Paul Feig Can’t Understand Why Adults Want to Be Kids

Published by Interrobang Staff at June 10, 2015

Director Paul Feig poses for photographers upon arrival for the European premiere of Spy at the Odeon West End in central London, Wednesday, May 27, 2015. (Photo by Joel Ryan/Invision/AP)

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(Photo by Joel Ryan/Invision/AP)

Paul Feig wrote and directed the biggest comedy of the summer so far– “Spy” starring Melissa McCarthy and Jason Statham. Last week Feig stopped by the SiriusXM studios to sit down with Ron Bennington and Gail Bennington to talk about the movie. Feig talked about some of the reasons his films succeed in areas where others may not, stressing the importance of trusting your performers, using logic in physical comedy, and guarding tone. He also discussed why chick flicks fail, the return of strong women to the silver screen, and addressed the question of why so many adults want to “grow down” instead of act like grown ups. Feig can’t understand the desire for adults to act like kids. In fact, he said, he can’t remember a time when he didn’t want to be an adult.

“I feel our society has gotten so odd with… everyone wants to be young and be a teenager,” Feig said. “When I was young I would look at adults and go – I want to be that!” He said he would watch television and see that Darren Stevens would come home and mix a martini and he would wonder “when can i do that? That looks awesome.”

“I feel our society has gotten so odd with… everyone wants to be young and be a teenager.When I was young I would look at adults and go – I want to be that!”

The always stylish, Feig remembered being just eight years old when a Groucho Marx biography he’d read inspired him to want to shop for an expensive suit. The Marx bio talked about how Groucho didn’t trust men who didn’t dress up, so young Paul decided he needed a suit. “My father would be furious cause I was like eight years old with an expensive suit that I’m going to grow out of,” he said, “but it never left me.”

Which is of course the exact opposite of today’s prevailing culture, where adults want to rediscover their childhood and continue enjoying toys, games, and moves aimed at young adults well into their middle ages. Paul would rather wear suits, eat oysters, have cocktails and travel the world. He recalled another early childhood memory of wishing he were a grown up, calling it an important moment.

“I remember like a key moment in my life, I was like, I don’t know five? Maybe? And my parents took me to Vegas,” he said. “And these were the days where people dressed up in Vegas and kids couldn’t even look at the casino. You couldn’t get near it. And so they were going in to see one of the Muhammed Ali fights, and I was all excited and then they put me in a nursery while they went to do this thing. It was the cruelest nursery every because it was a big glass door that looked out onto the entire casino floor. And I remember being in there, like why the fuck am I in here with all these kids? Look at those people dressed up and they’re drinking. And I was like, as God is my witness, I will be in that room one day.”

Feig even wishes that there were more ‘adult’ oriented places to go. Supper clubs, and places where a gentleman could wear a tuxedo and stay up all night watching the floor show just aren’t around anymore. And you can see his love for those kinds of experiences in his latest film. “That’s why I wanted to do Spy,” he told Bennington. “All of my movies and projects have been so working class that I was like, I want to do something where people dress up and we get to go to international locales, and shoot all that stuff. But then put a real person who hasn’t been in that situation in there so you can have fun with it and make fun of it.”