Josh Gad Discusses His Film, "Beauty And The Beast"

[Music] My dear Bell was so ahead of your time this is a small village you are the worst gorgeous thing I've ever seen nobody deserves and it's small-minded as well that small also means safe we've come to my father Conan's the light look a girl who said that ello you can talk of course it's what the other does [Music] how lovely to make your acquaintance what does he do a trade that's from the last pack of fools the must our new men's are beasts forever and we become and truth [Music] you have to help me you have to stand if she is the one will break the spell you must finally learn to love have you really read every one of these books some of them are in Greek who [Applause] thank you thank you guys for trudging through the snow it's crazy out there thanks so much for being here I had no choice but thank you to you this is part of your contractual obligation no I'm always loved coming here how this movie is so good by the way I'm not just saying that so many times you have to go out and promote a movie that you hate and this is not what I know did we do that together wonder I don't know maybe no you I love you love everything that you do but Beauty and the Beast no you don't but Beauty and the Beast is one of those I'm so tired of these high chairs I feel like a little fat baby I I really do love this movie I've seen it now three times with an audience and it's so you all look very young so how many of you remember seeing this the original in the theater right like I was 10 years old when I saw this and I remember that sensation of being like oh this is unlike anything I've ever seen and the reason was everybody started applauding these animated characters singing these Howard Ashman Alan Menken songs that are now iconic and at the time I'd never seen anything like that because other than live theater who applauds at the end of like you know in movies and to bring these songs and these characters to life and a now see a new generation and even the older generations respond in the same visceral way that we did it's the coolest thing ever having that memory and that experience of you know sort of being in a theater and watching these songs become iconic and I remember that time to worse for years people were singing be our guest afterwards you know he was in everybody's head it became a kind of pop culture punch line and not a punch line but it sort of like a touchstone for lunch like did you hear the one about be our guest know what I am that's wrong that's the punchline it's just that's it that's the joke were you nervous at all sort of getting involved in this project what made you confident that it would be not just a fresh take on it but also a wonderful lamashtu the original then we'd screw anything you are the nerves when you get that call that they want you they tell you this story actually so I got the call they're like they want you to be in Beauty and the Beast and I'm like oh my god I've always wanted to play Lumiere they're like no they want you to play Lefou I'm like the two-foot tall fat guy who like has his teeth knocked down all the time that's what they want yeah they're seeing nobody else but you know what was so great about it and the reason that I wasn't nervous was Bill Condon our brilliant director yeah you can applaud he's amazing he Chicago I mean everything that he's done has been incredible Dreamgirls and he sat down and we were discussing that we wanted to bring new dimension to all these characters to the story and for me Lefou because so much of his character and comedy comes out of cartoon conceits we wanted it to have a little bit more heart a little bit more specificity and in this version Lefou he's got pathos you know he actually has a conscience and when he sees his you know this guy that he worships in Gaston he start to whip this village up into a frenzy he doesn't just blindly follow he actually starts to wake up and say well is the real beast the one with the fur hiding in the castle or is it the one who's pretending to be like everyone else by my side and I thought that was a really interesting question to ask and again it's one of the many nuances in our film that take everything that you fell in love with in the 91 original but build on those moments yeah I would say that Lefou isn't the only character who gets as kind of a pathos a twist in terms of and added pathos you think about Gaston himself and his narcissism in this one and it's far beyond the the original film it feels like Bill Condon and everybody involved really wanted to push the ideas that were alluded to in the first film yeah everybody's story has new dimension how good is Luke Evans by the way I mean like you saw I got to set my guy he's a great guy I I got to set and I was like well you know this is the cast like this really good-looking guy who can do all these stunts but I'm the singer I got that going for me and then he opens his mouth and he's like Pavarotti and I'm like just be your to patrol sidekick that's me and I was you know it's it's amazing working with so many talented people like Luke like Emma Watson who is just BA I mean she's incredible Dan Stevens Stanley Tucci Sir Ian McKellen Emma Thompson I mean your mouth gets tired after a while like everybody in this movie everybody in this movie is remarkable and that was important that was one of the many reasons I wanted to be a part of it because when you have an amazing group of actors like this you know they're not gonna let you down they're all gonna bring something new to the equation that's what you have to do you can't just rely on the audience's memories you know for their nostalgia factor you want to give the audience a new experience while also honoring everything that they expect to see so you can't do this movie without the songs right but you have to add new songs which Alan Menken and Tim Rice did and you know you want to see all of the characters that you love but you want to find out why the Beast has a great new backstory where you learn sort of how he got this one Belle's got an incredible back story and the thing that's remarkable about Belle as a father of two little girls you know she is such an incredible role model for boys and girls I mean this is a good you have a girl in Belle in this version of Bell who is whip-smart she is the heroine she saves the Beast multiple times he's kind of a wuss like she like gets him out of like danger over and over and over again and her superpower so to speak is that she's an avid reader she reads non-stop so all of that like all of the dimensions that these characters now have it just adds a great texture to the whole piece how important was all of that for you to be a part of getting into this project and in the sense of how much of a role model Bella is how much did that excite you well I mean all of it excited me because it was you know it was a part of the bigger picture which was okay we have this this burden this huge task to again celebrate the movie that everybody loves but add new layers to it so the first that we did this table read which has now become sort of the stuff of lore and it was in that moment that I realized oh wow we've got something really special because you saw everyone tap into that same narrative you saw everyone tap into that same idea that we were all working towards the same goal and that I think is what got us all behind it in a way where we're like okay we know what the task is and we know how to do it now you're a huge musical fan you got you know for lack of a better argument you got your start in musicals a Book of Mormon just propelled thank you Beauty and the Beast obviously a much different kind of seeing audience sanity you know two-year-olds love Book of Mormon love hasa diga II bow I they'll just jam in their little their little tie Peas so how's that sadeghi boy mommy I think I made a pop pop do you miss being able to do a kind of r-rated musical like Book of Mormon do you think you'll ever get the chance to do something like that again it's so I mean it is a rarity but I love that experience and and you know to do something like that again especially with Trey and Matt and who knows maybe one day they'll be a movie and you know that that'll be something to working on I haven't they've been sort of working on that for a while it's none of your damn business there's uh that information will be released when they're ready to release it I got your back Trey hey Matt never gonna interview me again there no there's uh there's talk there's chatter we'll see I I imagine it's incredibly difficult for them to sort of decide to do it because they wanted to be perfect in the woods that's the show is still on this uh it's a huge success still like what if you put a movie out where now people can say well instead of going to New York and pain to see the show I'll just rent this movie on now exactly exactly so but it to answer your first question I would love to do I would love to do more musicals you know I've been very blessed that between Spelling Bee and Book of Mormon frozen and now Beauty and the Beast I've had a chance to use those skills and that skill set and I and I would love and welcome the opportunity and now with the success of lala land and hopefully Beauty and the Beast I have a feeling Hollywood is gonna make more of these I really do and I hope yeah I hope that they do is I think audiences walk all of those performances that you're talking about in these musicals are you know they're big performances because they have to because they're musicals but I'm curious about a show that you did with Billy Crystal where the performance was much smaller much more subtle and the humor was based off of very small nuances between these two guys was a show called the comedian's it was on FX you did it for one season I think I thought it was so fantastic and and funny and forth that was our choice we were like no we just want one year's worth of paychecks and we're out a story the British thing we'll just do like a season be done know if we had the best time Billy Crystal is one of my idols learning from him working opposite him getting to play in that canvas and what was so great about that show and it's amazing how many people now come up to me in hindsight and go that was one of my favorite shows it felt so personal it was so personal especially for Billy because I think he showed a side of himself that you know people haven't seen which was very vulnerable and beautiful and nuanced a very intense self-awareness yes not to it had to have that and that for me was such a joy to get to play in that you know kind of playground it was it sorry I keep interrupting Oh Larry Charles that directed those was Larry Charles Curb Your Enthusiasm bourret brilliant man yeah he directed pretty much every episode and we have the time of our lives and I hope to work with Billy one day again how did you guys develop the the story of that show because what felt so personal about that show was it felt like the two of you got in a room and we're like well these are the things that some of the detractors say about me and these are the things that some of the detractors say about me so let's feed off of that and make our characters essentially that that was exactly it I mean I'm I genuinely I'm not just saying I'm a nice guy to a fault and I had to be sort of a monster version of myself on that show where it's just ego driven and it was sort of like my wife would look at me and go who are you is this real and so tapping into those things is scary but you know you do you sit down and you go you look at the writers and you say make fun of me do it like do whatever do your worst and I'll do my best with that and you know that was so cool so do you miss getting the chance I mean that's the first time that I've really gotten to see you play apart like that you know because you're so good at musicals and you're so good doing sort of broad comedy and broad storytelling it was amazing to see you do something so sort of subtle and tuned in yeah you know there's it's funny because at this point in my career I'm looking for more opportunities and you know my next couple of films I think are gonna be a nice change of pace for my audience I'm doing Murder on the Orient Express which is an amazing period film directed by Ken Branagh starring Johnny Depp Judi Dench Michelle Pfeiffer Willem Dafoe Penelope Cruz Daisy Ridley it's crazy nothing casted so I call I call them the B group and then I'm doing another movie that's a drama another period drama with chadwick boseman which is a remarkable film about Marshall Thurgood Marshall and that's coming out and that story couldn't be more relevant than ever and we're so excited to share with everyone this October so yeah they're there's a lot of great stuff in the pipeline but in the interim Beauty and the Beast is it's everything you hoped it would be and more and I'm again I'm not just saying that I I've seen it now probably like 10 times and it's still as entertaining as the first time I saw it and I can't wait for all of you to see it this weekend okay so I'm kind of obsessed with you I just love everything you've done and I'm just like I'm such a huge fan but I just want to know what is your real preparation like when you originate a role like elder Cunningham and Olaf versus kind of recreating a role that we all kind of know and love that's a great question for elder Cunningham I sort of you know I love playing characters that have like a naivete because I just think that that's so funny so cunningham is a bull in a china shop and i sort of base it on someone that i know not the bull in a china shop but the sort of wide-eyed one I've never actually said this I'm gonna say this right now and I apologize but I based it on one of my closest friends Rory O'Malley do you know Rory O'Malley so we're malee was in Book of Mormon with me and he's got this gee-whiz kind of Cleveland thing going and so like I took that and I made it like times a thousand for cutting him so he comes in and he's like you know he's kind of crazy that's not Rory but there was that seed Olaf was more that that childlike thing so the first day I sat with the producers and the directors I said you know what like I feel like the energy is a kid who's discovering the world for the first time that's it so you get that hi I'm Olaf and I like warm hugs and it's that sort of like you know that that thing that I think we all recognize where we at some point or other in your life you have that wonderment the sky's the limit and and that's the sunshine that I wanted no pun intended that I wanted him to embody when you're recreating a role like Jack Nicholson in the shining most terrifying I don't know what I was doing that day probably the same thing I was doing backstage today come on in nothing Bad's gonna happen here you know you you know that you have you know that you have to honor what came before but at the same time you have to give it a new life you can't do the same thing so hopefully when you see the film you'll love the original of foo as much as you ever did but you'll have a different love for this Lefou because I do think that there are two sides of a different color what I like to say is in the original you guys hey welcome we're almost done but you're ready for the next interview it's gonna be great Jonah Hill is about to get here any minute so so you know you you were the place that we started as I said to Bill if lafoon the original is dumb as a box what if we made him dumb as a fox meaning he's actually smarter than he lets on and he still got some of the same texture that he had in the original but I wanted to expand that canvas thank you next question great we're gonna take a question from an online viewer so Madison would like to know is the song recording process different for a movie musical versus Broadway or animations Thank You Madison for asking that question shame on you for not showing your face today you coward [Laughter] teasing Madison the preparation is the preparation is the preparation you got a you know you got to bring life to a song that is on Broadway in the same way you have to bring life to a song that's you know on film but for Book of Mormon every day I have to rest because I've got to do you know when you're singing man up you got a man up you're frying your chords you know so you better come ready to play sometimes twice a day when I'm doing in summer uh you know I'm in a recording studio I have the luxury of being able to do it over and over again until I get it exactly right you know but I still got to be able to go and some are for like a little kid who's like what are you doing for me and I'm gonna be like no come to the recording studio and then you can hear it like everyone else I got it I can't do that there's small part of you that one day was just there's there's a very large part of me that would love to go up to a four year old and just be like what was that oh no you pay for the album like everyone else [Laughter] horrible breaking dreams pause pause just kidding just kidding you can pirate it little guy refusing missing live for him and then cast on Gaston was was crazy because it was the opposite I had to record the song first here's a problem with that Luke and I are both musical theater guys so when you're singing and dancing if those two things aren't you can't lip-sync your way through that song you just can't be like it just won't work so every take for three days in a row Luke and I sang that number live despite the fact that the recording was done and what they did that was brilliant was they mic tuss so a lot you can't tell where the differences are but a lot of what you hear in the song especially the ending of the song that was all improv and a lot of those nuances in the song were captured in the moment so that's the main difference Josh I gotta let you go but Beauty and the Beast comes out this weekend March 17th it's phenomenal congratulations thank you so much guys you guys are amazing I've hurt you Josh GAD everybody [Applause] [Music]

Channel: BUILD Series

Views: 14,836

Keywords: AOL Advertising, BUILDseriesNYC, AOL Inc, AOL, AOLBUILD, #Aolbuild, build speaker series, build, aol build, content, aolbuildlive, BUILDSeriesNYC, Josh Gad, Beauty and the Beast, 2017, entertainment, live action, LeFou, character, Disney, movie, family, fantasy, musical, Emma Watson, Dan Stevens, Luke Evans, Ewan McGregor, Kevin Kline, Emma Thompson, Audra McDonald, Stanley Tucci, Walt Disney Pictures, Mandeville Films, actor, GrammyWin, Olaf, Frozen, The Angry Birds Movie, Chuck, 1600 Penn

Id: atDzycNvtIM

Length: 23min 43sec (1423 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 15 2017