recalls, laughing. ''Before I actually got married, I was, like, 'I want to have kids right away.' Then I got married and totally changed (my mind). That has to do with wearing a pregnant pad for two months. So thank you, House Bunny.''
Stone, 19, says it was important she and her cast mates got along. ''This sorority can only really speak to each other,'' she says. ''These are seven girls who are so completely socially inept, they can't strike up a conversation with anyone. Of course, what Anna brought to the role is somebody they could relate to from the outside.''
Stone relishes the movie's empowering message to young women dealing with self-esteem issues. She reveals that she was a bit of an outsider growing up in Scottsdale, Ariz., but observes that everyone feels like an outsider at some point in their life.
''I sort of just always did my thing and it made me happy,'' she says. ''I made a lot of Web sites, but I didn't really think it was dorky or anything like that.''
Willis admits she was ''a dork.''
''I was a computer nerd,'' she confesses. ''I wasn't necessarily too active in getting in the social crowd, so I definitely understand not fitting in.''
Willis agrees with Stone's assessment of House Bunny's valuable message to young women.
''It's just about feeling confident and comfortable with where you fit and who you are,'' she says.
Faris says she still feels awkward as an adult, but she deals with it. Walking around in seven-inch high heels and skimpy outfits on the set of House Bunny made her feel a bit self-conscious, but she embraced it.
''I worked out, and I got some hair extensions and wore a lot of padded bras,'' she says, laughing. ''I loved the wardrobe. (Shelley's story is) more about finding her real family. She realizes she doesn't belong (to the Playboy family) anymore.''
Faris quickly adds that she is not judging Playboy models. She even appears in Playboy's September issue.
Indeed, the production got the blessing of Hefner, who has a cameo (along with some actual Playmates), and threw open the doors to his Playboy Mansion for the House Bunny production. ''He's been an incredible support system,'' says Faris. ''To see him act in a movie we conceived — it's awesome.''
HOLLYWOOD: Can Anna Faris become the next Reese Witherspoon?
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