Halfway through "The Overnight," Adam Scott and Jason Schwartzman get naked. Very naked. We say "very" not only because the scene is revealing, but because it's a slow burn to get there. In the comedy, which premiered to rave reviews at the Sundance Film Festival, Schwartzman plays a free-spirited artist who invites an anxious couple he meets at the neighborhood park (Scott and Taylor Schilling) to his palatial Los Angeles home for a playdate. When he and his wife (Judith Godrèche) suggest they put the kids to bed and have their own playtime, the night devolves into a series of oddities, all compounded by increasing amounts of alcohol and weed. One such curiosity involves Schwartzman's character convincing Scott's to let go of the self-consciousness he feels about his tiny penis and skinny-dip with the others.
Scott made sure to emphasize during the Q&A following the movie's world premiere that he and Schwarztman, who guest-starred on "Parks and Recreation" in 2013, wore prosthetic genitals for the film. Given the culture of Sexy Sundance, when HuffPost Entertainment sat down with the actors in Park City, Utah, the next day, we had to lead with talk of prancing around nude in Patrick Brice's movie. "The Overnight," which Scott and his wife, Naomi, produced with Mark and Jay Duplass, sold to The Orchard with plans for a release later this year. In the meantime, put this comedy on your radar -- it was one of Sundance's best, and now you can watch Schwartzman take a bong hit knowing he needed a major tutorial about the "lighter part."
The movie premiered only yesterday, but surely all of these interviews are about your prosthetic penises. On a scale of 1 to 10, how tired are you of talking about them?
Schwartzman: 10 being what?
Fucking over it.
Schwartzman: Zero. I’m happy to talk about it. It’s weird, I haven’t talked about prosthetic genitals all year.
Scott: Might as well get it all in.
Schwartzman: Yeah, I have lots to talk about. Today’s the day.
What was your initial reaction to the script's nudity requirements?
Schwartzman: There are two reactions happening simultaneously. One is, "How are we going to do this? What is this? What is happening? Technically, what happens?" Then, as a reader and a follower of the story, which is that, "Wow, this plot has elevated itself to a new level. It’s gone to a new place." And I think that’s the most important thing. When my character goes skinny-dipping, that’s sort of the moment in the movie where we realize we’re in for something a little more.
More than what the other couple bargained for, certainly.
Schwartzman: Exactly. I’m sure there’s people who go and eat food and then maybe smoke pot and dance and stuff. I don’t really go to those types of thing, so if there was a lot of pot-smoking and stuff, it already would have been like, "Well, this is an unusual night." But not for most. Once I’m asking him to take off his shirt when we’re taking pictures, that could also just be like, "This is my art, this is what I do." But I think once you take off your pants, it’s the statement that this is going to be a different kind of evening. But then Adam, when he takes off his, that’s more of a character breakthrough, so they kind of have different functions.
What's it like applying these prosthetics?
Scott: It’s pretty much like any other prosthetic. You just glue it on, apply makeup and it sort of blends. There’s no real salaciousness. You have to shave a little bit so the glue sticks well. And we’re swimming around in a pool, so it had to be waterproof.
Were there any hiccups with that?
Schwartzman: There weren’t with the glue, but with that prosthetic, once we were naked in the beautifully warmed pool, we didn’t really want to get out of it. The only hiccup came when, after five hours in the pool, the prosthetics were a bit more waterlogged. They had gotten heavier.
Scott: Oh yeah! It was filled with water.
Schwartzman: You know those little dinosaur things you can buy? They’re like this big, you put them in water and then two days later they’re like a stegosaurus? That’s sort of what happened.
Was there any pride or insecurity with getting to play these two roles?
Schwartzman: Not really, I didn’t think like, "Oh, I have this big prosthetic, I feel great right now." My confidence didn’t change once the prosthetic was on me, deep down. My mind never went there.
Scott: I remember when I first read it, I was like, "Why do I have to play the guy with the tiny dick?"
Did you ever ask anybody that question?
Scott: No, I didn’t, but I started really thinking about it and I was like, "Huh, this character’s really going through something interesting." And what does a tiny dick mean? What does it mean to him? And what does everyone else think about it? That was really interesting.
Schwartzman: And his wife.
Scott: It’s funny, though. My knee-jerk reaction was what you said: I wonder what Mark Duplass, who was like, "Hey, maybe you should play this part," thought here.
You both play increasing levels of drunk and stoned very well, particularly you, Adam, since your character is a relative novice. You seem like a pro.
Scott: No, I don’t drink and we certainly weren’t smoking pot on set.
Schwartzman: Patrick had to show me how to smoke out of a bong. I had no idea. He handed me the thing and was like, “And then just take a big, massive bong hit.” Then he walked away and I was like, “How do you do the massive bong hit? I don’t know how to do that. Can you demonstrate?”
What was everyone's reaction to that?
Schwartzman: I don’t think it was like, “Whaaaat?”
Scott: There were plenty of people who could show you how to do it expertly.
Schwartzman: If there was ever a set where there was a bong-hit technician, that was the set. People knew what they were doing. It’s hard to take a bong hit. I’m not a huge man. That bong was half the size of my body.
Scott: It was giant.
Schwartzman: I didn’t even have the arm span to reach the lighter part. I don’t even know what to call the lighter part. "I don’t know how to do the lighter part of the bong!"
You're both married with children. Do you respond to the restlessness these characters are feeling now that they're full steam ahead in the parenting process?
Schwartzman: Obviously there’s reality to always appraising your situation. That’s a part of life and marriage, and that’s what’s great about it. More what I kind of hooked onto was this idea of being a certain age and then, through your kids and your living circumstances, maybe having to make new friends. And what is that? They meet at a park through the kids. Playdates, I can totally relate to. Going to someone’s house for dinner that I don’t even know? I would never go to someone’s house that I don’t know for dinner.
Scott: Ugh. What a bummer.
Schwartzman: I cannot imagine. If either of you guys walked up to me like that, I would be in hell. All day long, I’d be like, “I think I’m getting ill, I have a fever.”
Scott: “I can’t just watch ‘The Bachelor’ in my underwear?"
Schwartzman: Oh, I know.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
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