BroBible
Academy Award nominee Mark Wahlberg and Emmy Award winner Paul Walter Hauser join BroBible’s Post Credit Podcast to discuss the 20th anniversary of The Departed, learning from Will Ferrell, mastering the buddy comedy dynamic, the best/worst sports moments of their lives, and more!
Mark Wahlberg and Paul Walter Hauser join BroBible’s Post Credit Podcast to discuss their new buddy comedyBalls Up
What sports moments in their lives would make them join a mob?
Eric Italiano: Folks, today I’m joined by Mark Wahlberg and Paul Walter Hauser for their new film Balls Up, which hits Prime Video on April 15th. Thank you for your time today, gentlemen.
Mark: Thanks for having us.
Eric: I know that you’re both fans of various sports. If you had to pick one sports moment in your life that would have caused you to join a mob, what would it have been?
Paul: Easy. I’m gonna go Nolan Ryan’s fight versus Robin Ventura on the pitching mound — the famous fight where he gets him in a headlock.
Mark: You know, I think any of those Super Bowl moments that we could relive, any of the Celtics when they won the championship — I think it was maybe ’86, ’87 — when everybody stormed the court and Bird was like knocking people down and they’re running after these giant guys. A bunch of drunk people in Boston. But I’ve had so many great moments in sports. You might want to jump in the middle of somebody else’s fight. It could be like Malice at the Palace where they bring the fight to you.
The buddy comedy dynamic and where they took inspiration from
Eric: This is clearly a throwback to a very standard formula of buddy comedies. If you had to pick the greatest buddy comedy pairing, did you guys try to channel them at all, or forge your own path?
Paul: I don’t feel like we channeled anybody. It felt like we had a built-in chemistry and we knew the characters were well written and juxtaposed as opposite people. For me, I really love Charles Grodin and Robert De Niro in Midnight Run.
Mark: Nick Nolte, Eddie Murphy — that’s a great combo. You and Will Ferrell have done what, three movies together? The Daddy’s Home movies and The Other Guys are hilarious.
Learning from Will Ferrell and how to commit to the bit
Eric: Mark, you’re one half of what I consider one of the most iconic buddy comedies of the last 25 years — THE OTHER GUYS. What did working with Will teach you about playing it straight or performing comedy in general?
Mark: Just being comfortable enough in your own skin to let it go, throw caution to the wind, and be fearless enough to try anything. I had always done movies where there were comedic elements — from Boogie Nights through Huckabees and Three Kings — but to do a full-blown comedy was definitely uncharted territory. Working with Will and Adam, they were really nice people who enjoyed making people laugh. It was a very safe environment to try stuff, and it got to the point where you stop worrying about what people think and just commit. If you commit 110%… even this movie with Paul and I, we both get a little bit of straight man and then we both get a little crazy.
Eric: Mark, THE OTHER GUYS has had an incredible second life — it’s more beloved now than when it first came out. Why do you think that is?
Mark: I really don’t know, but if I get called a peacock one more time everywhere I go… it happens a lot.
Eric: You guys kind of trade off and shift between both roles — the straight man and the fool. How do you calibrate that?
Paul: Peter Farrelly kept referencing Sideways when he was watching the footage. He’d say, “You’re kind of Giamatti, you’re kind of Thomas Haden Church.” That’s another road trip comedy where both guys are the fool and at times the straight man — the voice of reason pending the situation. It goes back to what Mark said: playing it honestly rather than trying to be funny. If you play the honesty of the moment — whether you’re high on cocaine, which we are in some scenes, or being attacked by an alligator — it’s going to be funny because the funny’s on the page.
How to oscillate between the goofiest of comedic characters and darkest of drama characters
Eric: Paul, this is obviously your job, but I’m amazed at how you can play both the goofiest and darkest of characters — Black Bird comes to mind. As an actor, is it the same muscle, or are you accessing something completely different depending on where on the drama-comedy spectrum you are?
Paul: Definitely not the same muscle. I think you have to shift mentally. With Black Bird, I’m tapping into something — I don’t know what it’s like to be a serial killer, but I can latch onto loneliness, feeling isolated, feeling underrated, having anger or rage. You find things you can latch onto to make it real, even if it’s an out-there character. But I’d also say — watch Mark in Fear and then Instant Family. Those are two diametrically opposed performances.
Mark: If it’s on the page, you just get the part and become the part. Hopefully the writing is good enough that you can get into that headspace and detach when you’re back in your normal life.
Paul: Didn’t you improvise the line where you scream “open the effing door” to Reese Witherspoon in Fear?
Mark: Yeah — it was kind of an outtake. Jamie Foley put that in the sizzle reel and everybody loved it. When he cut the movie it wasn’t in there, and Brian Grazer goes, “Hey, where’s the moment?” He’s like, “What moment?” “The moment when he screams at the door through the peephole.” Foley goes, “Oh, that — he was just joking around.” Grazer said, “Well, you better put it back in the movie.”
Eric: That’s something my dad showed me when I was like 10. My parents had a habit of showing me stuff way too soon, but that’s why I have this job.
Mark: The same thing happened to me. My dad took me — I was probably 7 — to see Hard Times, the Walter Hill movie with Charles Bronson and James Coburn. He snuck in a six-pack of Schlitz and we sat there and watched it. I saw every movie I wasn’t supposed to. We have that in common for sure.
Which moment from Balls Up was the most difficult to film
Eric: Was there a specific moment filming this where you guys just couldn’t get through it and had to scrape together one usable take?
Mark: For him it had to be the scene with Sacha, right — when he was sticking that gun in your face.
Paul: The interrogation scene with Sacha was really hard. I kept pinching my thigh trying to stay serious. I kept telling myself it’s a real gun, you’re really in this situation — but I’m still looking at Sacha Baron Cohen in a very feminine wig. Innately funny from the get-go.
Eric: Is swallowing a condom full of cocaine the single most absurd use of CGI you’ve ever been a part of?
Mark: No, it was all real — he had no gag reflex.
Paul: It was all CGI. That scene was insane. That was one where you’re reading the page going, “Oh, this day’s coming up.” I was under the impression it was just gonna be Paul, and then there was one on my plate. Peter was like, “Gotta do it, it’s gonna be really funny.” I didn’t want to — but like you said, committing to it is what makes it funny.
Hanging up on Martin Scorsese and the 20th anniversary of THE DEPARTED
Eric: This is the 20th anniversary of THE DEPARTED. I’ve probably seen it 25 times and just watched it again this past week. Your job in that film, to me, was to blow everyone off the screen at all times. How did Marty prime you for that?
Mark: It wasn’t really that he primed me. I was originally in talks to play one of the other roles, and then the studio saw it differently. I got a call from Marty saying how excited he was that I agreed to play Sergeant Dignam — and I was like, I didn’t agree to play Sergeant Dignam. I kind of hung up on him. Then Ari Emanuel, the real Ari Gold, calls me and says, “You can’t hang up on Marty.” I said, “That’s not what we were talking about.” He said please just take another look. I was shooting Four Brothers in Toronto, and when I read it again from Dignam’s perspective, I said I’ll do this as long as he lets me improvise and just go at everybody. And Marty said that’s exactly what he wanted.
Eric: How did you not cross the threshold of Dignam being too much?
Mark: I’ve seen a lot of guys like that — cops and crooks in the neighborhood. I was most familiar with that world. It was kind of a cross between a couple of guys I knew and a little bit of Wojohowicz from Barney Miller — a comedy about detectives, Abe Vigoda, all those people. Great sitcom. I was just going to push it, and every time I did, Marty would always say, “Give him a little more.”
Eric: When you read the script the first time, were you like — ‘He dies, he dies, he dies… Oh, I’m the one who lives!’
Mark: He was a bad guy too, but he was gonna do the right thing by Queenan and the other guys.
Which of their movie characters would they want to get a beer with?
Eric: We ask this of all our guests — which of your characters would be the best to get a beer with?
Mark: Marcus Luttrell. You are gonna get some stories. Goosebumps, tears — you’d be scared as shit.
Paul: I would want to have a drink with the guy from Luckiest Man in America — the movie about the Press Your Luck scandal. That guy Michael was a schemer, he had all these different schemes. It would be fascinating.
Eric: Balls Up is a classic buddy comedy in the tradition of the ones I grew up with. Congrats — Prime Video, April 15th.
Mark/Paul: Thank you, man.
Balls Up, directed by Peter Farrelly, also stars Molly Shannon, Benjamin Bratt, Daniela Melchior, Eric André, and Sacha Baron Cohen, and is now streaming on Prime Video. You can check out the official trailer below.