Shooting a scene alongside Seth Rogen and Ray Liotta has got to be the apex of my acting career …
Actually, the only acting I’ve done. As I pretended to shop for lotion at a mall kiosk (a role I’ve dubbed Lotion Shopper #1), the real actors worked their magic on the other side. Did they know I was there? It’s hard to say.
Along with a few other journalists, I was invited to visit the set of the new Seth Rogen movie Observe and Report–the story of Ronnie (Rogen), a mall cop whose post and power are threatened when a crime spree takes place in the mall. While he can only “observe and report” the real police, including Detective Harrison (Liotta), have all the authority.
Fresh off the success of his first film, Foot Fist Way, director Jody Hill transformed a “dead mall” (if you don’t count a few remaining stores like Dillards and Bed Bath and Beyond) in Albuquerque, New Mexico into Forest Ridge Mall somewhere in the Carolinas.
The food court alone had me fooled. Toast and Bun, Banzai Banana and Sub Atomic weren’t familiar names, but the fake food strewn on the counters looked like the real deal.
A stroll down the mall corridor proved the same: Window dressings–such as Curvaceous Lingerie, Zoo Town and Dress Right–would have made any mall proud. It turns out those were all fake, too!
The set visit was all about “observing and reporting” for me as well and when the time comes, I will have secrets from the scene, interviews and more to divulge. Stay tuned…
Observe and Report is slated for release in spring 2009
