Viswanathan and Cena put some real muscle behind daughter-dad ties in ‘Blockers’
WWE superstar John Cena and Australian newcomer Geraldine Viswanathan walk into a bustling brasserie for lunch on a rainy spring day in Beverly Hills, cosmically and accidentally twinning in patterned suits to talk “Blockers,” their heartwarming new R-rated comedy about teen sexuality, parental anxieties and a phenomenon known as … well, we’ll get to that in a bit.
In the comedy, which opened Friday from Universal, Viswanathan shines with natural charisma as Kayla, the all-American star athlete whose confidence leads a trio of teenagers (including Kathryn Newton and Gideon Adlon) into every overprotective parent’s worst nightmare: a sex pact to lose their virginity on prom night.
Cena, one of wrestling’s biggest names, has built his ring career around an unwaveringly tough good guy act. But here he unleashes the comedy chops glimpsed in supporting roles in “Trainwreck” and “Sisters” as Mitchell, Kayla’s stay-at-home dad who’s given to outsized
outbursts of emotion, tears and many of the film’s more outrageous (and skin-baring) body humor gags.
Together they ground an outrageous comedy in a relatable parent-child dynamic: He’s the perennial dad-coach training his daughter to be strong and confident in sports terms, the only language he knows, and she’s a self-possessed young woman developing a curiosity for life experiences beyond the goal posts.
In person the two share a warm mutual admiration from the nearly three-month Atlanta shoot last year, and Viswanathan’s ebullience softens Cena’s more serious-leaning stoicism.
The two were cast separately for their roles by director Kay Cannon — known as a writer on projects from “30 Rock” to the “Pitch Perfect” franchise — who makes her helming debut with the Universal comedy. Cannon wasn’t exactly an avid WWE fan watching Cena lay smackdowns on his opponents every week on live TV; seeing him dip his toe into comedy films landed him on her radar.
She was even more impressed watching his personality and charisma peek out while hosting the ESPYs and in a 2016 anti-bigotry PSA. “And I watched ‘Total Divas,’” she says over the phone, referring to the reality series he appeared on with his fiancee and fellow wrestler Nikki Bella. “I feel like he’s America wrapped up in a flag. Everybody connects to him, from all walks of life.”
For the role of Kayla, “I was definitely trying to find a woman of color,” says Cannon, “and what I liked about Geraldine is that she can play that cocky, fun, strong, funny lady, but then can also take it down a little bit.”
While raunchy comedies have historically treated women as one-dimensional objects, “Blockers” is about destigmatizing sex and enabling young women to assert ownership of their own bodies and choices. It’s the kind of messaging
teenage girls seldom get in mainstream movies.
Because Cannon sought to cast the role inclusively and wanted to reflect a realistically diverse setting, Kayla became a biracial character. “I didn’t want this to be — to be frank — a bunch of white people,” Cannon explains. “I set the movie in Chicago, and that’s not what Chicago looks like.”
Viswanathan says it’s about time for an inclusive, sex-positive studio film that gives agency to young female protagonists. “Even being part of a biracial family, that’s hard to come by and it’s not made a meal out of — it just is,” she says. “I think it’s empowering and it’s exciting.”
Over lunch, the gentle and generous dynamic between Cena and Viswanathan emerges. He wants to hear about how she bonded with Newton and Adlon in the week of rehearsals before the “Blockers” shoot. At her request, he expounds on his thoughts on the pitfalls of smartphone-age communication, one aspect of parent-kid relationships that’s mined for laughs in “Blockers.”
Viswanathan, 22, grew up in Australia, a competitive horse rider. She caught the acting bug by binge-watching “Friends.” She didn’t know much about Cena’s day job when she was cast in “Blockers.”
“I got into wrestling because it beat working for a living,” Cena quips. But like Viswanathan, Cena can trace his career in entertainment to his childhood fascinations. It was growing up in a small town in Massachusetts watching wrestling with his brothers that planted the seed for his WWE stardom.
“We were one of the first in town with cable TV and my next-door neighbor lived acres away, so you had to use your imagination,” he says. “I grew up with four brothers, and we made these crazy imaginative worlds out of thin air. I guess I never lost that, which is why I can get so wrapped up in WWE.”
Opportunities in Hollywood to play against type in comedies like “Blockers” have offered something wrestling could not.
“I think we all like to laugh. I’m a live performer. I’ve been in live performance moments that are serious, that are sad, happy, angry, and the one thing that’s very difficult to do in our line of live performance is make somebody laugh,” he says, “so I guess that was kind of the one thing I was missing.”
His most infamous scene in “Blockers” threatens to steal the movie, and it involves a move he hasn’t had the opportunity to attempt in wrestling: an obscene and thankfully obscure frat boy party trick known as “butt-chugging.”
“The ‘Jackass’ guys tried it,” Cannon says of the feat, which Mitchell reluctantly attempts as he and fellow parents infiltrate a teen party (imagine a person beer-bonging suds in reverse). “I didn’t want to hire anybody who wasn’t willing to do that scene because … (it) is so funny,” Cannon says. “To me it represents, ‘How far will you go?’”
Cena, for his part, seems to enjoy defying expectations — and wrestling has prepared him for anything. “I thought that was fun because everybody else felt uncomfortable, except me.”