Like a big bean-bag doll. Seriously, that’s how Ashley Tisdale describes the little CGI aliens she had to work with making her latest family comedy, Aliens in the Attic, in which she plays one of a group of kids, who must protect their vacation home from invading aliens . I got a chance to speak Ms. Tisdale recently, as she discusses said aliens, her childhood fears in her house – and her guilty pleasures.
Step 1: Play with a CGI “stuffy”
“We didn’t really use a lot of green screen but we did have a green “stuffy.” It’s a kind of bean-bag doll. That was the alien, and they would just move it around and we’d react to that [laughs]. I was only there five weeks because I had to come back to do High School Musical 3. And since [the other kids] were all younger and not allowed to work, I’d be shooting at 2 am and having to react by looking at the crew members. I was a little nervous about that.”
Step 2: Fear not the attic – but the BASEMENT
“I had a basement cause I grew up in New Jersey, and I thought Chuckie was down there. My friend at 7-years-old says, ‘Let’s watch Child’s Play.’ I thought it was a doll movie, a good movie. So after that I was scared, so scared and I wouldn’t go down there because I thought maybe he was roaming around down there.”
Step 3: Get the boyfriend stamp of approval from Dad
“Oh yeah, I can’t date anyone unless I bring them home to meet my dad first. Very overprotective. But I like that part in the movie in which Bethany kind sees her boyfriend’s true colors and sticks up for her family. I always want my parents to be proud of me and approve of who I’m with.”
Step 4: Go ahead and have it all
“I’m pretty creative and kind of a workaholic, so I like to do a lot of different things. I want a really long career, acting and my music. And also producing. I have many ideas that I’d like to watch, and not necessarily what I’d want to be in. So I get together with my producing partner and we get to create it and it’s a different experience for me. Right now I have a reality show that E! is looking at. I can’t really talk about it yet since it’s not picked up, but it’s fun. I’m not in it though.”
Step 5: Don’t take yourself too seriously
“I laugh at myself all time; I don’t sweat the small stuff. But I am very driven, ever since a young age. I credit my mother for that. I’ve always looked up to her because she’s very confident and has always taught me to believe. Don’t quit and go for your dreams. With hard work and drive, you can definitely get there. Even though I’ve been doing this for awhile, with the TV shows and High School Musical, I still feel like my career has just begun. I want to keep learning and honing my craft.
Step 6: But take her music seriously. Please.
“The balancing [between music and acting] isn’t the challenge, but the challenge is people taking me seriously for my music. They are two separate things to me. I’ve grown up with musical theater my whole life so music has always been something that’s part of my life. My second album Guilty Pleasures, which comes out July 28, is who I am. There’s a lot of break up songs [laughs]. But I’m hoping I’ll be YOUR guilty pleasure.” Wink, wink.
Step 7: HER guilty pleasures
“Alien movies [natch] and coffee. Oh, and I like designer handbags, too.
Step 8: OK, we’ll bite … What alien movies?
“Close Encounters, E.T. Oh, Signs, too. That one freaked me out.
Oh hell yeah, totally agree. Signs completely creeped me out, but I don’t think Aliens in the Attic is going to elicit the same response.
In yet ANOTHER romantic comedy, what else? Aniston’s set to star in Pumas, a story which, Variety reports, centers on two 30+ women (one being Jen, of course) who like to go cougaring for young guys and take a French skiing vacation to explore this habit — except it doesn’t quite go as planned. What, they end up marrying 70-year-old men instead? Jen, please make it stop.
It would be nice to clear it with the original actor first. Summit Entertainment, however, did not follow this advice. They decided to hire Bryce Dallas Howard to replace Rachelle Lefevre as the Bella-hating vampire Victoria in the third Twilight installment, The Twilight Saga: Eclipse. Summit says it was because of scheduling conflicts with Lefevre; she had apparently taken a role in the indie Barney’s Version. But today Lefevre’s made her own statement, via 
If you are Mila Kunis, play Natalie Portman’s nemesis. According to the Hollywood Reporter, Kunis is in talks to co-star with Portman in Darren Aronofsky’s supernatural drama Black Swan, a movie about a talented ballerina (Portman) who is tormented by a rival named Lilly (Kunis), who might or might not be a figment of the dancer’s imagination. All I know is getting these two actresses together onscreen could create some serious steam.
For Ben Affleck, that means starring in and directing the romantic crime thriller The Town. According to The Hollywood Reporter, The Town follows the relationship between a bank manager (Vicky Cristina Barcelona‘s Rebecca Hall), the career criminal (Affleck) who stole her heart and is trying to go straight to win her, and the dedicated FBI agent (Mad Men‘s Jon Hamm) trying to bust the crook and his gang.
I nearly did a spit take when I read G-Force beat Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince at the box office this weekend. Seriously? Then again, I guess I shouldn’t underestimate the power of a kid movie – even one about Special Ops guinea pigs – to be an alternative activity on a hot summer day. Personally, though, given the choices of new movies this weekend, I’d have seen Half-Blood Prince again.
Step 1: Blame it on Alvin and the Chipmunks. Cute, furry – and talking – CGI rodents are apparently now the rage, much to the chagrin of anyone over 12.
Step 3: Scratch your head on how G-Force got the cast they got. Penelope Cruz? Nicolas Cage? Sam Rockwell? I suppose I could see Cage and Cruz doing this. Certainly Tracy Morgan. Even Steve Buscemi, who voices a surly hamster. But Sam bloody ROCKWELL? He’s the dude who does cool indie movies like Moon and Choke or high-brow Oscar fare like Frost/Nixon. I just have to wonder what they said to convince him to do this. Maybe he has kids and they begged him to voice a guinea pig. What about Galifianakis, who HAD been gaining some serious comedy cred with his turn in this summer’s surprise hit The Hangover? This might set him back a bit. Oh, who the hell knows. They probably either did it for money or for the children in their lives.
Step 1: Don’t be afraid. Horror movies about creepy kids can be frightening – just not in Orphan.
Step 3: Seriously, watch the 1956 The Bad Seed to see how this kind of story is done correctly. It’s an older movie, yes, but one of the best movies about a evil sociopathic kid. That, and The Omen. At least young Furhman does her best, evil looks, screaming fits and all.
