‘Super Mario Bros. Movie star Seth Rogen on his big year of animation and how ‘Lion King’ influenced the ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ process

2023 is a huge year for Seth Rogen in terms of animation.

First up for Rogen is Illumination’s The Super Mario Bros. movie, in which he plays Donkey Kong, the tie-wearing gorilla who resists the idea of ​​helping Mario (Chris Pratt) and Princess Peach (Anya Taylor-Joy) rescue a captured Luigi (Charlie Day). Oddly enough, the 1981 arcade game Donkey Kong was the first of many more appearances for Mario on screen.

For the already vivacious and feisty Rogen, what you hear is what you get, as the Vancouver native chose not to put on a voice for his classic character.

“This didn’t seem like much of a role,” says Rogen The Hollywood Reporter. “It was more about the dynamics. It’s the dynamic of this guy hating Mario and kind of stuck with him, and I thought that was funny. So no weird voice was needed to be effective.”

In 2019 The lionking remake, Rogen voiced the warthog Pumbaa, and what made the experience so unique is that he shot some of his scenes alongside his real-life scene partners, Donald Glover (Simba) and Billy Eichner (Timon). With animation, voice actors rarely work in the same singing booth as their co-stars, but Rogen made it a point to apply this approach to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhemwhich his company, Point Gray Pictures, is producing for an August release.

“Before each session, we lumped people together. So every time the four turtles shot, they were together. Me and John Cena were Bebop and Rocksteady, and we recorded together,” says Rogen. “So we really got out of the way and leaned back Ninja turtles to try to capture that improvisational energy that you get when many people are in the same place at the same time. I actually saw how useful it was to do Lion King.”

Below, during a recent conversation with THRRogen, who is also an executive producer of Amazon’s animated superhero series Invincibleexplains why he is excited about the future of animation.

That did the SuperMario games help you pass the time during your many winters in Vancouver?

Yes, I grew up with a lot of these games, from Commodore and Nintendo to Super Nintendo and Nintendo 64. I grew up in the ’80s and ’90s, so the evolution of these games coincided directly with my desire to play them .

You started comedy and writing when you were 12 or 13, so did you turn back on video games then?

(laughs.) No, I remember leaving the comedy show to go play Golden Eye with my friends in the basement of [writing/producing partner] from Eva [Goldberg] house. So I was really able to multitask and do both stand-up comedy and waste a lot of time playing video games.

I like that you didn’t use a voice for Donkey Kong. If they made the choice to hire you, we should listen to you. But have you tried out a custom voice for your own curiosity?

No not really. This didn’t seem like one of those roles. So here and there sometimes, but it was more about the dynamics. It’s the dynamic of this guy hating Mario and kind of stuck with him, and I thought that was funny. So no weird voice was needed to be effective.

A few years ago further The lionking, you shot some parts of Pumbaa in the booth with two of your scene partners, Donald Glover and Billy Eichner. So if it was SuperMario or something else, do you ever want that rare arrangement again?

Yes, to be honest, but we didn’t get around to this. On Ninja Turtles, it was lovely because we could control the process much more. For each session, we lumped people together. So every time the four turtles shot, they were together. Me and John Cena were Bebop and Rocksteady, and we recorded together. Ice Cube has some scenes with the kids and they shot together. So we really went out of our way and leaned back Ninja turtles to try to capture that improvisational energy that you get when many people are in the same place at the same time. I actually saw how useful it was to do Lion Kingand if that’s the tone and style you’re going for then it’s great for hunting.

You already know what you’re doing with animation, but didn’t do anything about it The Super Mario Bros. movie inform the direction you took Teen Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutated Chaos?

We were pretty deep in the process, honestly, by the time I got to it Super Mario Bros, so not really. They started showing me early footage of this at the same time that I started seeing early footage Turtles, and what was amazing and cool was how different they both are and how different they look. It shows how versatile animation is and how the studios are making these films subject to more and more visual swings. And the fact that I’m a part of these two movies this summer that are so different is really exciting. It speaks very highly of the direction animated films are going in general.

How often do small children recognize your voice when passing something animated?

What’s horrifying is how often little kids recognize me from the dirty R-rated movies I’ve made. (laughs.) Because of Netflix, all bets are off with that shit. I think these kids are just looking at everything now. I have eight-year-olds come up to me and tell me they saw it Pineapple Emphatically, so these kids have seen it all. (laughs.)

I remember you saying that years ago Steve Jobs was the most out-of-left field call you’d gotten up to that point. did The Fablemans on top of that by a mile?

Yes, The Fables was a much less expected call. (laughs.) That came totally out of the blue, but very validating, very beautiful and very rare. It’s something I tried not to take for granted, and throughout the experience I really tried to absorb and be present and learn as much as I could. It’s rare to find yourself working with the people who are the architects of the industry you’re part of. Steven Spielberg pretty much created the blockbuster model as we know it, and a lot of the language of movies as we understand it is because of its taste and sensibility. So to work with someone like that was very special.

So I gave Paul Rudd a hard time about this the other day, but you guys shot one advertisement called “Golden Memories” for Lay’s. How come no one thought of making you famous massage story where Paul secretly switched places with your massage therapist? It would fit the theme perfectly.

That’s a good question, and I blame Lay’s. (laughs.) I blame Frito-Lay for that. We would have gone there in a minute, but we’ll save that for something else.

Your first foray into TV production was four seasons of Preacher, and now you’re producing season four of The boys. What did you discover about TV production during that time?

I learned how being on a different network or service can really be the difference between a show finding an audience and not finding an audience. When Preacher there was no place where you could watch every episode from Preacher. It was maddening. The current season was supposed to air on amc.com, but all previous seasons were on Hulu. So it was one of those things where even if you wanted to see the show, you couldn’t. And now, with Amazon, [The Boys] is just there, and it’s easy and intuitive. So Preacher somehow got caught in a weird time between traditional broadcasting and this streaming takeover, which is why it’s been really interesting to see how you’re served by an organized distribution model and strategy. But with us at AMC at the time, it spoke to a very difficult distribution model where it was hard to watch if you were a fan of the show.

I only have a few seconds left, but recently you did History of the World, Part II with Ike Barinholtz and David Stassen, among others. Those guys are childhood friends, writing and producing partners, and Ike is the artist of the two. So, given the similarities between you and Evan Goldberg, can we call them American Seth and Evan? The Bizarro Seth and Evan?

(laughs.) If they want it, they can have it. Certainly.

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The Super Mario Bros. movie will be in cinemas from April 5. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.