Planes
is directed by Klay Hall and stars Dane Cook, Val Kilmer, Anthony
Edwards, Stacy Keach, Cedric The Entertainer, Teri Hatcher, Brad Garrett, Roger Craig Smith, Gabriel Iglesias, Carlos Alazraqui,
Julia Louis-Dreyfus, John Cleese, Priyanka Chopra, Sinbad, Brent Musburger, and Colin Cowherd.
Planes opens
in 3D on August 9th.
“Question: The hero of this is a female character. Normally, in an animated film, it would be a
male character that comes to the aid.
Did you know going in that your character would be such a pivotal part
of it?
TERI
HATCHER: I don’t think I put that
together so much until I actually saw almost the whole movie together. I went in and I did my little sections, and I
knew what was important to the director and John Lasseter. I knew they wanted an earnest, honest,
compassionate person who could truly move Dusty’s character, so that was my
goal. But I didn’t until I stepped back and
went, “Huh. She could’ve been a
boy.” And then, I started to imagine little
girls leaving the theater with a little plastic screwdriver and pretending to
make an engine. And then, I thought,
okay, maybe we’ve just taken a tiny pebble into the pond of girls can be
mechanics, too. It’s an animated
movie. It’s not like curing brain
cancer, but anytime you can have these little messages where women are being
seen as the person who’s capable of fixing things, building things, and
inspiring things, it’s a good message, but it was a little bit by accident on
my part anyway.
For
your own daughter, is that something that you try to instill in her?
HATCHER: When it comes to my household, it’s just
because I’ve been single for such a long time.
I’m the breadwinner. I kill the
spiders. Actually I don’t kill
them. I put them in a plastic bag and
take them outside. I take out the trash
cans. I change the light bulbs. I lug the 50 lbs. suitcases down the stairs. So there’s a level of something needs to be
done. The garage needs to be cleaned or
whatever. I’m doing it. And that has been seen. My daughter has probably gotten some benefit
of being inspired by a woman who is willing to take on things. We travel.
We travel to exotic places. I’m
the first person to jump in the ocean with a whale. Even if I’m scared, I’ll do it anyway,
because I never wanted her to see fear, especially when she was younger. In Australia, we would go up in a little
glider plane or we’d go white water rafting.
I never wanted her to have the mom that went, “Oh that’s scary. Let’s not do that.” I paddleboard, anything that I can do so that
she can in an unconscious way think, “Oh I guess I could probably do that,
too.” But that said, I don’t build
anything mechanical. I’m not the
electronic [expert]. I wish I was. We girls should have to change a tire or take
a ‘change your oil’ class in high school instead of taking home economics,
because we’d benefit from that.
…
Was
it weird to be in a sound booth by yourself and not sit in hours of hair and
make-up for this role?
HATCHER: It’s like you’re by yourself, but not really,
because right on the other side of the glass are 12 or 14 producers, writers
and sound guys, and there’s constant feedback.
So you’re not alone. I never went
through hours of hair and make-up anyway.
Yes, it’s nice to be free from that, but at the same time, it’s a
different kind of effort. You don’t
realize how much you get away with, with a wink of your eye or a little upward
twinge of your lip. To have to get it
all into the sound of your voice and just have somebody be able to sit there,
not looking at you, and hear it, it’s special.
It’s fun.
After
spending so much time on a series and dealing with the demands of that, is
voice work something that you’ve wanted to do for a while? I know it’s hard work, but still it’s not having
to be on the set every day?
HATCHER: This is not hard work. This was like you can’t even believe you get
paid to go do this job. When it was
availed to me that I had free time, I chose to go to cooking school every day,
six hours a day, like a diploma program.
I wanted to learn something new.
I wanted to be in a different kind of structure than I’d been in for
years and years and years. I was very
grateful to have the luxury to be able to do that, and it still allowed me to
be there to get my daughter after school.
I have said a lot that it’s very important to me to make time for my
child and make her the priority. I made
sacrifices so that I’m around and not traveling for that. But I’m also very slowly and very quietly
creating different things. Hopefully,
some of those things will turn into something at some point. Mostly, I’m grateful that I can just be slow
right now.
…
HATCHER: I don’t know.
I’m not putting a label on anything.
I know in my heart the stuff that I’m passionate about. Honestly, if that ended up manifesting itself
in a TV show or a film or a talk show or a book, I still feel like there’s a
great need to want to go more vulnerable, more honest, more funny when it comes
to women’s issues. I still feel like I’m
not seeing it out there yet. I know what
it is in my head. And so, for women my
age, the story of the comraderie of getting to be us and what it is like to be
a woman and have children and have them go away and age and get divorced and
get remarried and date and all of those things, I still feel like there’s a
big, giant well of stuff to mine in that subject matter. I’m working on quite a few different avenues
that could go anywhere from a book to a scripted show, but it all feels like
it’s in that zone, which is something I feel like I’m capable of telling and
passionate about telling. I don’t know
if I’m going to end up telling it, or if I’m going to get somebody to write it,
or if somebody is going to come to me and somehow that we’ll pair up, or I’ll
never get another job again. They’re all
options.
Equal
pay would be nice.
HATCHER: Equal pay, that’s an interesting one,
too. That’s a general thing to say. In Hollywood, it seems to me it’s based on
box office, even though that seems unfair.
I mean, that’s why people get paid.
It’s less about if you’re a female or a male, and it’s more about who
delivers the sales. It’s pretty cut and
dry that way. If you’re a person that
gets somebody to turn on the television and gets somebody to go to the movies,
then you’re going to get that bigger paycheck.
I’m not sure that it’s primarily sex-driven. I mean, it ends up seeming like it’s the men,
but it’s like the chicken or the egg. I
don’t know. But certainly, if we were
both plumbing a house, yes, we should be paid the same. If we were both putting in your new oven, we
should be paid the same. It’s
complicated.
…
HATCHER: I haven’t actually seen it yet, but she’s a
little forklift mechanic. She’s so
cute. I didn’t realize when we were
making it that she was going to buzz around.
I thought she was going to be a little more (husky voice) “Oh I’m a
forklift…” And then she’s able to [move
around]. I love the scene with her arms
where she’s just so cute.
The
funniest one is when she pretends to die. That was hysterical.
HATCHER: That was funny. We had fun.
That was my favorite. We had fun
doing that in the booth because that was one of the ones where it just becomes
like they had the orphanage. “Oh my God,
there’s the orphanage!” That was their
line, but then the whole (high pitched voice) “Watch out! Oh my God!”
I can go really high and I can go really low, so we just did all kinds
of crazy stuff. It was fun.
Does
Dottie return in the sequel?
HATCHER: I have done a little bit of work on the
sequel. I’ve said these things that go
over a year so I forget. I don’t think
I’m in it very much because it takes place out of… I can’t remember at this point. Maybe I’ll be a big hit and they’ll rewrite
the sequel so that I’ll have a bigger part.
…
Did
you see Dustin Hoffman’s reaction recently when somebody asked him about the
role?
HATCHER: I did.
It was so interesting and beautiful and insightful and amazing. Somebody did ask me recently if there was
anybody I wanted to work with. It’s not
that there’s only one person, because clearly there are so many amazing people,
but maybe it was because I had just heard that, he is on my list. I just saw Quartet again which I love. I mean, those are the kind of stories that I
hope more and more people keep telling.
There’s another interesting, vacant area which is between 60 and
80. You seem to have some women’s glamor
and grace that starts to happen around 75.
And then, before 60, you’ve got a lot of women that are still holding it
together to be still considered sexy.
But between 60 and 75, there’s got to be some stories in there for
women, so maybe that’s what I’m going to get passionate about. I’ve got a few years, but I want to get
passionate about those stories.
What’s
going to be your biggest takeaway from this project?
HATCHER: (Laughs) I’m taking all the toys they can
give me. My takeaway is that I can
check off at least one Disney animated movie on my bucket list, and that maybe
it’s a movie I’ll get to see with my grandchildren, and a movie that families
will enjoy for decades to come.”
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