Kelsey Grammer loves to keep us laughing
As a Crane or a Stork, TV and film veteran loves to make us laugh
Kelsey Grammer is popular in two different worlds.
In animation, he’s known for the distinctive voice of Sideshow Bob on The Simpsons and for doing Toy Story 2’s crotchety Stinky Pete.
On TV, he will always be remembered as psychiatrist Dr. Frasier Crane — first on beloved sitcom Cheers and then on its spinoff, Frasier. Since then he’s dabbled in many live-action movies and TV shows, and returns to animation in Storks, voicing bird boss Hunter.
In the family-friendly comedy animated by Vancouver’s Sony Pictures Imageworks, storks have stopped delivering babies until a rogue bird (Andy Samberg) decides to fulfil one last shipment of a newborn.
The winged one has to do it without Hunter discovering his disruptive move, so naturally the trip sets off a series of unexpected events.
Grammer chats with Postmedia News at a Beverly Hills hotel about Storks and his career:
Q Are you an easy sell when it comes to animated movies? A Oh, yes. I always do kids movies and I always have. They called and said, “We have this new animated movie about storks,” and I just said, “Yes.” Q Where did you find that distinctive boss voice?
A It’s my homage to (actor) Rip Torn. I did a film with him years ago called Down Periscope and I had such fun with him. He’s a rough and tough old-school guy.
Q Are you ever concerned that one of your voices will sound like Sideshow Bob or Stinky Pete?
A I’m pretty confident in my vocal ability to present a new character each time. Q What do you think of your Storks boss? A He’s proof that power corrupts. But I like my boss. He knows who he is.
Q Is it difficult to create a character in a recording studio?
A It’s really more of a game you play. You aren’t really in charge of the performance, but you have to embody it. Q What’s one of your favourite scenes from Storks?
A The don’t-wake-up-the-baby sequence while they are trying to kidnap the baby. I thought that was brilliant.
Q Does it ring true?
A Absolutely, it does. As a parent, you are always thinking, “This baby cannot wake up.” I understand completely. Q How are things personally and professionally these days?
A Things are very good in my life in every phase of my life. I am engaged and happy. Q What’s your secret?
A I am doing fewer things and devoting less of my time to my career.
withQ But your you productionstill seem to company.be active True?A When I was doing the show Boss,in it becauseI found I I developedwas really it. invested TVQ What landscape?do you think of the new A new Cablelife to has comedies definitely and brought dramas. It’s probably the best thing to happen to television. Q Is it easier or more difficult to get something made? A I still have to keep agitating people’s imagination. It’s like saying, “Hey, I’m over here.” Q Are you aware your sitcom Frasier might be more popular now in reruns than when it aired?
A Yes, I have 12-year-olds telling me it’s their favourite show all the time. Q Why do you think Frasier has aged so well?
A We quite consciously decided we weren’t going to do anything pop-culture based, so the episodes can luxuriate in an eternal audience. Q Would you be prepared to update the series? A We can’t duplicate it. I’m very happy to have it where it is. Q What about a reunion of some kind? A There might be some callback to it. Q Is that a Frasier tease? A (smiles) It is. But that’s all I’m saying.
The recently rebranded Warner Animation Group got off to a fine start in 2014 with The Lego Movie, a critical and commercial hit with an earworm song, to boot.
Storks, the studio’s sophomore effort, may not have the same staying power, but what it lacks in quality it more than makes up for in enthusiastic lunacy.
Oh, and there’s a new Lego short before the main feature.
The backstory needs a little unpacking. Storks used to deliver babies, but now they carry packages for the fictional cornerstore.com — at least until drones take over. In the meantime, Junior (Andy Samberg) is poised to take over the company from outgoing CEO Hunter (Kelsey Grammer).
Before that can happen, however, there’s one more baby to deliver. A little boy named Nate has managed to get a letter through to the baby factory, where a human orphan in the shuttered mail room — she’s something of a dead letter herself, since the storks lost her delivery details 18 years earlier — puts the machinery into action. (This is easily the only time a scene of accidental conception will ever get a G rating.)
Now Junior and the orphan, Tulip (Katie Crown), must get the bundle of joy safely delivered before the boss finds out. But they’re blocked by a suspicious pigeon (Stephen Kramer Glickman), a deranged stork (Danny Trejo) who wants a baby of his own, and a pack of wolves, led by Keegan-Michael Kay, who aren’t sure whether to eat the infant or raise it, Mowgli-style.
All this gives Storks, written by co-director Nicholas Stoller (Get Him to the Greek, Neighbors), a licence to engage in various high-speed chases, slapstick violence and other mayhem.
Some of these antics are amazingly creative, such as the wolves’ Wonder-Twin-like ability to morph into a variety of vehicles and structures. And some — an off-screen cat hit by a flying object; a giant exo-suit, built by For No Good Reason Enterprises (a division of Because We Can Incorporated) — are lazier than cereal straight from the box.
In the film’s semi-quiet moments, Samberg and Crown manage some nice banter, and there’s the requisite feel-good subplot about finding your family and/or creating one. There are also a few unanswered questions, such as why so many stork-crafted babies are “born” with predyed hair; I don’t think there’s a genetic marker for pink locks. But the overwhelming lesson of Storks is simple: Don’t be asking where things come from. The answers may upset you.