Thank you to STX Entertainment for inviting me to attend a special Bad Moms press event.
Jon Lucas, Suzanne Todd, Scott Moore
The official kick off to the Bad Moms press event started the night before interview day with a cocktail party and screening. We knew about that ahead of time. What we didn’t know was that Flo Rida was there to perform a pop-up concert. “Did you rock it out to Flo Rida? How cool was that?” Producer Suzanne Todd knew he would be the perfect warm up for the night. “Flo Rida is like a dance party in a box or…the best cardio workout. You could just do all Flo Rida, and you’re like, ‘I’m done. Workout finished.'”
Of course it just might also guarantee you have a group of slightly tired bloggers who partied a little bit too hard the night before. But maybe that’s exactly as it should be when you’re talking about a movie brought to you by the writers and directors of The Hangover films. And it’s also why they invented coffee.
So let’s talk about the elephant in the room first. How did two dudes end up making a movie about Bad Moms? “Jon and I are both married, and we both have two kids,” says Scott Moore. “We’re sitting at home…racking our brains, and just watching our wives in this stressed-out life trying to be a great parent…so the inspiration was basically our wives.”
“It’s not super hard to get moms to talk about how they feel about being a mom,” according to Jon Lucas. “The best part about it was I actually feel like I understand my wife far better for the process because so much happens that I don’t notice.”
That’s not to say that they fully understood everything that made it’s way into the movie. The infamous PTA meeting shown in the trailer? “The list of foods you’re not supposed to eat…I don’t understand lists like this. I don’t know why the school sends us things like this. I don’t know why I get 50 e-mails day,” says Lucas.
Of course the movie wasn’t without some girl power behind the scenes. Todd found the script incredibly funny and accurate. “I’ve worked with a lot of people. Obviously, I’ve made a lot of movies….And I loved what they had to say. I love their method of working as directors. I love their language of speaking to each other. And it’s just rare in Hollywood to have people that are really talented and also nice people. And sometimes you make a movie with somebody, and you’re thrown in the trenches, and you spend a lot of time together. When the movie’s over, you can’t wait to not be in their lives anymore. And I really know that Jon and Scott will be in my life forever, and we’ll be friends and work together again. And I loved what they wanted to do with the movie.”
The admiration is mutual. Moore says, “Suzanne, by far, is the best producer we’ve worked with. She’s been incredibly supportive and deals with all the like s****y politics and stuff that you don’t want to deal with or don’t have the bandwidth for. And she’s right. After this movie, I’d love nothing more than to do 10 movies with her. She was great.”
They didn’t make Bad Moms thinking of it as a savvy business venture. “If anything, our agencies tried to talk us off of it a little bit,” says Moore. According to Lucas, “We definitely got the note of, ‘Could you do like, Bad Parents, where there’s like a dad in there so like the men will come.’ And we were like, ‘No, it’s not funny if there’s a dad in there because it’s not about that guy.’ We could do a whole other movie about dads if we wanted to. I don’t think it’s as funny because there are bad dads like everywhere…But, Bad Moms is funny because 99 percent of moms we know are really, really great moms. And so, a bad mom is funny, but a bad dad is not.”
The first inkling they got that they might just be onto something was when they were shooting the PTA party scene. It was pouring rain, they were cramped indoors shooting. And they were having a great time. “Every extra started talking about she couldn’t wait to see the movie. She was happy to work overtime. She didn’t mind being cramped in the rain because every single person thought that was their story,” says Todd.
Some might be surprised at an R-rated film about motherhood, but according to Moore they shouldn’t be. “I think there’s a view of motherhood when you’re not a mom yet that’s way more Hallmark and sweet…No…Being a mom is like three in the morning. There’s s**t on the wall. And there’s a kid cutting you with something. It’s brutal. It’s a war. It’s a physical battle…It’s not pretty and clean and your hair looks great.”
What should you take away from the film? Moore would like you to start by doing less. “Doing less is okay…our wives and all the moms that are in our social circle that I know work so hard, and they do so many things. And is there a way to maybe do 5 percent less and spend 5 percent, maybe, more time taking care of yourself or hanging out with your kids or just having a little more fun in your life? I think it’s gotten so crazy what the expectations are. And again, it makes for great comedy. So, I’m grateful for that. We got a movie out of it. But, it’s irrational how much moms are expected to do.”
Or as Todd puts it “Just do less… Enjoying time with your kids is more important than making the perfect lunch.”
You can spend that 5 percent of time you’re giving back to yourself at the movies when Bad Moms celebrates “Bad Mother’s Day” on July 29 – the Mother’s Day you really want and deserve! Get tickets now: http://www.badmomstickets.com/
Stay in touch with Bad Moms on their Official Website, Facebook , Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest.
You can also check out my interview with Christina Applegate and Annie Mumolo and my interview with Mila Kunis and Kathryn Hahn.