Asteroid City is Wes Anderson’s 11th film, and is at once a departure for the auteur writer/director and a reliable entry into his filmography. 1950s small-town America is brought to life through the signature surrealist eye of its imaginer, and at once evokes the nuclear era and old Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner cartoons. The film itself is both touching and detached, heartwarming and heartbreaking; its wide-ranging story is ultimately hard to define but certainly best left largely unspoiled.
Faces new and familiar join Asteroid City’s cast of characters, as Anderson has enlisted frequent collaborators well as actors newer to “Wesworld”, as his bubble is apparently called. Two exciting actors on the newer side are Stephen Park (who did appear in The French Dispatch) and Hope Davis. Park was a regular on the iconic sketch series In Living Color in the early 1990s, and Davis was most recently seen on Succession.
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Hope Davis and Stephen Park spoke with Screen Rant about sketch comedy, fan encounters, and more.
Stephen Park & Hope Davis on Asteroid City
Screen Rant: My first question is for Hope. The set of this movie is so unique and beautiful; it's almost otherworldly. I wanted to know what it's like just physically working in that space, and then also who in that space tried to get Succession spoilers from you?
Hope Davis: I think I shot this before I was on Succession, so nobody. I'm not great with time, but I'm pretty sure--because this was shot two years ago. Yeah. It was before I went on succession, but in the last few months, a number of people have been hounding me, and now that it's done, I can relax.
It's amazing to step onto his set. It's so extraordinarily beautiful, the entire thing that Adam Stockhausen created, and that he and Wes designed. You want to move into a little cabin and you never want to leave. You kind of feel like you're dreaming, [as] a long time fan, to actually be on one of his sets. I kept having to pinch myself.
Stephen, I love that you did In Living Color. I was just re-watching some sketches this morning. I'm curious--as someone who just did The French Dispatch and has kind of joined the Wes Anderson ensemble club, does it feel at all like doing sketch comedy [to be] a part of this community of [people who work on] his films?
Stephen Park: Well, sketch comedy is kind of tense. Being in a show like that, there's kind of a level of competition--nothing like working on a Wes Anderson movie. But in terms of the fun, yes. I remember on In Living Color just dying laughing [and] being around the funniest people in the world, so that was really great. Working with Wes, it's different; it's more relaxed, and there's no competition, and we're all supporting each other. Because everybody's already so talented, nobody's, like, working too hard. Everybody is just naturally being their own brilliant self and just being in Wes' atmosphere. Through osmosis, you start to absorb all of this stuff, and you just start to swim in Wesworld. That's what we call it: Wesworld. Everything is different in Wesworld.
Hope Davis: Everything is better there.
Stephen Park: Living in the hotel, you never have to take your wallet out. [Laughs] It's great.
And Hope, you have one of my favorite moments in the movie. It's in the trailer, too. You tell Scarlett Johansson's character "I loved your movie. I don't know why nobody else liked it." As someone who has been in the industry, did that bring you back to any bizarre interactions that you've had?
Hope Davis: That happens to me every single day. Because of the kind of weird span of my career, people will come up to me every single day and they'll say, "How do I know you?" Sometimes I'll say, "I don't know," or sometimes I'll say, "I'm an actor," and sometimes they say, "No, that's not it." But if they say, "What have I seen you in?"... This happened to me the other night with a group of parents. They said, "What have you been in recently?" and I said, "I work a little on Succession." She said, "I hate that show. I can't be with those people."
That was a scene that Wes wrote two-thirds of the way through shooting. He came down to the dinner table at night with this little folded piece of paper, and he said, "I wrote a scene for you and Scarlett, because I feel like we need a little more of Sandy in the movie." I opened that scene, and when I saw that line, "I don't know why nobody else liked it," I mean, every actor has experienced that. It's like, what do people think they're doing when they say that to you? Why do they do that?
Stephen Park: I think people, when they meet an actor, kind of imagine that they're still on the TV set. [They imagine] that they're not really fully there, so they can say insulting things, [and] it's not going to hurt them or something.
Hope Davis: They say, "Oh, you're prettier in person," or "You look so much older on TV." You never know what you're going to get. So generally now when someone approaches me and they say, "How do I know you?" I say I have no idea.
About Asteroid City
Asteroid City is a dot-on-the-map desert town in the American Southwest. The year is 1955. Thetown’s most famous attraction is a gigantic meteor crater and celestial observatory nearby. Thisweekend, the military and astronomers are welcoming five science award-winning children todisplay their inventions. What begins as a celebration to honor the achievements of the Junior Stargazers receives an unexpected visitor.
Check out our other Asteroid City interviews here:
- Maya Hawke & Rupert Friend
Asteroid City will release in select LA and NYC theaters on June 16, with a wide release on June 23.
Key Release Date
- Asteroid CityRelease Date:2023-06-16
