That would be amazing. I was so happy when that happened. We had gotten married in May of And when Zoolander came up, it became clear that I probably would be sent out or submitted to audition for it. My joke is that I was fourth choice and cheap. I think he was a very talented guy. Let me take a look at it. And I thought the character was an interesting character for me to play.
I thought I could make it work. I should have a part in it. And there was another part at some point. I thought the hand model was the most fun for me to try. And I believe Paramount and Scott Rudin were one of the main producers of the show. So Paramount and Ben called my agents the very next day.
We set up a meeting, and I was just told to wear something sort of fashionable and that this project was based upon a character he played on VH1 called Derek Zoolander, which I had no idea about at the time. I went in, and we just talked. He asked me some questions. And I was, of course, delighted and excited to meet him.
We talked a little bit about The Wild Party. And for the life of me, I have no idea how he watched that show—which was about a jazz poem—and thought that I should be a part of Zoolander.
I had met him a couple of times. And a lot of the supporting cast that Ben filled in and sprinkled in throughout the film are really dear friends of ours—some of them who had acted before, some of them who had never acted before.
His parents are both in it, his sister is in it. My brother, who is not an actor, has a part at the end. It felt like this sort of family affair. We had met a little bit before that.
I was frequenting quite a few fashion shows and gallery openings and enjoying my Manhattan minute. And in the process, I kept running into Ben, who was doing research for the film at some Hugo Boss shows, among others.
And he asked me to show up to this one sequence that had quite a few cameos in it of people playing themselves, with a nod to self-parody. We had been friends for a while. That sounds really fun. And then we just went with it. I always loved his movies. So when he reached out and asked me to be in this movie, it was a thrill. I really had a good time. And it was a brilliant idea. Because there was never a movie about making fun of the model industry, especially back then.
With the cast and cameos in place, Ben and the team he assembled—which included cinematographer Barry Peterson, production designer Robin Standefer, composer David Arnold, and costume designer David C. Robinson —began figuring out what the film would look like aesthetically. I always looked at [ Zoolander ] like a Mel Brooks movie or something like that.
That was what I was aspiring to, because he would create this sort of heightened reality. I was shooting Super Bowl commercials and shooting cool fashion at that stage. So it felt like the perfect fit.
And then within it was the comedy—within it was the simplicity of these models. They had fired the first designer, and so I had five weeks, and that included getting a crew and finding a space, because there was no space. So that was a little scary. So [art director] Stephen Alesch and I got this sort of clandestine call.
And I went and met Ben one night in his office. We just talked about the narrative, the script, and the whole concept of the film. And Stephen and I agreed to take it over. We brought in a whole new crew. A normal prep is maybe three to four months. They were about to start in a month, so we had to really rethink a lot of significant sets.
So the funeral would be Helmut [Newton] and all low angles, black and white, with sexy blonde girls. So then I thought, Okay. Like Derek wearing all white to the funeral, or wearing a python suit with matching luggage at the coal mine. That became more of the M. This included every billboard, every bus, every magazine cover in their portfolios. I called everybody that I knew would give me permission to parody them. For instance, Herb Ritts, with the famous photograph of a male model holding these huge tires.
It was a very famous Herb picture, and I asked him if I could parody the picture and not have him sue us. And he said it was funny and let us do it. They love the fashion world, they want to know more about it.
I worked with all of the guys and girls [in the industry], and I remember most of them taking themselves so seriously. But it was more modular. It was more sort of in-house, so to speak, in Manhattan.
So I sat down with him and he was trying to articulate how I had to be funny. The VH1 short was apparently not well liked in the fashion world. We went to designers to try to get clothes and they were not interested at all in working with us. If anybody called her up and asked her what she thought, she would tell them to go for it. I think, for whatever reason, at that time people were very into the idea—because it was a time when fashion was starting to become so much a part of the pop culture world.
We knew we had to shoot the sequence that happened at the Fashion Awards [at the beginning of the film] at the real Fashion Awards. Can we shoot live there? GALLEN: I helped coordinate, orchestrate, and oversee that part of the shoot, because I knew all the players and had produced that show for three years. It was loads of extra money, and we had to figure out what the TV production was going to absorb and what the film cost was going to absorb.
Each break was about three-and-a-half minutes. And we had to change the podium onstage, put our own prop up there. And we had to film Ben walking down the aisle and up onto the stage. So we had three shots at it in those two-minute breaks. It was a pretty exciting event. It was a taped show. It was totally stressful. You had to get it and get out of the way so they could continue the show. One minute to live.
We cut it so damn close to the show going live with Derek Zoolander on the stage. He directed me to improvise. So I asked Donatella Versace if she would do it, and she agreed. It was just such a funny moment.
LEVINSON: We also really wanted to take advantage of the amazing look of that red carpet and the crowds that were coming in and all of the photographers.
Ben Stiller is Derek Zoolander doing this thing. We just want to ask you a couple questions. Following an embarrassing mishap at the VH1 Fashion Awards and the death of his model roommates in a gas station explosion, Derek returns home to the coal mine where his father, Larry Zoolander, and his brothers work.
I thought about doing prosthetics or something like that. He just nailed that part and gave it credibility, even though they all had Zoolander hair. He was really good as a guide through it and all of that. But I remember him thinking of me as a serious actor.
He probably was working with one of the old thoroughbreds. But there was a little more respect or a different tone with me. And that was nice, in a certain way. All I was trying to do was fill in and be the right guy for it, and be funny. And I was. To make the world of Zoolander believable, fake print ads, billboards, and artwork had to be created featuring Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson as Derek and Hansel.
And some things where we could do it in a funnier version in our own photo shoot. Many scenes have become fan favorites over the years. So eventually, they had to cut the T-shirt on the sides and sew me into it so that it stretched tall enough against my chest so that you could see the imprint of the latte on my shirt.
Despite Andy Dick having to turn down the role that eventually went to Will Ferrell, Ben Stiller still wanted to include his old friend in the film in some way. So Dick wound up playing the part of Olga, a grotesque masseuse who manages to give Derek a ridiculous-looking erection under the covers.
Even with all the stellar cameos in the film, there is one particularly epic one during the runway walk-off scene that never fails to catch first-time viewers by surprise.
First of all, he was an incredible gentleman when he came to film. Everybody was in awe of him, the fact that he was there. I mean, it was very surreal to me that he was actually there. Like, Hey, maybe we could talk about putting some of this music in the film. Laughs He was incredibly gracious when we filmed. He gave us this air of credibility that made that sequence especially work so well.
ZANE: My scene [leading up to the walk-off] was pretty much entirely improvised. Derek was challenging Hansel and he had his whole crew behind him. Sure, no problem. That was just Owen in his mad genius just creating this funny meme in the making.
I just thought it was humorous on the day. I had no idea that it was going to evolve into something that people quote more than any other line from my other films. The person that actually helps set the plot of the film in motion is David Duchovny. Duchovny, completely unrecognizable as hand model J. There were literally a hundred painters and carpenters sculpting and building these hedge stones.
Like Adonis with a penis. They were so insane. And at that moment, there was some foreshadowing that this was an incredible and funny and ironic send-up of fashion. And it was so timely. I had these flashes of, I think this is going to be epic and an archetype on some level. And we had this whole wig setup. I think I was wearing padding too. And I just realized the straighter I could be, the funnier I could be.
So I just committed to the reality. This is Gene Hackman in some other movie. It was a real long walk-and-talk, and I had the bulk of the dialogue. It was very exposition-heavy. And I remember after a number of takes, I fucked it up. Also, I think we laughed a lot at that moment where I explain everything, I give him all the answers, and then he asks the same question.
I just told you. Everybody was around and was going to have their moment in this crazy shot that they had designed of the camera going around in circles. Everybody was hanging out, wondering, when they got called into the room, how awkward, uncomfortable, or silly it was going to be. We knew it was going to be comedic.
It was so awkward. They kept giving it an R rating because of that scene. Of course we wanted to end it with a wedding dress, so we did the refrigerator box that turns into a wedding dress. And I gotta say, that fashion model really gained my trust because here she is, inside this box, four rods holding it in place.
She has to drop the rods, pick up her bouquet, and then walk down the runway with a 40 pound winch on her back while her dress is being drawn in by the winch in high heels on a plexiglass runway. So I suddenly realized why models make so much. But to me, in retrospect, it now seems kind of tame in terms of what actually has been done. They were all looking at me like they were going to kill me.
Laughs While I was in the fitting room stapling garbage onto the cape Ben wears with the tagger gun, Bette Midler walked in. She was at Parsons, I guess, getting fitted for something. And her thing is collecting garbage on the West Side Highway. It was like The Walking Dead. It was surreal. In fact, the more absurd the better. I think Owen had a stunt double for the head spins and things like that. Laughs I did all my own moves. We did have a fight coordinator, because we had to actually make punches happen during the breakdancing.
Like, him doing a head spin and whacking me repeatedly in the face. That sort of thing. And it was very kind of run-and-done indie style. It was wildly difficult. Can you do this? I just told you that a moment ago. Prewitt : The truth is male models have been assassinating world leaders for over years. Abe Lincoln wanted to abolish slavery, right? Well, who do you think made the silk stockings and powdered wigs worn by our early leaders? Derek Zoolander : Mugatu!
Prewitt : [pauses] Slaves, Derek. So they hired John Wilkes Booth to do Mr. Lincoln in. John F. Matilda : Lee Harvey Oswald wasn't a male model. Prewitt : You're goddamn right he wasn't, but the two lookers who capped Kennedy from the Grassy Knoll sure as shit were! Prewitt : I'm a hand model, mama. A finger jockey. We think differently than the face and body boys Prewitt : [as Zoolander runs off, standing on the glass dome covering J.
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