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Alan Arkin on Get Smart
By Fred Topel | Image property of Warner Bros.
Get Smart
Get Smart reunites Little Miss Sunshine's Steve Carell and Oscar winner Alan Arkin. This time, Arkin plays the Chief of Controll, so Maxwell Smart (Carell) is his subordinate. Carell got the last laugh though, literally, when he cracked his "boss" up during a take.
Alan Arkin the Chief
"I'm actually laughing in the movie," Arkin admitted. "There's a shot of me where I'm laughing at you in the movie. I was humiliated beyond my wildest hopes. I remember, it was at the table. You can see me going."
The Second City trained comedian made his own contributions to the film also. "Me, I like to improvise. It's my training, it's my love but on this script, I can honestly say I think I improvised one word, nuclear. That was my one contribution. I was not only bowled over by what [screenwriters] Matt [Ember] and Tom [J. Astle] did, but the development from draft to draft I found really amazing. These guys put in a 40 hour week. Matt told me they go to work at nine and they stop at five. I couldn't believe that. I never knew a writer that did that, except to take a drink once in a while, but these guys don’t seem to do that."
The Chief was previously played by Edward Platt in the original TV series, but Arkin chose not to watch his predecessor. "In making it my own, I made the choice 30 years ago, not watching the show. It was easy. I would have had a fondness for it. If I had seen it, I would have liked it."
Perhaps Arkin was busy honing his improv skills at Second City. "It was the only place, there is no place anymore you're allowed to fail. Failure is now a moral issue. Somehow it's worked its way into that insane place in history but when we were there, the audience came expecting to see 40%, 50% of what they were watching not work. They didn't care. They knew that was part of the process. It was like having 20 years of experience every year. It was amazing and I don't like clubs particularly, organizations but every time there's a meeting between two people, I think that's true of everybody who's ever been to Second City, we're all iconoclasts. You see another person from the group and it's a brotherhood. It's an amazing brotherhood. It's an extraordinary place."
Get Smart is out in theaters now.
For the trailers, posters, stills, review and more movie info, go to the Get Smart Movie Page.
Fred Topel
Sources: Image property of Warner Bros.
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