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Compiled by: Jack Foley
Catherine O'Hara
Q: Miss O’Hara, we must mention your secret talents,
too. How on earth did you come up with the lyrics for the Catheter
Song?!
A: Jim Pittock, who plays my husband, Leonard, had a catalogue
of medical supplies and there was this show at the end of the
movie and Chris said that I would be singing for my husband’s
wares and Jim lent me this catalogue.
And, first of all, I said to Chris: ‘I’d like to write
this song’. And he said sure. Because only Chris can say
go ahead and do it and made me feel like I could. So I just took
the catalogue and went through it, and all those things I mentioned
are real – I hope that none of them will know them personally.
But, buttock scraper, and penis clamp, are real products that
Leonard would be selling. And I sang about them very seriously
and tried to make the music as pretty as possible, because I was
now back in the music world.
Harry Shearer
[Spoiler warning]
Q: Harry, how much input did you have on your character’s
final look in the film? You make a lovely blonde!
A: Thank you very much! Well, that, I think, is a transitional
look for Marta while the hair grows out. The thing about these
pictures is that, as an actor, you have a great deal of involvement
in the look of your character, from start to finish.
Unlike a normal movie, where you arrive in your trailer, and there’s
your wardrobe and they slap on the make-up and maybe consult with
you, but probably don’t, in these movies, you’re invited
to come in and talk to the wardrobe people, the make-up people.
You choose what your character will wear in each scene, so you’re
involved in the choices your character makes long before you start
acting, and you’re thinking as your character thinks. So
when Chris said, ‘we have this idea for the ending’,
after breaking out the champagne, I sat down with the hair lady
and wardrobe lady and said what fascinated me with people who
make that change is not that they end up looking not necessarily
like people in a drag show.
But that people will go through this incredible upheaval in their
lives and then kind of end up, a bit dowdy, a bit ‘mumsyish’,
as you would say, with just a touch of glamour in the wig.
Christopher Guest: Small touch, Harry. [Laughter]
A: Yes, a small touch. But the idea was to walk that line
and leave you wondering, so what was this about?
Christopher Guest: If you don’t know, I could tell
you!
Catherine O’Hara: [Picking up a paper to fan herself]
As a friend of mine once said about someone who was going through
a sex change, why would anyone choose to become a middle-aged
woman. Of course, you don’t choose it.
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Q: How much of an impetus was it for being the people behind
Spinal Tap?
A: None of us are impotent.
Catherine O’Hara: Oh, Harry, you’ve got to stop
talking about that.
Q: Harry, I guess you’re probably better known for your
voice performances than your screen work. Do you have to approach
them differently in the way you work?
A: Obviously, it’s different if you’re doing lines
than if you’re doing improvisation – that’s the
big difference.
Q: But with ‘The Simpsons’, you’re also part
of a large comic ensemble…
A: Yes, and with that show, you are able to listen to each
other most of the time and hear what the performance that precedes
you does, so you can work off that. Because most of the normal
animation, historically it’s been line 47, "I’m
going to lunch!" Line 49, "I’m back!" Without
any sense of what’s been happening in the interim.
Christopher Guest: I like line 47.
A: Thank you. I did my first Disney animated movie and
said: "Why don’t you guys work the way we do, because
you get better performances that way?
And they said: "Yeah, we know. But we work with stars and
they’re not available."
So it just so happens that one of the reasons as to why the show
works is because Jim Brooks decided, when he set it up, that he
wanted people acting, rather than laying down lines, like laying
down tracks.
Q: So are we going to see you at the Royal Albert Hall soon?
A: I would love it. Me personally, I haven’t had as much
fun in my life as I did doing this show with these guys. First
of all, each of us does about three minutes, so I spend two thirds
of the show watching the New Main Street Singers and Mitch and
Mickey, and I have the best seat in the house for that and it’s
amazing.
And then we get to play in addition. Chris is even more laissez
faire with the live show than he is with the movie, so it’s
even more remarkable what people now start bringing in and the
story moves ahead. The story of all these characters has moved
along and you see that in action.
Q: I’m quite intrigued – do you do it in drag now?
A: We all do it as we left it when the movie ended. So yes.
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