The actors who brought the characters in Pixar’s Inside Out to life assembled for a press conference on Sunday, June 7 and had a funny and freewheeling discussion about the film which opens Friday.
Amy Poehler (Joy), Bill Hader (Fear), Mindy Kaling (Disgust), Lewis Black (Anger) and Phyllis Smith (Sadness) answered questions, talked over each other, engaged in comedic banter and even sang at one point.
Question: What was it like for you all when you read the screenplay to wrap your head around the scope of what was going on in this movie?
Phyllis Smith: Okay, I was – as always I’m speechless – no, I was very excited to get the call and it – I really don’t know the magnitude of it even now. I don’t believe – I was just really happy to go to Emeryville and have Pete and Jonas tell me the story and see the pictures and immediately without a beat, without missing a beat I said yes, yes please and I had a great time and I don’t know – take it Bill.
Bill Hader: All right, it was great. I kind of stalked them – Pixar – I went to them. I said, “I wanna take a tour of Pixar.” This was back in 2010 – I’m a giant fan, so I just said, “Can I please take a tour?” And I went around and I met Pete and Jonas and there was actually a scene – has everyone seen the movie? Everyone in here has seen the movie, right? Because I’m about to blow the ending of the movie; no, the Dream Production they said, “We have this…” They didn’t tell me about the movie – there is a scene in the movie that deals with a live television element. We’d like to come to SNL; and I said, “Come to SNL.” And they hung out at SNL for a week for reference of that sequence and so they let me come and hang out at Pixar as a thank you and then kind of really – “Do you want Fear?” and I said, “Sure.” It worked.
Amy Poehler: I came to the project later and they have done so much work already and a lot of people had already recorded, so I kind of got this PowerPoint presentation of what the idea was and I couldn’t believe it was – the setting was the mind of and 11-year-old girl. I just loved that that was the setting. I just thought – I honestly believe from the minute they told me the idea I was like “This film is gonna be the best Pixar movie ever made, and it’s gonna make the most money and it’s gonna win an Oscar;” that’s what I thought from the minute – I’m sorry but not to be – but from the minute they told me I was like this is the best movie ever made, and it will be the only good movie I’ve ever been in and I can’t believe I’m in it. So I just thought about this day, I actually thought about the day when the film came out because as you can tell, I’m kind of a pessimist when it comes to these things.
Lewis Black: Apparently – I found out – I was like the first one cast so I was really the tipping point as soon as the others heard I was in it, they couldn’t wait to be with me.
Bill Hader: Yes, they said, “You wanna be in a Lewis Black movie?” And I went “Yes.” And they said. “You got to go out to Pixar.” “Oh, Pixar is doing it, oh boy.”
Lewis Black: But they did send me a box – I have to say they showed – you never see this in this city or really in this industry, but the humility that is really almost psychotic because they sent me a box of stuff with a letter in which they said that I may not know who Pixar is -which meant that they were crazy or they thought I was just some sort of a recluse. So they said that they had this role of Anger -well, that fit – and would I be interested in it? And maybe if I didn’t know them, then they sent me all their stuff; all these things that I’ve seen.
Bill Hader: They sent you their reel?
Lewis Black: They sent me everything and a big nice book – I think I made out better than any of you and I leapt on it but they also sent me – and I’ve said before – they sent me about a 20 page kind of what they were thinking, a kind of a rough draft of the script and I thought and I read it and I said, “Oh my God, this is going to be a flop and I’m going to be in the worst thing that they’ve ever done and maybe they’ll be something to that in its own special way.” Then I went out there and they’ve already done 12000 changes and I went “OH yeah you’re an idiot Lewis.” And the rest – Like she said – this is crazy what’s going on here.
Mindy Kaling: Well that is really true, it’s almost if Pixar and Pete and Jonas in the experience of working with them it’s like dating a guy. It’s like this really well raised guy that doesn’t know he looks like Tom Brady and has the title of Tom Brady and it’s just like – and we did these other movies and we have these other things and you’re like “I’m in” like why didn’t I –
Amy Poehler: Totally, it’s like “and I’m about your pleasure.”
Mindy Kaling: Yes and “I wanna just make you happy and you feel so honored to be with you” and you say to your friends like – because they don’t have to be that way frequently, much less wonderful organizations teeming with talent treat you much worse and so you’re kind of like “This is great, how do I take advantage of this? It’s really wonderful.”
Bill Hader: They act like it’s a real privilege that they get to do their jobs. It’s like they can’t believe they get to do what they do which is really nice.
Mindy Kaling: Yes and I don’t know if that was so great – you know, a lot of the people hear we have to create our own opportunities or we enjoy doing that, being the orchestrator of own projects and to be part of something where you don’t have to, they want you to collaborate but you need to because the standard of excellence is so high, it’s such a treat.
Question: What you see in yourself that makes it perfect that you play the characters that Pete Docter and the rest of the team wanted you to play; how do you relate to the emotion that you’re playing?
Mindy Kaling: Sure, I think that there’s a – the character discussed has a lot of qualities of a very impatient, judgmental adolescent girl and because I seem to be recurring in playing that role over and over again in my career – she just says the things I say on a really bad day – the thing I really wanna say but then don’t say it. Basically, in my mind the parenthetical role or her lines is “I can’t, I can’t with this;” it’s just like what she’s always thinking.
Lewis Black: For me it’s just that I’ve spent – my family argued all the time, that’s what we did, that was the way we expressed love and it’s always been so – that kind of anger is always kind of being a part of me, and my mother couldn’t cook.
Amy Poehler: Well, I think there are some characteristics of Joy – like just maybe some unrelenting energy and bossiness perhaps that Pete, Jonas and Ronnie thought I could pull off, maybe from the other characters that I’ve played and I do think she just likes living in the moment and maybe like to think that I do that too, but I aspire to be more like Joy and I think that characters in the film get all of the range of emotions. Everybody feels anger, fear, sadness, joy; each in their own journey. Bill?
Bill Hader: I think yes, I’m a big wimp, I don’t know. “I guess he needs to play Fear.”
Phyllis Smith: Likewise I’m just a mess and I’m a real sad sack. I sit around and mope all day and I think they saw that effervescent side of me and decided to hone in on it. No, it’s actually my insecurities that I think they – you know, those little quirks that I have – that Pete was able to glean out of me so – yes.
Question: If you could play another emotion, what would it be and why?
Amy Poehler: I’d like to play Anger. That feels like the one that next to Joy and Sadness – for me is kind of in the driver’s seat and it’s just so funny, Anger is so funny.
Question: But do you ever get angry?
Amy Poehler: (angrily) Of course, what kind of question is that?
Bill Hader: Oh boy. I would say Anger is the fun one, yes, I would like to play Anger. It’s just very therapeutic, you know. I just felt like when I was watching Lewis’ thing I’m like “God it would be nice just to go into work and be like AAAAAAHHHHH!!” Yeah, because when you do a take in a movie you do it, and then you get some breathing room and then you get time to relax and you do it again, but in this they do a series, so they say, “Do a series of that line.” So it’s like “Open the door, open the door; open the door.” And you just start to go crazy so it would be nice to be Anger.
Phyllis Smith: Bill, I wish you would have told me that’s what I was supposed to have done. I didn’t…
Bill Hader: You did the whole scene.
Phyllis Smith: I did the whole scene, yes.
Bill Hader: Oh Phyllis… This is not the place.
Phyllis Smith: Okay great, yes, I’d like to be Angry as well as Disgusted. Yes, Anger and Disgust.
Question: How about you, Lewis?
Lewis Black: Yes Disgust, that’s really my second place. I’m really of the idea of just – I spend a lot of time on the road in restaurants listening to people talk and I’m just – I’m disgusted.
Mindy Kaling: I think I would be Anger. It’s not necessarily socially acceptable to be angry – a woman – and so that would be a fun thing to be able to do.
Phyllis Smith: What does that say about us that we all wanna be angry?
Amy Poehler: No one wants to be Joy, isn’t it interesting?
Bill Hader: Yes, isn’t that weird? “We’re older; we’re bolder, Inside Out 2.”
Question: How surprising was it, this being an animated film, to find out that when the climax of the film comes along, that the core, the emotional center and theme of the movie is sorrow?
Phyllis Smith: I attribute that to the genius of Pete Docter and the writers and they really – they took me on a journey too. I didn’t realize that it was going to have that kind of feeling until the end of the movie and I just love how Joy and Sadness – it shows the importance of your emotions in your life and that’s it is okay to be sad and to have – and Joy just complements it – becomes aware of that too. It’s a really nice moment. So it’s Pete Docter’s fault; it’s all his fault.
Amy Poehler: Yes, Pixar doesn’t patronize their young audience and they don’t underestimate the intelligence of their audience every time, so they keep raising the bar, and also they assume that you and your big brain is gonna show up, and your big heart. They assume you’re gonna take all those things with you when you go see their movies; and you’re so rewarded when you do.
Question: Actually Amy, I wanna ask you, Pete Docter talked about this, about sitting down with him, going through the script and maybe making adjustments to certain things about it. What was that like to do that with Pixar?
Amy Poehler: It was an ability of two – it was awesome. I have a theory that with the exception of a few eccentric geniuses, I feel like most talented people are good collaborators because they are not threatened by other people’s good ideas because they have a million of them. It was awesome and my fear was that Joy would get annoying and apparently she was because no one wanted to be her; that’s okay. That’s okay, but just tracking that and make sure that she’s – you know what I mean – and we talked a lot about that and pitched jokes, ways to walk that line where you weren’t like – she wasn’t driving you crazy.
Question: Of course, the movie is all about feelings and memories, what is a core memory that you have as performer or writer or producer?
Mindy Kaling: Sure, first I’d just like to say that the idea of a core memory – if that something that Pete and Jonas and Ronnie in this movie is making this movie that people say and talk about because if before they named it I didn’t know it, but there are such things as core memory and that’s what so enjoyable about the movie as you’re watching. You’re like “Thank you for putting a name on that now I know.” For me my core memory was that my mother who was my absolute best friend – she was an OB/GYN – when I was very little I would have that thing with my brothers, right? Competitive about spending time with her alone like one on one; that was so important to me, that no one would be around except the two of us. And she came back from work and she was in her scrubs and she had spent the night at the hospital and she had – I grew up in Boston – she had brought home Dunkin Donuts and she had a jelly donut which I’d never seen as a kid, and I sat on her lap in the kitchen and we shared it a jelly donut; so it was like everything I ever wanted in the world was just undivided attention from my mother and to be exposed to this new delicious sweet filled with another sweet. So that to me is like such an important core memory.
Question: I was wondering for you ladies as producers and writers, would you ever consider doing an animated film or just even start something like a brain trust to come up with more great ideas for more diversity?
Amy Poehler: That seems like a lot of work, but yes.
Mindy Kaling: Amy with Smart Girls is already doing something that’s so wonderful. She has six full-time jobs but I love about what she’s doing is she’s – and this is important to me also – but what I’ve love is that she wants to give young girls a voice and I think it’s great. The hardest thing about when you start creating your own material and you’re a woman, it’s like all the people that I love the most – you’re like they’re so talented and they’re great and then they have their own show like Ellie Kemper, Amy Schumer, Amy Poehler – you’re like they are the best, then it’s like, yes, they’re incredibly busy with their own thing but I mean, I love Amy and I love these opportunities when I get to sit two people away from her.
Amy Poehler: Yes, we don’t always get to work together like that.
Mindy Kaling: Yes of course, the answer is yes.
Amy Poehler: Yes, it’s really cool to have young women like what you do. I really like young women and I love that age girl, that girl that Riley is that moment before you’ve been thrown into the snake pit. Where you’re just like all possibilities and really open faced and just ready for everything and boys are the same way too. It’s just that great time – I feel like as an adult you’re just trying to always get back to it. It’s like magic hour and I think we both have a lot of love for those – that age and it’s really nice if that age – if anything we do resonates with people that age; it’s really nice.
Question: Pixar characters tend to have a long life beyond the initial film itself, with this one assigning emotions to characters as a physical embodiment, particularly for kids with special needs, I think this is gonna be a big deal. Going forward, are you guys prepared for that kind of – like a scene where you’re thinking about that, when you were doing your voice or…?
Amy Poehler: That’s really cool; really. I hadn’t put that perspective on it…
Lewis Black: I was thinking about lunch.
Amy Poehler: I’m happy to represent Joy until someone tells me to stop. That’s not a bad job.
Phyllis Smith: And I’m very happy to be Sad, so…
Question: Like so many Disney and Pixar movies, this one is going to be very important to kids who see it and grow up with it and revisit it over and over. I’m curious, what are the Disney or Pixar movies that are really tied up in your emotions, the ones that you fell in love with it as children?
Bill Hader: Up – the other movie that Pete and Jonas did, Up – by far was just unreal; I thought it was really great.
Amy Poehler: Disney and Pixar, what about a Disney film like a –
Bill Hader: A Disney movie?
Amy Poehler: What about when you were a child, Bill?
Bill Hader: When I was a child? When I was a child…
Amy Poehler: Yes.
Bill Hader: You remember that Ichabod Crane Disney one – do you remember that? That was it; yes, I dressed up like Ichabod Crane for Halloween like for four years in a row because I was obsessed with that. It was great. This was a couple of years ago.
Phyllis Smith: I’m just an Up person as well as – I date myself but it’s like Cinderella and the older Disney ones.
Amy Poehler: Yes, I think it was Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, Snow White… All those; I loved Cruella De Vil, right? She’s a funny character. A meaty character part for a woman, Cruella De Vil. May we all get to our Cruella De Vil stage, in a manner of months and now that I have kids, watching Pixar movies with them, they love them all. I love Wall – E, it’s like one of – I just love the first 35 minutes of no talking. Again, like the audacity, to make a movie like that. It’s like the big risk, big reward philosophy of Pixar. This film is really high concept and every film right now is going external, everything is about made up stakes – the world is ending and super heroes, you have to get the diamond from the computer chip place…
Bill Hader: (Action hero voice) We got to get the diamond from the computer – (Announcer voice) they had to get the diamond from the computer chip place, Matthew McConaughey. You got to get the diamond from the computer chip place or the world is gonna turn into an ice ball, Christopher Nolan.
Amy Poehler: Christopher Nolan; ice ball yeah.
Bill Hader: Ice ball diamond computer chip store; sorry.
Amy Poehler: So all those movies which- I know a lot about obviously, no they’re all – it’s so bad ass that Pixar went in. You know Pixar was like “You wanna see some dangerous stuff? Why don’t you go inside someone’s mind? Do you wanna see stuff like a terrain that you live in everyday but know nothing about how it looks? We’ll tell you.” Like Mindy said, this is what this is called now. So it’s really – anyway.
Bill Hader: That’s what Pete is good at too, he’s such a – it’s like a real artist, it’s not a pandery kind of thing – Up, it’s like an old man who ties balloons to his house, and is one of the most beautiful films I’ve ever seen and it’s an expression of him, and he saw his daughter going to this thing and so what’s going on with that? And it just came out of him in this way, and that they – that’s what so great about Pixar is that they trust their vision.
Mindy Kaling: Up really made me feel – I guess a writer – thinking like you can do anything and as you get older that it’s harder to find movies that do that. You see things that you’re like “That was great and I could see how you could do that.” To not see the process is – those were really the things that stay with you. We were saying this earlier is that there are some artists were certain – Pixar, the Coen brothers, Alexander Paine where no matter what they do you’re like I’m in – and Pete Docter is one of those types of people that when I saw up I felt that, and so this is a dream come true. Disney when I was younger, since I bear no passing resemblance to any princesses is hard to really attach to them; but I really liked Robin Hood as portrayed by a fox and I thought that he was very dashing and while not human, I had a crush on him. Is that okay to say? Is that all right to say?
Amy Poehler: That’s all right to say.
Mindy Kaling: Okay, thanks Amy.
Amy Poehler: Yes, hold on I just checked; yes fine, not weird.
Bill Hader: They endorse that.
Lewis Black: I was never a child.
Bill Hader: You came out like this.
Lewis Black: My mother carried me until I was 27. No, Up, had a big effect. Up just irritated me because it was like – I was old enough at that point to go “Yes, you know what I wanna do for the next couple of hours is confront death; that’s kind of a fun thing for me to think about.” Someone who’s spending his whole life avoiding thinking about it and if it’s literally like oh boy, I’m gonna die. And the big one for me was – the Disney ones – was Fantasia because that was the one that made me go “I can’t wait to do whatever it is they’re doing.” You could laugh at that, that’s funny.
Amy Poehler: Got it.
Lewis Black: Wow guys, seriously? What room am I in? I’m in California. I’m going home. Really? It’s unbelievable.
Bill Hader: Come on you guys, right? It’s Fantasia.
Lewis Black: You go “Well, should I laugh – I’m not sure.”
Bill Hader: I think we have another one.
Question: As you all just have shown, you have excellent experience with improvisation and I was wondering if you had that opportunity in the recording studio to improvise on the characters and the dialog, and if so, how much of that made it into the final cut?
Bill Hader: We all record by our selves so that’s – you know, we’re just alone. Actually, Mindy and I figured this out that we’re all actually reading with Pete usually so in the movie, we’re all just responding to Pete. All our characters were basically talking to Pete. I remember there was a part in the movie where I go up – where I said, “I’m taking the coward’s way out,” and I go up a thing. That was in the room and I remember Ronnie del Carmen who’s a genius. Ronnie del Carmen boarded out the sequence in Up, showing the relationship between the two people – we’re talking about that and he’s looking at me just drawing and he goes “So like that?” And he just drew it out the way you see it. It was unreal. I was like “Yes, something like that” and he just did it. Is that what you mean?
Question: Yes, that’s a good one.
Phyllis Smith: Well, I had the privileged of recording with that lady there, with Amy. And we did have a couple of –
Amy Poehler: Yes.
Phyllis Smith: We had like three sessions together and there was –
Bill Hader: You guys got to record together.
Amy Poehler: Yes.
Phyllis Smith: Yes we did.
Amy Poehler: We recorded together.
Bill Hader: What, what?
Phyllis Smith: Yes, yes.
Bill Hader: How was that like, guys? How was that? I guess no one wanted to record with me. How was that getting to record together?
Phyllis Smith: It was great.
Bill Hader: Yes?
Phyllis Smith: Yes it was great.
Bill Hader: All right.
Phyllis Smith: Actually, Amy helped me through some lines.
Bill Hader: She helped you?
Phyllis Smith: Yes, some lines that I might have been having a little trouble with and she gave a suggestion to tweak here or there.
Mindy Kaling: It’s been like Amy and Phyllis have been like really cliquey throughout this process – I can – they are…
Bill Hader: That is so weird. I’m just putting this together that I was…
Mindy Kaling: Pusher, pusher – release. It does, today like Amy was just like, “really?”
Amy Poehler: It’s just that we have some private jokes and we don’t want to tell anybody.
Mindy Kaling: And then they just went on to a movie…
Phyllis Smith: That’s all I’m saying.
Bill Hader: We’re going to Chipotle.
Mindy Kaling: Yes, there was like – there is a scene that’s on at the end of the movie where they come back and we’re like “Guys tell us about your adventure?” And you had to be there. Bing Bong was there…
Bill Hader: Yes, it’s like Mindy, a lot of going outside and closing the door and I would be like “Mindy…”
Phyllis Smith: Speaking of Bing Bong we should take a minute to…
Bill Hader: Richard Kind…
Phyllis Smith: To give a – due respect to Richard Kind…
Mindy Kaling: He’s not dead.
Phyllis Smith: He’s not.
Mindy Kaling: He’s alive.
Amy Poehler: He might argue but his performance is so amazing and the heart breaking…
Bill Hader: They are my favorite moments in the movie.
Amy Poehler: He should be – he is here, up here with us because that character is like…
Bill Hader: Unreal. We had a screening and we all got to watch it together and we all got so emotional during that scene; we just totally lost it.
Amy Poehler: My favorite part was when Bing Bong puts his hands out and says, “I got a good feeling about this one.” And you’re like “Oh my God, childhood is over.” It’s just like he resigns himself to the fact that “I’m not gonna be able to get up there with her.”
Bill Hader: What this scene real quick to it – Amy looking at the memories and Bing Bong, looking at the memories; how good she is in that. That’s the thing so hard with these movies – I go on there and it is really hard if you go “Oh, it’s really easy, you get to go over in your pajamas and record and stuff.” And you don’t; it’s really difficult and you’re channeling everything just through your voice. A lot of times you’re just screaming – I’m just screaming for four hours. But Amy did such a nuanced, beautiful performance in that scene, I thought, it was really, really unreal; right up here.
Question: Amy thank you for bringing up Bing Bong because I was gonna ask you guys, did you – each of you have an imaginary friend growing up? Maybe some of you still have one, but can you share with us any of those memories? I don’t mean you specifically Lewis.
Bill Hader: She pointed to Lewis. Lewis is unreal.
Lewis Black: Let the jury know.
Bill Hader: Yes, let the jury know that she referred to Lewis Black.
Question: Did anybody have one?
Bill Hader: My father.
Amy Poehler: I did not.
Bill Hader: I’m joking.
Question: Bill? Anyone else, no?
Bill Hader: I feel like I was someone else’s imaginary friend.
Amy Poehler: I had an imaginary enemy.
Bill Hader: Who was that?
Amy Poehler: She’s here. No, I’m just kidding.
Lewis Black: She’s right here.
Amy Poehler: Right here.
Lewis Black: You’re sitting on her.
Amy Poehler: She thinks she’s so great. You’re sitting on her.
Lewis Black: You’re sitting on her.
Amy Poehler: No, I didn’t have one, I didn’t have one.
Lewis Black: Yes, I did.
Amy Poehler: You did?
Lewis Black: I did but we used – And so did two other friends of mine and I realized when talking about this that – I’m trying to remember what do I – I don’t really remember much except that we instead of attacking each other kind of thing and making fun of each other, it was all about the imaginary friend. So that my friend’s imaginary friend was silly. So we never attacked each other.
Amy Poehler: Cool, that’s good.
Lewis Black: We created these imaginary – it was weird… Most people would be talking to their imaginary friends but we would use them to beat each other up. It was really strange.
Question: I loved how she had all the different islands – obviously, I think all of us have probably the friendship island or the family island; but I was wondering if you guys have any other kind of fun island. She had hockey or whatever. And then the other thing if you have time is what is something that pops up in head like that gum commercial because I’ve thought of so many things like that and I was “That explains how I keep having “Call Me Maybe” in my head all the time.”
Amy Poehler: Oh, thanks a lot, now we got that one.
Mindy Kaling: If you grew up in the Boston area, The Boston Herald had a number which was 423-4545; that song – I don’t know why – (sings) 4234545.
Amy Poehler: 4234545, yes.
Amy Poehler: Busting moves to it, but The Herald is still around and they may still have that number; I don’t know my own phone number but I have that in my head. I’m sure I hadn’t heard that in a long time. My islands would be, Thousand Island, Fantasy Island, kitchen island, Skull Island…
Lewis Black: Skull Island?
Amy Poehler: And…
Bill Hader: Treasure Island.
Amy Poehler: “Islands in the Stream”… it’s a song – that thing that keeps getting stuck in your head…
Bill Hader: I have “Hot Cross Buns” stuck in my head. My daughter is learning it on the piano right now so it’s 6:00 a.m. and when she gets sad she (mimes sitting at the piano and playing dramatically) and then she goes “I’m the Phantom of the Opera.”
Amy Poehler: She does?
Bill Hader: And plays “Hot Cross Buns,” and my wife and I are just sitting there at the breakfast table and she goes “I can’t believe you guys.” Then she goes in her room and would be like…
Amy Poehler: Oh my God.
Phyllis Smith: How do you beat that? You don’t. Let’s see, my islands are very boring; I have Baseball Island, a lot of Amy’s Islands; I like her islands as well.
Amy Poehler: Yes, come over to mine.
Phyllis Smith: Okay.
Amy Poehler: There’s a tasty treat over there. Mr. Roarke would take good care of you.
Bill Hader: Mr. Roarke – I’ve got to hear Lewis’ mind islands or island.
Lewis Black: Barbecue Island, the pork in a variety of fashions served in all sorts of delightful ways lathered with sauce. That’s a big island and the other is Tahiti.
Amy Poehler: The actual island of Tahiti?
Bill Hader: The actual island of Tahiti is the big part of your personality.
Lewis Black: Big, big, it’s huge.
Bill Hader: Yes.
Lewis Black: That’s where I go. When you look at me and you’re like “Where’s Lewis?” He’s in Tahiti.
Mindy Kaling: You know what that to the answer to question – a little seriously, I think lately like Role Model Island – it’s something that I think of and that I’m okay and it’s good. I think it makes me wanna live my life in a way that I think is inspirational and doesn’t make me feel ashamed of the people in my life; but I’m – yes, that’s one I think about all the time. And then like sleeping, Good Sleep Island –
Bill Hader: Sleep Island.
Mindy Kaling: I think to me is – in my dreams is when I – I’m my best self.
Amy Poehler: Doesn’t that sound good?
Bill Hader: The Shirelles.
Amy Poehler: Yes, on Sleep Island.
Bill Hader: Oh my God. (Hader and Poehler improvise a calypso song about Sleep Island)
Amy Poehler: Some Bossa Nova on Sleep Island, pajamas, cashmere blankets. Just some cozy sleeping on Sleep Island.
Bill Hader: We got the Good Wife on DVR but we don’t have to watch it.
Amy Poehler: We play a little of the opening of Little House on the Prairie with the horses clumping – that puts me to sleep.
Bill Hader: I don’t know.
Question: I don’t know how great this will be, this goes to Bill.
Bill Hader: Right, right.
Amy Poehler: We all know how this is gonna go, Bill.
Bill Hader: Everybody settle in.
Question: This is said with all the love in the world, Bill.
Bill Hader: Oh no, this…
Question: You are the Robert Osborne of film history and classic film to a whole new generation of kids.
Amy Poehler: Here, here.
Question: So if you had to describe to kids what will make Inside Out a classic film that they must see, how would you describe it?
Amy Poehler: No pressure but this is the last question, it’s a killer question and a generation is depending on you.
Mindy Kaling: He looked at me and said this was the only question he cares about. He just texted to me.
Bill Hader: It’s a quote that can change our lives. Oh gosh, we all remember where we were the day Bill Hader described Inside Out for our generation.
That’s what they’re gonna say when I get the presidential medal of freedom. I’ll be like in a wheelchair “I was there when he said what Inside Out meant.” All right, What would make it a great film for children. I think it’s – what’s so great about this movie is that they chose to make a film about a time in your life that we all have to go through – when you go from being young and then you start to go – when you’re an adolescent, things start to change and things start to get a little hard for you and a lot of normal movies don’t talk about that. I wish I had that growing up because I would go through that and you look for answers and you think you’re the only one going through this thing and they did in this film in such a beautiful, fantastical way and that’s why you have to see it. It’s a movie I wish existed – my life would have been a little easier I think if this movie existed when I was a kid. How was that for an answer?
