Joel Massie from www.GoneWithTheTwins.com recently had a chance to sit down with Australian beauty Teresa Palmer to talk about her two latest films (Take Me Home Tonight and I Am Number Four), as well as motorcycles, crazy fans, chick magnets, and why she’s now hesitant to improvise any of her lines.
Joel Massie: You have two movies coming out only a few weeks apart. How hectic has your schedule been?
Teresa Palmer: I’ve hardly slept. It’s been very exhausting but so exciting and exhilarating at the same time. The films are completely opposite so I’m talking about being a warrior chick from planet Lorien in I Am Number Four and then going back to the ‘80s and being surrounded by comedic geniuses in Take Me Home Tonight. I’ve been talking about different things so I’m not getting bored with that at all.
JM: After the Take Me Home Tonight screening I left the theater with a bunch of ‘80s songs stuck in my head. The soundtrack is pretty amazing.
TP: The music is incredible in the film. Topher Grace and his writing partner Gordon Kaywin wrote out a list of songs before we started shooting the film and they burnt us this ‘80s cd and said “these are the songs we want in the movie”. And pretty much 90% of what was on that cd made it into the film.
JM: Did you have a favorite song?
TP: “Straight Outta Compton” by N.W.A. was my favorite in the film. Bette Davis Eyes was another and I was lucky enough to have that playing during my slow-motion entrance into the party scene. It was the iconic John Hughes shot.
JM: The title song wasn’t actually in the movie was it?
TP: No, it’s not. We knew we’d be playing that song so many times throughout the trailers we decided that the public would probably be sick of it by the time they saw the actual movie.
JM: In one scene in the film you get down to your bra but then turn your back before there’s any actual nudity. All of the men in the audience were quite disappointed.
TP: (laughs) I’ve actually done nudity before. Go check out the movie Restraint. It’s an Australian film. I’m open to doing nudity in movies but only if it makes sense for the role. In Restraint I was playing a stripper who’s really damaged, it was a psychological thriller, and it called for it in the script – but in this ‘80s comedy I thought it probably wasn’t necessary that Tori take it all off. But it’s funny – they kept asking me if it would be okay if I showed a little side boob or side nip, so I ended up wearing these pasties and when I took my bra off Topher was not expecting it, because I’d put smiley face stickers on my boobs. He had the weirdest reaction and expression to it. (laughs)
JM: The movie was rated R. Was nudity originally in the script and they decided against it?
TP: No. Actually we really wanted to show a contrast between Angie Everhart’s character and Tori’s and the two sex scenes are completely different and we loved the idea of cutting between the crazy threesome scene to this loving and romantic scene between Tori and Matt.
JM: Is it true that an American accent is the easiest to do?
TP: I think so, yeah. I grew up watching American television so it’s sort of engrained in us. I think you guys speak very eloquently as well and you pronounce all the letters of the words. For instance I would say the word “brother” with an “ah” sound on the end and you guys would say it with the “er” and it makes sense. You spell it and say it the right way. (laughs)
JM: What’s the wildest thing Dan Fogler did on or off the set?
TP: Every day Dan Fogler did something crazier and crazier. He has this infectious energy and he puts up such a brave performance in the film. He’s very uninhibited and really goes for it. Just watching him is crazy (laughs). The scene after he steals the car and he starts going nuts making all these bizarre noises – he really took it to the next level.
JM: What’s the craziest thing a fan has done?
TP: I’ve signed a baby before. (laughs) That was bizarre. I thought there was something really wrong about it, but the mother was like “the baby will like it”. I was pretty sure the baby had no choice in the matter. I also get sent some really interesting letters now that I have Twitter. I have been getting a lot of weird requests and there are people who keep mentioning my name every two minutes to try and get me to reply to them. This one guy said he cries from loneliness and depression and it would make his life if I just wrote back to him and then it started to get really freaky so I had to block him. (laughs)
JM: Did you get to improvise at all or did you stick to the script?
TP: I did, but my improv didn’t go so well. (laughs) This was one of my first American movies and the director said to ad lib, and it’s the party scene where we’re all dancing and Topher started making all of these strange facial expressions and I thought, I have to react to this, so what do I say? I yell “I love your facials!” The camera guy dropped the camera and all the extras started laughing and I think I’m doing an amazing job so I keep saying it and it wasn’t until Topher broke character and was dying laughing on the ground that he says “Tez, I think we just had a lost in translation moment”. He proceeded to tell me the meaning of “facials” but in Australia we’d call facial expressions facials. So that was very embarrassing and I did not attempt ad libbing again.
JM: The tagline of the film is “Best Night Ever.” Is there a night that stands out for you as the best night ever?
TP: The craziest night for me was when I was in my “rebellious” years 14-16 and I decided to throw the biggest party ever. I got the keys to my dad’s investment property, which was this house that he was going to knock down and build apartments over. I ended up inviting over 300 people to this party and it got gate-crashed by even more people and it was on the news and the house burned down. I had to go to my dad with my tail between my legs and say “I have something to tell you”. His first reaction was “You’re pregnant!” And I was like no, of course not. And my dad said all right, I don’t care what happened just as long as you’re not pregnant.
JM: Oh, but by the way dad, I did burn down a house…
TP: (laughs) It was a demolition party and I figured if we burned the house down they wouldn’t have to pay someone to come demolish it. (laughs) He was actually a softy and I didn’t get into too much trouble.
JM: So which is the bigger chick magnet – the Ducati 848 motorcycle (from I Am Number Four) or the Mercedes-Benz 560 SL (from Take Me Home Tonight)?
TP: Come on, the Ducati of course!
JM: I guess I’m going to have to learn how to drive a motorcycle.
TP: (laughs) The Ducati is amazing. It’s such a powerful machine and it does not want to be driven slowly at all, and the one time I drove it slowly around a corner after I had been warned many times not to do that, I ditched the bike and the handlebar snapped. I think I was getting over confident on it.
- Joel Massie
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