Seeking Streisand
Advice from elusive singer’s son cinched Guilt Trip movie deal
LOS ANGELES – Think of the casting exercise as searching for Barbra Streisand.
That’s how the Guilt Trip folks felt when they tried to land the elusive Streisand for the mom role opposite Seth Rogen’s son part in the comedy-drama, which opens Wednesday.
As loyal fans know, Streisand doesn’t do many films. She begrudgingly agreed to play Ben Stiller’s mom and Dustin Hoffman’s husband in the 2004 comedy, Meet the Fockers and 2010’s Little Fockers, but she hasn’t starred in a movie since The Mirror Has Two Faces more than 16 years ago.
First, The Guilt Trip director Anne Fletcher and screenwriter Dan Fogelman went to Streisand’s home in Los Angeles for a five-hour cajoling session, then the already-cast Rogen laid on the charm afterward. And still she hesitated.
With Streisand by their side during a Beverly Hills hotel interview, all three agreed they were determined to sign Streisand and probably wouldn’t have made the film if she had ultimately turned them down.
“I was open to Shirley MacLaine,” said Rogen, cackling at his joke. “No, it’s not true.”
One-liners aside, everybody concerned is happy that Streisand finally came around, and that includes Streisand.
In the movie, she portrays Joyce, a stay-at-home mother resigned to her uneventful and lonely life as a widow.
When her son, Andy, heads out on a desperate mission to sell his inventor wares across the country, he persuades her to join him on his travelling salesman adventure. She agrees with humorous results and a few heartwarming revelations.
It’s really a road movie with the mother and son as the comedy team, so without a strong bond between Rogen and Streisand the more intimate sequences would have been difficult to pull off. But both agreed they hit it off almost instantly when they met and continued to enjoy each other’s company on set, too.
“The way they talk in real life is the way they are in the movie,” said Fletcher, who directed the box-office hit The Proposal, which featured another unlikely twosome — Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds.
In fact, Fletcher said she encouraged improvised moments between Rogen and Streisand. And lucky for the film they were up to the difficult task. “They can speak and listen at the same time,” she said of the Guilt Trip headliners.
Certainly, the odd couple is from different movie worlds. Rogen, 30, is noted for his Rrated antics in Knocked Up and Pineapple Express. Streisand, 70, won Oscars as best actress for the musical Funny Girl and picked up another Academy Award for best song, cowriting Evergreen for A Star is Born. She was also nominated for her role opposite Robert Redford in The Way We Were.
Still, their generation gap didn’t hinder them from connecting and communicating the mother-son story.
“What reaches an audience is honesty and truth,” said Streisand. “And when you are acting, I don’t think there is a distinction between comedy and drama.”
Despite being won over by The Guilt Trip’s mix of honest-to-goodness humour and down-to-earth drama, she confessed that it did take her a while to commit.
It was only after Streisand visited her son Jason Gould, who was in the hospital recovering from surgery, that she decided to take the plunge.
“He was very important in my decision to make the movie,” she said.
“He told me, ‘I think you should do it, mom.’ And it clinched the deal.”
Of course, that’s when negotiations began Streisand style. She wanted and received a later-than-usual onset call time of 8:30 a.m. And she didn’t want to work too far from her Malibu house, so the filmmakers set up their base at San Fernando Valley sound stages 45 minutes away.
“I think I made two movies by the time she made up her mind,” added Rogen playfully. Indeed, it sounds like Streisand is a little like the stay-at-home character she plays, which might contribute to the fact that she doesn’t do as many films as she once did; although she did get out of the house for an incredibly successful North American concert tour, Barbra Live, this year.
“Less is more and maybe that keeps the mystery,” said Streisand of her picky ways. “And I do like to stay at home.”
There’s no question when she is at home she’s keeping good care of herself. So, what are her beauty secrets?
“Sitting next to me helps,” said Rogen, looking at Streisand giggling before she tried to answer. “I like the child in me,” she said, “so maybe it reflects in my face.”
In the end, Streisand noted that she’s pleased with The Guilt Trip, which presents a balanced relationship story of two lonely people trying to find themselves.
“It’s a transformative kind of movie,” she said. “It’s a different kind of love story.”
And that’s a straight line Rogen couldn’t resist. “Which to me,” he said, “sounds gross.”