How you doin' today, Tom? Hey, Stefan.
Very good, thank you.
So as someone who was behind Madagascar and now Boss Baby,
I'm kind of interested to know how you approach things from...
from a franchise perspective.
At what point as a writer to you?
Allow yourself to think of sequels.
Are you completely at the mercy of audiences that studios do?
You blank out future stories and ideas and concepts until that greenlight arrives?
Or you someone always thinking two
steps ahead where these characters could go in future projects?
Yeah, ironically, you don't really think about it
because it seems kind of presumptuous to think like every movie wants a sequel.
So you try to make the best movie you can.
And with them, with whether it was the Madagascar movies
or Boss Baby, you just fall in love
with these characters and you want to do more with them.
And a Boss Baby seemed like there was a part to go
to this movie that we felt fortunate we were able to tell it's family.
But the first one is about
two young brothers finding their way of their relationship.
And then, you know, as often with family, you grow up and you can grow apart.
And that was my brother and I's story as well
and and families and ongoing drama.
And it just felt like, oh, it'd be great to know how these, how Tim and Boss Baby
we grew up, what they're like, you know, and and that
it's never too late to have a second chance with
family is kind of what we're saying with our relationships.
Yeah, I mean, obviously, one of the kind of overriding feelings of this not
is this kind of idea of of growing up, but holding on to that kind of sense
of adventure, kind of maybe a blissful outlook that we perhaps lose sight of.
Are you someone in life is able to do that?
Do you practice what you preach in that regard?
I think I've always had an active imagination so I can relate more to Tim, who
who kind of held on to his childhood.
You know, in a way.
And it's important because
part of what's underneath this is you don't want your kids to grow up too fast.
You want them to enjoy their imagination while they have it.
And so these movies in the Boss Baby movies, it's kind of a, you know,
we have these imagination sequences we're quite proud of.
And it's really a celebration of youth.
And you know what?
The funny premise that we thought would make a fun
movie was the idea that these two adults have to.
Turn back into children to relive their childhood,
to make them better adults, ultimately,
and it just felt like a fun premise to to jump off a.
If you're presented with the chance to go back and be a child again,
if only for a week, would you take it?
For a week, I would do it, I wouldn't want to relive
everything you know, and I wouldn't really want to change anything,
but it'd be fun to be able to go back
and and look at yourself
and how you were as a kid,
which is an interesting idea, which we did with with Tim.
As a father, there's a father/daughter story to this movie
and just thought I would be fine if he could
grow closer to his daughter, not as her father,
but as her weird friend in school.
So that was fun to play with.
Many of these two great cast Alec Baldwin is back as well, but obviously
Jeff Goldblum said, I mean, I interviewed him once
and it was almost impossible to kind of stick to the script.
He deviated so much away from the kind of conversation in the dialog.
It was almost like a toddler kind of watching blowing bubbles
kind of around him.
Is he easier to direct it than he is to interview?
I have such a great time with Alec, you know,
and we have a lot of fun together and and he's been such a partner
in this because, you know, we always discuss the lines.
We always go off, book, you know, and work with Michael McCullers, our writer.
But for me, with the since the Madagascar movies,
improv is gold, you know, in a way.
And and
so you let the actors play with the words and let them have their own words.
But at the end of the day, my job because I sit right across from Alec is
not to laugh.
When he does his lines because he always knows where the humor is.
And so I have to cover my mouth when I'm reading along with him
for that kind of thing, but he's really funny.
And over the course of the two years we're in production doing the movie,
you know, we'll constantly try and ad lib with Alec and then go to Amy Sedaris
or Jeff Goldblum, and then they come back with an adlib line.
And so over the course of a year, you know, we we get this
this scene that feels very spontaneous, like they're all in the room together.
Well, hopefully we'll see you all back together for a third sometime soon.
I don't know. Hopefully, this will play well.
You know, we're excited to to see it go out into the world.
But thanks so much and best of luck with the release of the movie.
Thank you, Stefan.