Last year, comedic powerhouse Kristen Wiig surprised everyone with her villainous turn as The Cheetah in Wonder Woman 1984. Now, the actress is once again playing a villain in Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar. The director of the movie, Josh Greenbaum, recently revealed that Wiig disappeared so completely into the role that many viewers were completely unable to recognize her.
“One of the greatest compliments I think to [Kristen Wiig] is that when we did early test screenings, it was so many people that were like, ‘Who is that villain? She’s so good. I can’t put my finger on who the actress is.’ And that’s, I think, such a compliment to her role. My other fun, short story about that is we had a guy even working on the film, doing some color work early on in the process.He worked on the film for three days.”
“Every day, I’d check in on him and he’d say, ‘Don’t tell me. I haven’t figured it out yet. I’ve got to go to IMDB. But I want to figure out who it is.’ He worked on it for three days and didn’t figure it out that it was Kristen. We do a couple of tricks. We add a little tooth gap… and a little prosthetic on the nose, and obviously, she’s actually wearing some interesting contact lenses. But the rest of it is just her performance and how she completely goes from one character to the other.”
The movie tells the story of best friends Barb, played by Annie Mumolo, and Star, played by Kristen Wiig, who live in Nebraska and decide to go on a vacation to Vista Del Mar, Florida. Unfortunately, the vacation bliss is cut short by the machinations of Sharon Gordon Fisherman, also played by Wiig. Fisherman plans to kill everyone in town, unless Barb and Star can put their vacation plans aside in time to stop her. In a previous interview, Mumolo, who co-wrote the script for Barb & Star Go To Vista Del Mar along with Wiig, explained how their personal history allowed them to create the project from an intimate perspective.
“Kristen and I have always been writing together, since the Groundlings, and since we were in our early 20s, we’ve always gravitated toward these middle-aged women characters. Always. These ladies! Gals! They probably come from a lot of different places in our heads, but some of it’s like your mom, some of it’s like your aunt and other family relatives. But more and more we’re realizing how much they’re us. [Laughs] We are these people when we’re in our private conversations. It was something we liked to do always. We liked to inhabit these people and give them a voice. We find so much fun and delight in these women.”
Barb & Star Go To Vista Del Mar was directed by Josh Greenbaum, written by Kristen Wiig & Annie Mumolo, and stars Kristen Wiig, Annie Mumolo, Jamie Dornan, Damon Wayans Jr., Fortune Feimster, Wendi McLendon-Covey, Rose Abdoo, Vanessa Bayer, Phyllis Smith, and Kwame Patterson. It premiered on Premium Video on Demand on Friday, February 12. This news arrives from CinemaBlend.