Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. I conducted this interview with Ms. Janeane Garofalo immediately after my chat with Patton Oswalt (click here if you missed that one). In fact, there was a bit of time in-between the two since Garofalo was in a round table interview a room over. I saw Patton in the hall outside and chatted with him and the publicity folks until they finally looked around and said, “How long is she going to be?” So, Oswalt decided to crash the round table. I heard him enter and say something, “What the hell are you still doing in here!” Garofalo was ushered in by a friend of mine, Brandy. She’s a good poker player and also very pregnant. She’s also tiny, but next to Garofalo, Brandy looked like a giant. Garofalo is so tiny! After some pre-interview chit-chat concerning pregnant Brandy’s choice of high-heeled footware and her skills as a Texas Hold ‘Em player we started the interview properly. I dig the interview. Garofalo’s a no-nonsense lady. Sharp-tongued, no BS in her. She calls me out on a traditional (ie boring) question straight away and kind of sets the tone. Enjoy the interview and thanks to Kraken for the picture taking!
Quint: So, you guys were in Houston yesterday?
Janeane Garofalo: We were in Houston and then we got here in the afternoon… then we did Emo’s last night and that crowd, God bless them, stood in a hotbox for a couple of hours and never lost the enthusiasm. They were so nice to Patton [Oswalt] and I, they were drenched… shoulder to shoulder in a hotbox, they were packed like sardines.
Quint: I wasn’t there, but I saw Patton when he came through with the Comedians of Comedy tour, that was at Stubb’s I think. It wasn’t summer, but it was like March, but it was still right when the summer heat started, so it’s almost worse, because at that point you are almost used to the winter…
Janeane Garofalo: …you call it winter?
Quint: Well, winter for us is the 50’s maybe. So, was RATATOUILLE your…
Janeane Garofalo: No, it is not my first.
Quint: It’s not your first?
Janeane Garofalo: Uh uh, I did THE WILD, TITAN AE, KIKI’s DELIVERY SERVICE, FREAKSHOW… which was a series with David Cross and John Benjamin… and I do some books on tape.
Quint: That’s cool, but it was your first Pixar experience though right?
Janeane Garofalo: Yes! Is that what you were going to ask or were you just saying my first voiceover?
Quint: Well, it was all leading in to working with Brad Bird…
Janeane Garofalo: I had not… Can I borrow some paper?
Quint: Sure.
Janeane Garofalo: For my gum… Yes, I had not worked with the Brads (Brad Bird or Brad Lewis) before. I had seen THE INCREDIBLES… I had seen THE IRON GIANT. I didn’t see CARS and I didn’t have the reaction Patton did at being cast, because Patton is… knows everything about such things and I didn’t realize what it means to work with Brad Bird and Brad Lewis, until Patton told me that I should be freaking out way more.
Quint: Did the experience live up to that?
Janeane Garofalo: Yes it did. It’s very nice to work with them, they make it as enjoyable and laid back as possible to make something like that.
Quint: Patton was saying that the way Bird works is very hands on, like he was demonstrating where he’d push you and pull you at certain points…
Janeane Garofalo: Yes, I actually would chuckle sometimes by the lengths they both will go to show you… I mean, there’d be points where I’d go “I get it! I ABSOLUTELY understand…” You know, I’m thinking “they will act out the entire… they will keep going…” and even if it’s just for one scene of dialogue… they get pepped up. Their level of enthusiasm never wanes, doesn’t matter year after year and they will act out and do all of the dialogue, but with all of the emotion and I would go “No no no, I know…” but they’ll keep going unless you put your foot down. Yeah, they’re into it.
Quint: Well, I have to compliment you on the accent, because I’ve seen so many horrible French accents and I totally bought it. I didn’t even realize that it was you in the movie until the credits.
Janeane Garofalo: I take that as a great compliment, so far everyone is like “I was wondering if you were a rat or… I didn’t know if you were… I knew you were in it, but I didn’t know which character you were…” and I was nervous, because I thought “I don’t want a Keanu Reeves in DRACULA… Dick Van Dyke in MARY POPPINS moment here,” and hopefully I pulled it off. I don’t speak French, but I would see an international anchor who’s French and speaks English and then I had a CD of a French guy speaking English.
Quint: Well, it’s very natural and that’s the thing – it doesn’t feel like “I’m trying to do an accent,” it just feels like an accent. I’ve ended up in long conversations with dialect coaches on random film sets… that kind of stuff just fascinates me, because I can’t do it.
Janeane Garofalo: I don’t think I can either. I have no idea what it would be like to do a sustained (accent) in a live action format or if you were playing a person with an accent on a series week after week. I have no idea if I could do that.
Quint: But it worked in the end. It really did.
Janeane Garofalo: Thank you.
Quint: I saw the movie last week and I even mentioned in my review, I think Colette is one of the new animated crushes that kids are going to have.
Janeane Garofalo: [With an interested voice] Really?
Quint: I really do think so. Like, I had a crush on Ariel when I was growing up and I think that Colette very much falls into that realm.
Janeane Garofalo: I hope so. I’ll take it anyway I can get it… through an animated character that looks nothing like me? Fine. She’s a cutie…
Quint: It’s not just the way she looks though, what you bring to it is the personality and the kind of layers to her… It’s funny; because it is a cartoon, but it’s very realistic in that the character is very vulnerable underneath…
Janeane Garofalo: She has great hair.
Quint: Yeah?
Janeane Garofalo: Did you see that? The shine on that hair… the perfect haircut and she has the vespa or whatever… the motor scooter that she zips around Paris with… yeah and she’s willing to be intimate with a huge geek. Now, if that doesn’t earn her a lot of points, I don’t know what else I have to do. So. there’s that and she’s the only girl, so who else are you going to pick for your crush?
Quint: That’s true…
Janeane Garofalo: There was the grandma, who tried to shoot the rats and there were other patrons in the restaurant, who were female, but you never spoke to them… Right? You’re limited… you’re very limited there.
Quint: I’d love to talk about any specific memories you have of Brad Bird, like if there’s any point… I guess a specific moment that you were either stuck on or that he really got into you with…
Janeane Garofalo: Yeah, Brad Lewis is the balder one and Brad Bird is the director and I don’t say that disrespectfully, I just always refer to them as “The Brads,” and when I say “bald,” I mean that as the balding virile type, because he’s a hottie… I mostly worked with… which Brad? The bald one… the producer…
Quint: Brad Lewis, then. Brad Bird is the director.
Janeane Garofalo: Right right, so he’s blonde… the director’s blonde. Brad Lewis is the producer, right? The story by and producer. He I had more contact with and my fondest memory of his is when he removed my stitches from beneath my chin. Brad, the director, I don’t have a memory like that. He didn’t remove my stitches, but they both would always make sure there were chocolate chip cookies, because I think I mentioned once I liked… I’m a sucker for taking the chips out of the cookies, because I just like the taste of the chips with just some crumbs… Do you know what I mean?
Quint: Yeah.
Janeane Garofalo: So, I tend to like a large chocolate chunk cookie as opposed to a chip, so they would both make sure there were chocolate chunk cookies around, which I appreciated a great deal. I wish I had more stories…
Quint: What happened to your chin?
Janeane Garofalo: I cut underneath my chin and I just had a few stitches in it and I didn’t think it was that deep or anything, but I got stitches and then the doctor wanted me to come back to remove them and I was like “No way…” It seemed like that’s just another reason to pay maybe a hundred and eighty dollars and it was way up town, so I said “I feel like I could do this myself,” and then Brad (Lewis) zipped out and got scissors and gauze and antiseptic. He couldn’t get it all, though. I had to get the last piece. It was oddly erotic… Oddly, because he’s a cutie, but there’s something about when the stitches are getting pulled, if you’ve had stitches, that makes your stomach turn over… it made my stomach turn over and Brian Dennehy looked on, because he was waiting to do his session, so Brian Dennehy, if he even remembers – he was staring like “What are you guys doing?” So that was interesting and I think he was wondering why that was happening in the kitchen area of the studio, where he’s eating. So there’s that. I’m trying to think… it was so long, it was two and a half years ago… I mean, not “ago,” it’s over two and a half years, so it’s hard to remember specifics. It was always enjoyable. There was not a bad day and they’ve never been anything other than very easygoing and accommodating, even when I would be so frustrated I would start a… profanity at myself, not at them, but I felt that I couldn’t do it well and then if I was complimented, then it made it worse, because I thought I could only disappoint from there. So they started to go “that sucked… that was the worst read ever…” which, intuitively, I knew it meant the opposite, but I couldn’t function if they complimented me. I don’t know why. It just feels like once somebody gives you a compliment for something you’ve said, you can only do it worse than what they just enjoyed. So, they would just say “OK, do another take, just like that one, because that was shit,” and stuff like that, which I liked.
Quint: How set was the story and the character when you came onboard? Did you have much input on…
Janeane Garofalo: No, it was set.
Quint: Completely set?
Janeane Garofalo: Yeah, there was nothing as far as I know. No one ever asked me anything, so I’m assuming… I think they have to have it pretty set, because there are artists at work when you show up and I think that they had been at work, because they show you cells and barebones drawings before you even start, so…
Quint: So what’s new? You got anything else going on?
Janeane Garofalo: Well, I’m doing stand up… (Right now) I’m doing this tour with Patton, then I’m off the road for about four weeks and then I go back on with Mark Maron and I think David Cross. I’m hoping to do some more shows with Henry Rollins and Mark Maron, which I was doing. I am working on a project for Paramount Television with Barry Schindel and other than that I have no idea… who knows?
Quint: You’re in a movie called THE GUITAR, right?
Janeane Garofalo: Yeah, for about a minute and a half. My friend, Saffron Burrows, is in it and we were watching ROME one night and she goes, “Oh, can you come in tomorrow, because they had somebody playing the doctor who couldn’t do it?” Yep, so I just… yeah, you know Saffron Burrows, the British actress...
Quint: I know of her.
Janeane Garofalo: I met her long time ago in Ireland and just coincidently, she was staying right next door to me, just completely coincidental to me and I didn’t even know it until six weeks… she had been there six weeks… Neither of us knew the other was next door to each other and then we were watching ROME one night and she remembered she was supposed to ask me if I could come to work the next day and that’s it. I was only in for about 2 or 3 days and a lot of the stuff my character does isn’t essential anyways, so who knows what will make it past the cutting room, so that’s it. I always forget about it until people say that… that I’m in that.
Quint: Well you know, before I do any interview I’m on IMDB going “OK, so what do I need to know…”
Janeane Garofalo: No, I’m thrilled about it, because IMDB makes it seem like you’re far busier and working more than you are, but THE GUITAR, yeah… I wonder when that’s going to come out. Does it say?
Quint: I didn’t check the release, no.
Janeane Garofalo: It’s directed by Robert Redford’s daughter and I’m so sorry to say “Robert Redford’s daughter,” like she doesn’t have an identity, but I truly can’t remember her first name.
Quint: It’s Amy, I think.
Janeane Garofalo: Yes! I believe that it is and I don’t remember anyone’s name ever ever ever ever, just my mom’s. I can’t remember anyone’s name and I think it’s hereditary and I think it’s a genuine brain dysfunction.
At this point the tape recorder clicked off and I said that was about it. Garofalo said, “So, when the tape recorder turns off it’s over?” I had honestly reached the end of the interview, so it was a happy coincidence and it probably saved 3 or 4 minutes of rambling nonsense on my part. So, it was all good. I must say, Garofalo was adorable and engaging. Although, there was one picture I almost used just because it's so funny... she's totally making the John Ritter "eww" face from BAD SANTA... But I decided to use her pretty shots instead. Hope you guys liked the chat. I'm off to see a movie that sounds like Terry Dotter and the Board of Phoenix. -Quint quint@aintitcool.com
