‘Fubar II’ Actors Give’r!
Posted October 5, 2010 2:17 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Following in the footsteps of the cult hit Fubar, Fubar II is a raunchy comedy that reintroduces us to idiot hosers Terry and Dean (David Lawrence and Paul Spence) as they head to Fort McMurray, Alberta to work the pipelines along with their buddy Tron (Andrew Sparacino). Thanks to brilliant improvisation from Lawrence and Spence, the film is hysterically funny with an underlying heartfelt message about the importance of friendship.
CityNews.ca spoke with the two actors during the Toronto International Film Festival, where Fubar II premiered as part of the Midnight Madness Programme. Read our Q&A below.
Brian McKechnie: How did the first ‘Fubar’ change your lives?
Paul Spence: It completely and totally changed my life. Since it came out I’ve managed to make a career out of writing and acting. Without it I don’t know where I’d be but certainly I was not acting and writing for money before Fubar.
David Lawrence: It switched me from the stage and street into film and television.
BM: Why do a sequel now?
David Lawrence: It’s a slow process. Films always take a couple of years to get from concept to production to distribution. We walked down the road slowly on this one. First it was like: Do we want to do a sequel? What are we going to do? Are we going to taint the first film by making another one? Then in 2005 we developed the sequel to see what we would get. We weren’t in a rush and took our time to make sure the ideas we had were worthwhile.
BM: Do you feel more at ease improvising the characters as opposed to acting from a script?
Paul Spence: I think I can say with a bit of confidence that that’s our forte. I love acting and have been in films that weren’t improvised but I think when we’re improvising as Terry and Dean it’s very easy to be funny. It’s a lot harder to be funny sitting down in front of a blank page and trying to write it out.
David Lawrence: The opportunity to improvise a fully financed film to me was like… we had to do it. We had a chance to prove to ourselves and the film-goers that you can take skilled improvisers and an outline and make a film. Improvisation has a really bad rap and I don’t know a lot of films that have been funded that don’t have a script. If we can pull it off then we can open doors to do it again.
BM: Was there much of a difference between the filming of ‘Fubar II’ compared to the first ‘Fubar’?
David Lawrence: It was a completely different beast. The first film we spent $12,000 on our credit cards and shot the film and then tried to get post-production financing. The second film we had a crew of 70.
Paul Spence: It was the difference of going camping in a tent versus in a fully electric motor home. You’re still out in the woods, you still get the campfire, and you go swimming in the lake, but then you can have a hot shower and a hot meal. The result is the same, you’re out in the woods having a good time, but how you got there is completely different.
BM: When you’re not filming do you ever get approached by people who think you really are Terry and Dean?
David Lawrence: Not really. People do recognize us from the film but they don’t think we are bangers. That happened way back when the first film came out. You’d go to a bar and people would be like, ‘you look like that guy in the movie’ and then tell me about the film.
BM: Can you talk about your next film ‘Western Confidential’?
David Lawrence: It’s a period piece set in 1880 and it’s about two half brothers on the run from a rogue fur trader.
Paul Spence: But it’s a comedy!
David Lawrence: It’s a comedy but it also has some heavy themes in it. We tried to deal with racism and homophobia.
BM: When can we expect to see this?
David Lawrence: The film is just about finished and we’re going to try to get it into the hands of the distributors to see who wants it.
Fubar II is in theatres now.
brian.mckechnie@citynews.rogers.com
Top image: A scene from Fubar II. Courtesy Alliance Films.
