Bret McKenzie win an Oscar for his songwriting in the first Muppet flick , and now he ’s back for the second . We spoke to the Flight of the Conchords co - laminitis , and he spilled all his arcanum on finding the melody for a Modern generation of Muppet movie . Plus his inspire NASA series , and his next fantasy musical .
The first Muppets movie you worked on was a Brobdingnagian achiever , you won an Oscar and the public totally embraced these classic part all over again . How did the Muppets ’ success vary Hollywood ? Are people more open to doing musicals now ?
Bret McKenzie : I mean Hollywood is more excited about making films with tattle puppets . The one difference , trace the first film , was that a lot of citizenry wanted to be in the next film . And it was much easier to get cameos . Whereas the last pic , hoi polloi were kind of suspicious about what we were doing . manifestly because the Muppets had n’t been around for a while . But after the winner of the last film , we were capable to get so many peachy cameos . And I be intimate that , because it feel a little bit more like the original film , full of cameo feature .
Do you have a number ? Do you have a go at it how many cameos are in this film ?
There must be 50 cameo . Maybe 1,000 cameo , if you let in the extras . It was great , because we get people like Lady Gaga , Tony Bennett [ and ] Celine Dion . Unbelievable .
What do you have to remember , when you ’re writing music for the Muppets ? How is it different for writing for yourself or Flight of the Conchords ? How do you receive your inner Muppet representative ?
I have a unripe felt suit that I put on . [ Laughs ] One of the challenges was , the songs have to connect to story and persona . But they also need to have a affectionateness to them . So , that ’s a challenge . act as with the character but also making them feel sincere and good at the same time . I think songs work well when they have something genuine within them . evidently that ’s quite slippery when you ’re doing a song like “ We ’re Doing A Sequel . ” But I think we pulled it off .
That ’s one of the great thing about the Muppets , their complete sincerity . I feel like your grapheme had a lot of those sensitivity , do you link up to the muppets ? Are you much more honest than normal human beings are ?
I jazz comedy that is solemn . I discover it funny when a character is being honest in what they ’re doing . I get laid drollery songs [ to be ] solemn , and as real as possible . So it diddle against the ridiculousness of a cockamamie song . Whether I ’m like a Muppet , I ’m not sure . Having worked on the Muppets for a few years now , I ’m starting to think most masses are like Muppets , actually .
The Muppets Most Wanted is missing a huge vocalization with Jason Segel . “ Man or Muppet ” and “ Life ’s a Happy Song ” really leaned on him and Walter a lot . How did you prepare for a sequel that does n’t have that voice ? How does that vary the music in Muppet Most Wanted ?
I definitely missed Jason on this film . He brought so much sexual love and his Meatloaf playful performance . But the new motion picture , I retrieve the characters share the load more . Ricky Gervais really came through . He ’s get a bit of a rock phonation underneath it all . I do n’t hump if you are familiar with his 80s medicine career , but he has a great part . We broadcast the strain over : Kermit get a strain , Piggy gets a Sung . in reality the bad anuran , Constantine , gets a great deal of song . I do n’t know if you noticed there ’s plausibly too many songs tattle with bad Russian accent . I ’m not sure if that ’s a good or a risky thing . I intend we were trying to go for a Cold War comedy [ feel ] .
That ’s weird affair about doing a risky emphasis is you start in one place and then you slowly wander into another accent and the next thing you sleep with you ’re in an Irish gulag .
Yeah my accents often terminate up Irish — no matter what , they are they always stop up Irish . I would be curious to see what the Russian audience thinks of the performance . They did have a Russian dialect coach on set , which was fairly silly because I cerebrate it was a minute of a wastefulness of time hear to make the Gaul sound truly Russian .
[ The dialect passenger car ] is just toast in the back on circle … Do you get laid the actors you ’re move to be working with before you write the song ? Like would you have write the “ act 2 ” call different if Ricky Gervais had n’t been mold ?
You know , what I ’d already written the Song dynasty before it had been cast . Ricky Gervais come on quite recently . Yeah no , I indite that song … I commonly just write them for myself and make the individual sing how I would sing it .
He really goes to town on that song .
He goes for it . He does make it his own … He ’s a very confident man . He came into the studio apartment and dissemble like he was Frank Sinatra . And did a couple of takes and get out of there . But fortuitously , he has the good .
What was it like being in the studio with Celine Dion ?
It was incredibly to work with Celine Dion . But I use the word “ worked with ” loosely because we never conform to each other . She read all of her part in Vegas . I did n’t get to go with her , but it was awe-inspiring having her in the vocal because she ’s absolutely a powerhouse . plain she ’s no Miss Piggy , when it occur to singing , but she ’s pretty good . I ’m hop that Miss Piggy and Celine Dion fall in military force for a Vegas Diva off .
I ’m so excited that you ’re passionate about making fantasy - ish musical theater . We freak out when we find out that you were work on afairy tale melodious with [ Muppets theater director ] James Bobin — how is that expire ?
https://gizmodo.com/oh-my-god-bret-mckenzie-is-making-a-labyrinth-style-mus-1112286766
It ’s travel great , we ’ve almost complete the playscript and I ’ve started to write the birdcall .
Is this going to fulfill the Princess Bride jam in this generation ? We have nothing like it .
I would be very happy if it was that sound .
What is it about live action queer tales that were SO sluttish to get made in the 80s but not right now ? Everything has to be so gritty and dark , besides the Muppets . There ’s a void .
I agree everyone is obsessed with making the human race dark . ingest quite gleeful report and then dedicate them a obscure twist . idiot box ’s like that as well . Maybe life ’s … everyone … I do n’t know it does n’t make common sense … That was n’t a very dear answer to that . I get laid what you think but I ca n’t articulate it .
What ’s give way on with yourNASA show?Are you sound to vocalize it ?
https://gizmodo.com/bret-mckenzie-is-developing-an-animated-series-about-na-1455433707
I ’m doing character figure at the mo . And it turn out my drawings are very stick - like . Might need to get some aid with those . It depend like a seven - year - one-time drew the show .
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