March 2002

Sorority Boys: Gurl Talk!

Three guys in heels..and they're straight! We got to chat with the stars of Sorority Boys, a new gender-bender comedy film. Barry Watson of 7th Heaven, Michael Rosenbaum of Smallville and Harland Williams (Rocketman, Dumb and Dumber), put a whole new light on male bonding. They got waxed together and helped each other pick their femme wardrobes. Michael recorded a lot of behind the scenes video but.will it be on the DVD? Check out all the good-natured ribbing and joking.

The trio introduces themselves:

Hi! Harland Williams, Barry Watson, Michael Rosenbaum and we are (in unison) Sorority Boys!!

Teenhollywood: Harland, your character seems to have inherited a lot from the John Belushi character in Animal House (the wasted, totally out of it but lovable guy). Was that intentional?

Harland: You know I've never seen that film. Believe it or not. I've seen little clips.

Barry: That's a compliment, by the way, Harland.

Harland: I haven't modeled it after anything. I like to find my own thing.

Teenhollywood: Do you think the audience will pick up on the positive message within all the craziness?

Michael: Yeah. Because it's obvious. As crazy and raunchy and stupid as this movie can get, it's right there. Especially with my character Adam. He's a chauvinistic pig and hits on all these women and goes after the gross girls because you can get more. Then he becomes a woman and he's ugly, at least in his own eyes. Then he experiences all these "women" things. He's got a big ass, he thinks, and he's picked on and starts to realize, 'wow, we can be really mean to women.'

Barry: If people don't pick it up it's just because they aren't opening themselves up to see it. I would think that most people would get the moral of it.

Teenhollywood: Were there any second thoughts about being in drag in the film?

Michael: Yeah, if the movie doesn't come out the way you envision it, doesn't come across to the audience, it could be a flop. We'll just wait to see what happens. With all the horror that's going on in the world, for an hour and a half you go eat some popcorn and laugh with some friends. That's what this movie is about. You go out and have a good time.

Barry: Then you come back home, watch the local news and you're depressed again.

Teenhollywood: Did they check out you guys in wardrobe as girls before you could get the parts?

Barry: We got the job and then they figured all that stuff out. We were just looking at stuff on a hangar and going 'how do I put this on'?

Teenhollywood: What did you think when you first saw yourself dressed as a woman?

Harland: It was great. I was really happy and excited. I thought I was really beautiful and amazing. (The other guys are looking at him. 'yeah, right').

Barry: I just looked in the mirror, waited about five beats and went 'Mama'!

Michael: When my mom saw previews, she calls me and says 'Michael, all my friends say I look like you.' I go, 'Mom, I'm a man. This isn't good.' Everybody is getting a treat out of it, my parents, my friends. Actually, this is my second time in drag. I was a transvestite before.

Barry: The first week, it was like walking by mirrors doing a lot of double takes. For the first time in my life I didn't recognize me. Then, I missed Daisy after shooting.

Harland: We missed our girls.

Michael: It was sad, the day we put the wigs away.

Barry: I thought that Daisy was a sweetheart. I was almost crying.

Teenhollywood: Did you actually learn anything from playing the roles?

Barry: As much as a man can learn about being a woman. Hopefully, we learned as much as we could. I think so.

Michael: It takes so much to become a woman.

Barry: Men getting in touch with their feminine side and maybe women getting in touch with their masculine side is good. Everybody's got them.

Teenhollywood: Barry, did you go looking for something wild after the wholesome 7th Heaven stuff?

Barry: I remember reading (the script) months before I had the meeting. I always want to do something different. It was just what could I bring to the movie?

Teenhollywood: Michael, were you comfortable in those heels?

Michael: I pretty much jumped into it and was pretty comfortable. It was something I'd done before. My mother dressed me up as Pat Benetar in the 5th grade, full make-up and heels. The heels hurt. Horrible. The bra straps hurt. I had blisters on my feet.

Barry: (to me) How do you do that to yourself? I'd get these rubbing marks from my bra and indentions on my shoulders. It wasn't that comfortable. I tried to avoid wearing heels. I had flat sandals. Sweaty panty hose.

Michael: They gave me a prosthetic ass, a behind. Harland's character was goin' 'why are you wearing heels? Heels are out, man.' I'd say 'It makes my ass look slimmer.'

Teenhollywood: Did you dress up and go test out your girl duds on anyone?

Harland: Not me!

Barry: I had my dog on set one day so at lunch I went to walk him. So I was walking down Ventura Boulevard, and I kind of just forgot. We'd been working for a month and I kind of got used to it. Walkin' my dog, dressed up like Daisy.

Michael: At the wrap party we were dressed up in full drag and I've never been hit on by more women in my life. I was thinking maybe I should just do this for a living. Be in drag every night.

Teenhollywood: Wait, you were hit on by men or women?

Michael: Women! Oh, well, men too. They had too many drinks.

Teenhollywood: There is a scene involving roofies and date rape. Is that kind of thing going to help the problem or make it worse?

Barry: That's a fine line.

Michael: You always hear it happening to women; these pig guys who take advantage of women by dropping drugs in their drinks but the tables are turned in the film. It's still a fine line, talking about date rape but we put me in a situation where we aren't sure what happened. The drug wasn't dropped (by his character Adina) in order to take advantage but to go get a tape to prove our innocence.

Teenhollywood: Michael, did you do this before you shaved your head for Smallville?

Michael: I shaved my head for Smallville. Three days into shooting Smallville I got the part and they didn't know I was going to be bald. I told them a few days before I was coming. I was a little worried and they pretty much threw this mop on my head like I'm wearing a beanie. I had Wally hair. It looked just like his (Wally is their director Wally Wolodarsky).

Teenhollywood: Michael, how are things going on Smallville?

Michael: Great. Every week the scripts get better and better. The only thing bad is being in Vancouver. As much as I like the place, being away from family and friends, but these guys, I can hang with them.

Harland: Hey, we're glad you're not here. (laughs).

Teenhollywood: Is Lex Luthor going to turn evil in a hurry?

Michael: They are taking it at a nice pace right now. If I become evil too quickly it's 'oh, he's evil. What's he gonna do today?' The audience has embraced my character which is nice. He has good intentions. You'll find out what inevitably makes him evil and that's the exciting part of watching a character grow. If I find out we have a season left, let's go for it! (the evil Lex).

Barry: He'll be Matt Camden (Barry's 7th Heaven character) next year. I can see right through your character, you know. You're evil!

Teenhollywood: How did you guys work so well together in this film?

Harland: We didn't know each other.

Barry: The first rehearsal, when we all met, it just kind of jelled. I think we're really lucky that it happened that way. We all three get along. We really hang out.

Michael: We had a great bonding experience. We went and got waxed together.

Barry: Three guys in their underwear getting their hair ripped out.

Harland: Where do you go from there?

Teenhollywood: Was there a lot of ad-libbing?

Barry: With Harland, all the time. Always with the falling. Wally would just let us kind of go off and do our take. If he really needed to tone it down, he'd tell us.

Michael: All the falling. I probably fell down twenty times. I'm a big Buster Keaton fan. I love physical comedy. Harland was always doing something. The lines where we were introducing our (girl) characters, (does Harland doing his Roberta voice) 'Hi, I'm Roberta.'

Barry: He'd do wild, random things that were so great. I couldn't keep a straight face with him.

Teenhollywood: What about the Wookie growling thing? Did you make that up? (it's in the trailer)

Harland: Oh yeah.

Barry: That wasn't in the script but you didn't even read the script. Just come in and 'Hey, guys, what are we doin' today?'