Hey everyone. Capone in Chicago here. I know that Mr. Beaks ran a couple of really great SEX DRIVE interview combos over the last week or so, but I'll admit that when I saw the film for the first and second time, the actor whose talents I was most impressed by was Clark Duke. Duke is probably best known for his role as Dale on the TV series "Greek," as well as his phenomenal online series with Michael Sera called "Clark and Michael." He will also co-star in the big-screen adaptation of KICK-ASS, directed by Matthew Vaughn. The guy is unbelievably great in SEX DRIVE, delivering a performance that is part Hugh Hefner (complete with smoking jacket at one point) and part Flounder from ANIMAL HOUSE.
Duke and I met at Angels and Kings one afternoon. The club is owned by Pete Wentz of Fall Out Boy (the band cameo in the film), but since it was the middle of the day, the lights were up, the music was off, and the place was empty. It was actually the ideal situation for a casual conversation. SEX DRIVE is a small but funny film that gives us a showcase for a whole lot of talented newcomers in the leads, as well as a few familiar faces in the supporting cast (James Marsden and Seth Green). Enjoy Clark Duke. He's a great guy with the potential to do a whole lot more in the future.
Capone: Watching SEX DRIVE reminded me of the first time I saw AMERICAN PIE--a bunch of actors that I don't know very well or at all in the leads, plus a couple of better-known people in the supporting roles. I’ve seen the movie twice now, and I totally dig it. In this day and age, that sort of thing is kind of rare, because R-rated comedies typically feature known entities, known writers and directors. How do you become a part of something that has been built almost from nothing. And most people who actually see it, love it.
Clark Duke: That’s the thing. I just hope people see it. I think people see the title and the genre and everything, and kind of have certain expectations about what it’s going to be. And, everybody seems really pleasantly surprised that sees it.
Capone: Yeah. Tell me about the director and the writers.
CD: Sean Anders and John Morris cowrote it, and then Morris produced it, Anders directed it. They’ve written a couple of other scripts. They did this independent thing that they just shot themselves, living in Phoenix a few years ago, called NEVER BEEN THAWED. I don’t know if you’ve seen that, but I think you can get it on DVD somewhere. They gave me a copy, and it’s really awesome. And, Anders, the director, is the star of that one, too. He wrote it with John, and Anders directed it and has the lead in it, and his timing is really killer; he could be an actor. And, they did that and got enough attention from that that they got an agent/manager and started working and writing scripts.
They wrote this movie called SHE’S OUT OF MY LEAGUE, which DreamWorks just finished shooting. That’ll be coming out. And, they kicked around, I think, a few scripts, like a MEATBALLS remake and a couple other things. But, this is the first thing they got to direct. I was really impressed when I saw the first cut of it, because it doesn’t look like somebody’s first movie to me. It looks pretty assured, you know?
Capone: Should we be expecting, like, a ton of outtakes on the DVD?
CD: Yeah, they’ve already got an unrated cut. They shot porn stars against the green screen for the unrated cut, so there will just be random naked people in scenes. They’re going in such a weird direction with the Unrated, and they shot this disclaimer at the beginning saying, like, “Don’t watch this version. It’s terrible. Watch the real movie, but we have to sell you this unrated DVD, so here’s the shitty version of the movie with more tits.” And, the intro is really funny, that they shot. There are just bizarre cuts, like when I’m running through the cornfield, there’s a close-up of my face, and it cuts down to a close-up of this big cock, and it cuts back to my face, and then it goes back to the black guy’s cock. They’re going all out. [laughs]
Capone: Is any part of that cornfield sequence really you, the nude scene stuff? Is that really you?
CD: Nothing when it’s my ass is me.
Capone: It’s not, okay.
CD: I can tell. That guy’s in much better shape than me, like, all of a sudden, I’m in amazing shape when I turn around.
Capone: I think that scene fools people.
CD: It looks pretty good. I mean, everything from the front is me, but I didn’t want to do any actual nudity. They pulled this sock out that you put over your dick, and I was like, There’s no way. You guys are not paying me enough to walk around with my dick in a sock. [laughs]
Capone: Some people do it for free and play concerts like that.
CD: Yeah. I was glad they had a stunt guy. That guy had the worst job in the film, I swear.
Capone: Did you use him more than once?
CD: He did other stuff, too. He was a stunt guy, so when somebody jumps off the roof at the party scene, that’s him. That’s my ass-double. He did some other stuff, too. He did quite a few stunts, I think. So, he was constantly having to do the worst shit.
Capone: Yeah, well, ass-double--I don’t know if you put that on your resumé. So, did your writers and director ever explain their fascination with the Amish?
CD: I think they saw that movie DEVIL’S PLAYGROUND.
Capone: I was going to ask you if that had been a part of it, because I certainly did.
CD: I haven’t seen it yet, but they had seen that and were just really taken aback by ‘rumspringa’. Like I said, I haven’t seen it yet, but they said in the movie, it’s really a lot wilder than even in SEX DRIVE. They said the kids start shooting heroin and becoming lunatics.
Capone: It’s a dark movie. A certain number of people don’t come back from that. There is no time limit for these kids on the break they take from the Amish lifestyle. But, in a short time, they just go so crazy, they become instant alcoholics and junkies. Yeah, it’s a dark movie. You should check it out.
CD: I will. I’ll watch it eventually. But, no, that was their inspiration for it. Anders saw DEVIL’S PLAYGROUND and was just really enthralled by it.
Capone: There are very few people I’ve met who have not seen that movie, shockingly enough. It was, like, a weird little cult thing.
CD: I never heard of it until we did this.
Capone: It’s less than 10 years old. Yeah, it’s a mess, but anyone who is just starting to get into documentaries will ask me, “Have you seen DEVIL’S PLAYGROUND?” And really there is nothing more American than a road movie.
CD: Or a sex comedy.
Capone: That’s true. What kind of wiggle room did the actors have to improvize?
CD: Yeah, there was quite a bit. A lot of my stuff is riffs on…I mean, the script is extremely funny, and what you do a lot of the time is just tweaks, just kind of making it your own. But, they were great. They left so much of my stuff in, and Jimmy’s [Marsden] stuff, and Seth’s [Green] stuff. And, it just made it a lot more fun for me to shoot, you know, ’cause you feel like you’re part of the whole process, and they’re appreciating what you’re doing. Everybody was trying to come up with what the funniest line was. There’s was never anything like ego involved with it.
Capone: Working with Seth must have been inspiriing, because that guy is a master of that sort of thing.
CD: Yeah, I love Seth, man. We’ve been friends for a while, so it was great to shoot something.
Capone: It took me until the second time to realize that the line he has early on about how he misses about sarcasm in the outside world is the basis for most of what he does in the rest of the movie. It is damn funny.
CD: The scene where he Josh [Zuckerman] are just going back and forth always cracks me up, like, “That’d be cool.” “Yeah, it would be cool. I'm probably be the coolest guy you know.”
Capone: And the exchange between Seth and Marsden at the end is pricelesss?
CD: Yeah, my favorite line of Marsden’s is “Don’t lean on it.” I think Marsden’s about the funniest thing in the movie.
Capone: He seems for a lot of years to have been working against his good looks, like, trying to not fall back on that. He’s done, like, in HAIRSPRAY and in this, he’s really funny. He’s really got some great timing.
CD: Exactly! He's funny man. He’s a huge talent, I mean, he sings and dances. I say he’s the new Patrick Swayze.
Capone: Wow, I wonder what Patrick Swayze thinks about that. He’s in town, Swayze. They’re shooting a TV show.
CD: Wow! So, is he okay?
Capone: Yeah.
CD: You read about when he was sick, but they never say when he’s better. You never know.
Capone: Almost immediately, he said, like, ‘Look, it’s not that big a deal.’
CD: They reported that he had two weeks to live.
Capone: Yeah, I know. He immediately came out and said that was nonsense. But, he’s in town shooting a series now. I’ve seen him around town.
A lot of people know you from the shorts ["Clark and Michael"] with Michael [Cera]. To me, watching it, it looked like a great opportunity for the two of you to show everybody what you could do. I don’t know if you made any money off it, but it was like a great audition reel.
CD: Yeah, exactly. That is my reel. And no, we didn't make any money from it. It’s my writing, acting, and directing reel right out of the gate. It was the only thing I had done. And, it really worked out nicely, because, like you said, it kind of played up our strengths. It showed, like, our tone. It showed what we thought was funny. I’ve always been really surprised it has the cool following it has.
Capone: How old is it now?
CD: It came out last summer. But, it’s so dry…There was part of me that thought it would only be funny to me and Mike. Or just funny in LA, like in the industry. People in the industry do seem to really dig it.
Capone: Right. Well, it all of those auditions.
CD: Auditioning is the most brutal process in the world. That scene in the last episode when Mike does the audition, that’s probably one of the more realistic audition things I ever seen in anything. We just wanted to make it, like, that’s really how ugly and stupid and dry and horrible it is. Not all of them, not all of them! But when you have no name or presence, and you’re going on auditions with, like, 20 other guys in the room. That’s what it’s like. It’s that uncomfortable.
Capone: And, dignity goes right out the window.
CD: Oh, totally. Exactly.
Capone: I’ve never had any aspirations to be an actor, but I think if it ever crossed my mind, it was the audition process that prevented me from going in that direction.
CD: It's rough, man. You’ve got to really be able to take some rejection.
Capone: It’s funny, when I watch something like the “Freaks and Geeks” DVDs, they have the auditions for all the actors, and I’ve thought, ‘I could never do that’.
CD: Yeah, you got to really put yourself out there. It can be hard. I don’t know, it’s my least favorite aspect of the whole thing.
Capone: With the shorts on line, whose idea was that, and how did those come about?
CD: It was just me and Mike.
Capone: How long have you know each other?
CD: I met him when I was in college, so a few years now. Yeah, we just happened to live next door to each other at this apartment complex, and we started hanging out, because we were the only young people in the whole building. And we kept talking about writing something, but what do you write about? And finally, I was, like, well this is the show, like, these two guys trying to figure out what to write. They’re just complete morons. This is the show.
So, we just wrote them with no real purpose or intent. Some we wrote together, and some we wrote independently; we’d e-mail each other scenes or IM from where we were at, we were sending each other scenes. It was just very organic. It kind of happened. Over the course of a few months, we wrote 13 of them. And, it was weird, because when we finished it, it sort of felt like it had an arc to me, which happened kind of accidentally. But, it did.
Yeah, and then I went to film school out in LA. And, for my thesis film, I was, like, we should just shoot the pilot. So, I directed that and shot that as my thesis, and I got a really huge response, immediately at the school, people really dug it. And, we had a mutual friend, me and Mike, who worked at CBS. And, we had a couple of meetings over there, and just kind of immediately went into production, as soon as I graduated, more or less.
Capone: Right. So, was there ever a discussion about actually putting it on the air?
CD: I don’t know. We wrote it for "Adult Swim," to be honest. And, Mike sent it to somebody over there, and I think they, I don’t know, just passed. They said they weren’t doing live action at the time. But, then, at Comic-Con a couple of years ago, Keith Crawford, the head of "Adult Swim," came up to me, and he was, like, "Hey, man, so sorry we missed the show. We would really like to have got it." I’m, like, "Well, we sent it to you." And, he’s, like, "I never saw it." So, I don’t know. It got lost in the mail somewhere.
Capone: I think one of our Mr. Beaks talked to you at Comic-Con this year.
CD: Oh yeah, yeah, I talked to him for a while.
Capone: Yeah, it was kind of like a spontaneous moment.
CD: Yeah, it was weird. I don’t think it was scheduled or anything.
Capone: I don’t even think he had seen the movie yet.
CD: I don’t think he had. My publicist just kind of grabbed me, “Hey, come talk to…”
Capone: I remember, because there was a screening of the film.
CD: There were a couple at Comic-Con, yeah.
Capone: There was one day, in the Gaslamp theater downtown, there were four movies in one day. There was, like, HAMLET 2, THE ROCKER, I think DEATH RACE, and yours.
CD: Hopefully, our movie was way better than those movies.
Capone: At the time, I had never even heard of the movie. 'What is SEX DRIVE?' And, people I knew who saw it said it was really funny. I wish someone had told me. I would have gone!
CD: Yeah, I just hope awareness is there, that’s the main thing. It’s just, like, we have no control over the marketing, and it just seems like the only answer to that stuff is just throwing more money at it. It just really amounts to how many commercials they buy. I mean, word of mouth helps, and good reviews help, and you guys…
Capone: I think the Red Band trailer helped a lot.
CD: Yeah, but if you look at the hits on YouTube, it’s not a huge amount of people. It’s not in the millions, or anything, you know. So, that’s the only thing that’s frustrating to an extent. It’s just that you have no control over it.
Capone: Can you describe your 'look,' and your look in the film versus your everyday guise, because they don’t seem that different.
CD: [laughs] No, it was me and the wardrobe lady trying to come up with something interesting.
Capone: The tie is very '80s.
CD: I've always tended to be a little dressy. It’s just, like, a personal preference thing, and I thought it would be funny for the character. My only thought process on the character was that he was really into that book “The Game.”. And, I felt like he would be peacocking, he would have an ascot on. He would always be, like, a little weirdly overdressed, especially for a guy his age in the suburbs of Chicago. He should just be kind of dandy. And, [director Sean] Anders is, like, ‘Okay’. I don’t think he originally saw it that way, but he was, like, ‘Yeah, well, if you guys like it, sure.’
Capone: The scene at your party when you come out with almost, like, a Hefner-like smoking jacket…
CD: That was a little cartoony, but I think it worked.
Capone: It was your party, and you looked like you dress like the host.
CD: Seth took me to the Playboy mansion to a party, and I wore a smoking jacket like that. So, it all came full circle.
Capone: What was that like?
CD: Bizarre. Really fun, though. I met the guys from “Mad Men” there. They were all there, hanging out. It was really fun, actually. It’s not nearly as seedy as…
Capone:…you’d hope?
CD: Just as you’d expect. You picture, just like in the 70s, the orgies. But, it’s really not. It’s just like any other party, but at the coolest house in the world.
Capone: I also remember the scene where you guys first get to the Amish community, and suddenly, even though you’ve lost all your clothes, you’ve got a jacket on again within minutes.
CD: Well, I think, the only thing I lost was that one outfit, because I guess the logic is that he packed a lot of clothes.
Capone: But, it’s just funny that he packed more than one jacket.
CD: Well, I brought a lot of clothes on this trip, too. I tried to get them to get some bizarre, vintage Louis Vuitton or Gucci luggage; I saw my character as having this really incredible luggage, I feel like he’d just load a huge trunk into the back of the car. But, no one would approve anything, like, no one would be in the film.
Capone: You mean none of the designers would approve their logo in the film?
CD: Yeah, no one would clear anything. We couldn’t clear MySpace. It was like, really? And now we did all this press for MySpace, and they want us to be funny. And, it was kind of weird being on MySpace, since you guys refused to be in the movie.
But, it was weird going to the Eddie Murphy movie. We have, like, Coke in scenes…I’m, like, “Wow, you guys have Coke? That’s crazy!” We couldn’t clear anything on SEX DRIVE.
Capone: You just did something with Eddie, right? What is that?
CD: Yeah, yeah, it’s called A THOUSAND WORDS.
Capone: Is it another young person’s movie?
CD: No…well, I mean, it’s just a comedy. It’s for everybody.
Capone: So, it’s not like a kid’s movie, okay.
CD: No, not at all. It was pretty amazing to work on.
Capone: Who else is in it with you?
CD: All my scenes are just with Eddie.
Capone: Wow. So, what’s the basic story.
CD: Eddie is this, like, kind of loud-mouth, asshole literary agent, and he gets this curse put on him by a New Age guru that he has only 1,000 words left to say before he dies. So, all of a sudden, he can’t talk. So, he really can’t talk most of the movie. And, I play his assistant, so I end up having to interpret a lot of it and talk for him. And, I’m just so meek and scared, I’m just scared to death of him, he’s always, like, slapping me…
Capone: So, it’s about abuse is what you’re saying, like SWIMMING WITH SHARKS.
CD: Well, that’s what I was thinking, like, for the character. It’s kind of like SWIMMING WITH SHARKS. I just played him like he was constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop and Eddie to scream at him.
And, I was so nervous the first couple of days that it just came out on screen when we filmed it; I was just almost shaking all the time, you know, because it’s Eddie Murphy. And that ended up totally working for the character, so I just went with it.
Capone: How much of an influence was Eddie? I was going to ask you about your comedy influences. Was Eddie a part of that?
CD: Yeah, definitely. I love the BEVERLY HILLS COP movies and 48 HOURS and the stuff where he was, like, this action guy, too, but still so fuckin’ funny. I mean, he kind of like reinvented being vulgar in film like cursing in film. I hope in BEVERLY HILLS COP 4 that they say they’re making, he won’t shy away from an R rating.
Capone: Right, there’s been a lot of talk about that. But, people say, though, that 48 HOURS, if it didn’t invent it, it totally reinvented the Buddy Cop movie, and changed everything that came after it.
CD: Oh, totally. Yeah, with LETHAL WEAPON and everything.
Capone: Who else? Who else did you like growing up comedy-wise?
CD: All the original SNL guys--Belushi and Aykroyd; Chevy Chase in his prime, sort of, a favorite.
Capone: Yeah, I’ve been watching those old ones they’ve been putting out on DVD.
CD: Yeah, I love it so much, man. They’re just the ultimate. They’re so loose.
Capone: Yeah, oh man, almost too loose, sometimes!
CD: They’re so, like, meandering, you know? Currently, obviously Ricky Gervais, I’m trying to rip off as much as possible. [Laughs] Larry David is another one.
Capone: I was going to say, like, the shorts with Michael, those totally reminded me of "Curb Your Enthusiasm" with that same insider thing.
CD: Well, The other thing is, like, the idea I had for Season 2 of "Clark and Michael", what the arc would kind of be--if we ever did one--he more or less did with the "Extras" Special, you know, the second season, the special. He just did it; there’s nothing else to say, you know what I mean? He just owned it. Yeah, him and [show writer-director] Steven Merchant are so brilliant. It’s painful.
Capone: Yeah, I thought GHOST TOWN was really good.
CD: I haven’t seen it yet. Is it?
Capone: Yeah, I think it’s hilarious.
CD: How did it do?
Capone: I don’t know how it’s doing, but critically it’s doing really well.
CD: Yeah? That’s all he needs, that’s all he needs for his first American movie. The critical response is probably more important than the box office. But, everybody already knew he was brilliant, so, I don’t know, he probably doesn’t need any of it.
Capone: He does seem a little jaded with his own success. Not like he’s rejecting it, but he doesn’t really seem to care. As long as he’s getting to do what he wants to do, he’s fine. He’s pretending not to care that much about how much money he’s making doing it or if people are applauding. As long as he doesn’t feel that he’s compromised himself, then he’s fine.
CD: A lot of the stuff that I love the most is the British stuff, Alan Partridge. Have you seen “Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace”?
Capone: Yes. God, I love that show.
CD: I keep telling everyone about that, because people keep asking about the robe. I’m, like, "We stole that from Garth Marenghi." Remember, he wears the robe in that. He’s got the little, short robe? We cut one off and made that…’cause I gave “Darkplace” to Anders, and he just, like, flipped out over it. We just quote it constantly.
Capone: That’s a great one. I love that show.
CD: It’s so strong, so strong.
Capone: Did they just make the one season of it?
CD: I think so. They took the character that Richard Ayoade plays, that plays his boss, and he did this talk show called “Man to Man with Dean Lerner.” It’s him as that character hosting a talk show, and it’s the fuckin’ weirdest…YouTube it, if you get a chance…’cause he’s still in the bizarre character from the show, but he’s wearing a tuxedo, and he has, like, a chat show, and it’s the funniest thing to me in the world to just take this really bizarre character and do a talk show in character.
And, he was in “The IT Crowd,” too, which is okay, kind of more like standard sitcom. But, I just think that guy’s great.
Capone: So, will you and Michael ever get to work together again? Have you guys talked about it?
CD: I’m sure. I mean, we’ve kind of broadly chatted about me writing something eventually. But, we’re both busy right now. But, yeah, I’m sure, eventually…
Capone: You’re also in KICK-ASS, aren’t you? And Marvel is reissuing all those today.
CD: They’re awesome. That book is so fun. I’m just a supporting part in that one, but I think the movie is going to be awesome.
Capone: Who do you have scenes with?
CD: Just the kids. I don’t have even Nicolas Cage. I mean, all his stuff is costume, and I’m not one of the costumes. But, I’ve been watching them shoot some of the stuff in the costumes. It’s going to be really interesting.
Capone: I’m excited to see it.
CD: Dude, it’s going to be great. It’s going to be really great.
Well, good luck with the film. I predict huge success when it hits DVD, especially with all those porn star nude clips.
CD: I know, right. Well thanks for all the support.
-- Capone
capone@aintitcoolmail.com
