Ahoy, squirts! Quint here. I conducted my very first interview when I was still a freshman in High School. That's 21 years of doing this, thousands of interviews, ranging from 3 minutes to 3 hours in length, and I still haven't quite cracked the kid actor interview. I get along with kids, so I enjoy talking to young actors, but they can be some of the most difficult interviews.
Thankfully young Neel Sethi was one of the better child actor interviewees. I've had some kids that respond literally with yes or no to everything. It can be like asking your own child how their day at school was, trying to start up a conversation and getting “It was okay” back.
Sethi, on the other hand, jumped right into it. In fact, he starts the interview by grilling me about football.
I had the chance to speak with Neel over the phone while he was out promoting the Blu-Ray release of The Jungle Book (out today!) and the below chat is pretty quick and not as in-depth as I would have liked, but you get a good sense of Neel as a person, I think. We talk a bit about Bill Murray, Jon Favreau, a possible Jungle Book 2 and the ultimate question about Texas football.
Enjoy!
Neel Sethi: Hi, Eric. I have one question.
Quint: Shoot.
Neel Sethi: You're from Texas.
Quint: I am.
Neel Sethi: So, the Dallas Cowboys or the Houston Texans. Please answer this the right way.
Quint: I gotta go with the Texans.
Neel Sethi: Alright! Hoo, that was a close one. My team's the Giants and the Cowboys are in their division, so we have a rivalry and stuff.
Quint: I grew up in the Bay Area during the Joe Montana years of the 49ers, so I could never root for the Cowboys even when I moved to Texas.
Neel Sethi: Alright, now we can do the interview because you're cool.
Quint: Great! I don't know if you'd remember, but we met on the set of Jungle Book. I was there for the landslide scene. We talked a little bit after you shot the scene and they had to photograph you from all angles...
Neel Sethi: Oh, yeah! Now I remember you. I was doing the photobooth, where they would twist me 360 degrees and I showed you the Mickey Mouse on the pillar.
Quint: Yeah, you showing me the hidden Mickey on one of King Louie's pillars was one of my favorite parts of that day.
Neel Sethi: Yeah, that was cool!
Quint: I'd like to start talking with you about imagination. Any actor in any movie is required to use a lot of imagination, but you in particular had to use it more than most actors.
Neel Sethi: Yeah, definitely.
Quint: Was that easy for you to do? Were there certain scenes that were tougher than others?
Neel Sethi: The only thing I had a problem with was the mud. It was just itchy and scratchy and I don't really like mud, so I didn't like that part. I'm very sensitive.
Quint: (laughs) When you had to interact with other characters, the animals that weren't there, did you have a good idea of what was going on?
Neel Sethi: Yeah, they had SimulCam, which they showed me. It was a rough version of what they were going to do. It wasn't the final look, but it gave me an idea. They used the same thing on Avatar.
Quint: From what little I saw it seemed like Jon Favreau was always there to help you out. Did he play characters off screen for you?
Neel Sethi: Yeah, he played a lot of Baloo. He did just about every character that was off-screen. That helped me a lot with interaction.
Quint: Speaking of, I saw the film a few times in theaters. Took my nephews, who are younger than you are, and one of the things I noticed that they really responded to was your relationship with Baloo. Was that something you could tell was going right when you were filming it?
Neel Sethi: Yeah, I think it was really cool. Me and Jon have a really good relationship. We're always laughing. We usually talk about food because I really like food.
Quint: He's a good guy to talk about food with. Did you see Chef?
Neel Sethi: Yeah, I watched Chef and it made me so hungry! I loved it.
Quint: You didn't shoot with Bill Murray, but I heard that you guys hung out a little bit after you were both cast. Is that right?
Neel Sethi: Yeah, we played football and ate food. I was on a private jet to meet him! It was one of my favorite days.
Quint: So, you got along well with Bill, then?
Neel Sethi: Yeah, we have a really cool relationship.
Quint: What do you have coming up next? Anything going on in the near future?
Neel Sethi: I hope to do more. I have some stuff in the works and I think Jungle Book 2 would be really cool.
Quint: Yeah, there are other Kipling stories about Mowgli. The only one we usually see is The Jungle Book.
Neel Sethi: Yeah, there's different stories for Mowgli that are cool.
Quint: I wonder if they would make new musical numbers for a sequel. One of the biggest reactions was from the King Louie musical number. People loved it.
Neel Sethi: Yeah, that was really cool. I liked the music. That's how you know it's THE Jungle Book, you know?
Quint: Exactly. I'd love to hear what new classic Disney style music they'd come up with in the sequel. Maybe you'll get a song!
Neel Sethi: Yeah!
Quint: Well, I appreciate you taking the time to talk to me today. It was really fun.
Neel Sethi: My pleasure! Thank you for your time!
Thanks for reading along. Got a bit of a deeper dive interview surrounding this film coming shortly. Stay tuned!
-Eric Vespe
”Quint”
quint@aintitcool.com
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