After a long career in front of the camera, Jason Bateman makes his directorial debut this month with Bad Words, the story of a middle-aged loser who finds a loophole that allows him to enter an eighth-grade spelling bee, terrorizing children along the way. The story comes from screenwriter Andrew Dodge, who took a few minutes to chat with us via telephone about his experience writing the film and working alongside Bateman during production.
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I was excited to read that your inspiration for this film came from watching Spellbound. That’s a documentary that I really enjoyed. Can you tell me a little about that?
Well, I saw the documentary, and it’s that, matched with [the fact that] I did high school debate. I felt that high school debate had all the same kind of herbs and spices that the spelling bee world has. You have high functioning kids, you have helicopter parents, multi-million dollar programs, coaches, that kind of thing. So I was watching the kids in Spellbound, and I thought “those kids are fucking weirdos.”
And it was kind of a funny notion, because on one hand they’re adorable, and they’re trying their hardest, and yet they’re also a little awkward. And then it occurred to me: I was a fucking weirdo. I was the same type of kid in debate. And then the notion hit me: what would it be like if adult me terrorized young me? And that’s how it all started to blossom for me.
When the film first went into production, was there ever any consideration given to approaching Scripps Spelling Bee and getting them involved?
You know, I’m not even sure. The script was originally set in Washington D.C. and Jason, after reading it, decided that was one of the things that he wanted to change, he wanted to locate it in L.A. For the type of movie that it was, we could get talent to come in a lot easier if we weren’t having to fly them and keep them in Washington D.C.
I don’t think we would’ve ever gotten the blessing from Scripps, and it was far more interesting to develop our own spelling bee institute, and hypothesize that it’s far dustier and older than the Scripps institute. I don’t believe this made it into the movie, but I remember writing a line that Bowman says, where he kind of chafes at the idea that some highfalutin new spelling bee group would air their bee on a sports channel. I liked the idea of an older, dustier institute.
When you were writing the script, did you have anyone in mind for the leading roles?
When I write, I make it a habit not to imagine anybody currently working. Chances are, you’re not going to get that person, and it could create a little bit of a bottleneck in your brain if you have to start writing for them, because you’ve spent so long imagining somebody else.
So what I do is, I imagine Jack Lemmon as the lead in anything that I write, for the most part – just the young Jack Lemmon with a modern day sensibility – and it seems to work fine for me. That way, when I make the transition and somebody jumps onboard a project I’m writing, it’s not as hard for me to switch gears.
You obviously can’t have young Jack Lemmon, so you don’t feel nearly as disappointed.
[laughs] That’s right.
How did Jason Bateman get involved? Did he come to you?
Yeah, he approached me. It was all nearly in the same moment where I learned that Mason Novick, one of the producers on the project, was interested in it. Then I got a call from my manager telling me that Jason was interested in directing it, and because it was all sort of happening at the same time, I actually met both of them at once. It was over lunch, and I ordered a salad and I didn’t touch it, because I was just gobsmacked that these two people were telling me that they wanted to do my film.
That has to feel awesome. This is your first screenplay, right?
Yeah, it was beyond awesome. I thought after that meeting I might catch the flu, because I had so much adrenaline going through my body, I thought once I came down everything was going to invade me. [laughs]
Jason Bateman is obviously a fantastic comedic talent, and well known for his ability to ad-lib and improv and come up with material on the fly. That being said, how close is the finished film to the script that you wrote?
What Jason and I did is, right before shooting we went through the piece, to kind of collaborate with the jokes and make them as strong and outrageous as we possibly could. So there was a lot of new thinking during that session, we spent about a week doing that, which was just great. He’s throwing stuff at me, I’m throwing stuff at him, and it all just kind of ends up in this wonderful, nasty cocktail.
It’s really close to what was envisioned on the page. Of course, when you have Kathryn Hahn and Jason, it’s inevitable that you’re going to come up with some pretty rich stuff. I do remember on the page, the second sex scene wasn’t as it ended up onscreen. That was kind of a spur of the moment that Kathryn and Jason did which just had everybody in tears. It was happy Kismet.
Is there anything from the original script that didn’t make it to the screen? Anything you’re disappointed about not being brought to life?
This is going to sound like I’m kind of toeing the company line, but everything was so close and seamless, that just didn’t happen with me in this instance. When I showed up on the set of the regional spelling bee, it was so close to what I imagined when I was writing it, it was just un-fucking-believable.
I think I looked like a guy possessed, because I was like “where the fuck is the set designer? I’ve gotta talk to them right now, because I’ve gotta tell him he crawled up into my head and pulled something out.” It was all just so close. That, and the way Jason imagined it, the way he shot things, it was all very, very, very close to the way I imagined it. I’m a lucky guy.
Bad Words premiered at the Toronto International Film Fest and got great reviews. Are you expecting a similar response going forward?
Well, it’s dangerous to expect anything in this business. [laughs] I’m hoping. I’ve seen it in front of an audience a few times now, and the response is always really strong, so I can only hope that it will continue to be strong. It’s like crack for me, I love hearing a big audience reaction, and truth be told it doesn’t happen that often when you go to the movies nowadays. I really feel proud that Jason and I were able to bring something that hopefully will elicit that from audiences all over.
I’ve seen the film compared to Bad Santa and Bad Teacher, and some people would even say that Bad Words is the final installment of an unofficial trilogy. How do you feel about those comparisons?
[laughs] Look, they’re all movies that got made, so I’m proud to be able to say “hey, I got a movie made.” The thing is, when I came up with the title for Bad Words, as well as the tone and everything else, I didn’t have either of those movies in mind. I’m a big fan of the filmmakers of Bad Teacher, and especially Bad Santa – I think it’s a Christmas classic – but when I came up with the title for Bad Words, I wasn’t trying to add another film into the pantheon of Bad movies, where you have misanthropic assholes turning people’s lives upside down.
It really was a title pointing to an expression: “bad words.” Kids use it all the time, and it was kind of paying homage to the undertone of the idea of kids expressing themselves using bad words. I had a whole conversation with my daughters, kind of close to the conversation during the mini-bar scene, where Guy is trying to get Chaitanya to use a bad word. So it really was just an honest, straightforward title.
With Bad Words opening, you’re probably starting to look down the road and set your sights on future projects. What can you tell me about this movie you’re writing with Peter Dinklage?
[laughs] Well, I got a call from my manager, and he told me about Disruption, this production company over at Paramount that has a relationship with Peter Dinkage. And my manager said said “Peter Dinklage wants to play a leprechaun.” And I fucking freaked out, and after I picked myself up off the floor, I was like “I’ve gotta make sure I get this gig, I’ve gotta make sure I come up with something.” They didn’t really have a story, they just knew he wanted to play a leprechaun, and he wanted it to be [R-rated], which is just magic to my ears.
I loved Peter Dinklage so, so much, way before this opportunity, so I seized it. I knew when I pitched him my take, my story, in the first 30 seconds I would either win him or lose him. Thankfully, I won him over. It’s very foul. I’ll just leave you with that, it’s very, very foul.
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Bad Words hits theaters everywhere on March 21.