Video:Tony Hale Interview - The Tale of Despereaux
with Rebecca MurrayTony Hale tackles the role of Despereaux's brother in the animated family-friendly movie 'The Tale of Despereaux.' At the film's premiere, Hale talked about his nervous little mouse character - and the possibility of an 'Arrested Development' movie.
Transcript:Tony Hale Interview - The Tale of Despereaux
Rebecca Murray from About.com Hollywood Movies at the World Premiere of The Tale of Despereaux.
Tony Hale – The Voice of 'Furlough' in The Tale of Despereaux
So you're playing a brother again – there's a theme…Tony Hale: "I know, I know. Buster was a brother, Furlough's a brother. I play Furlough who's kind of a nervous mouse. I play a nervous character – how ironic. That's all I ever play. But he's the nervous brother who kind of tries to teach Despereaux how to be afraid. And Despereaux just won't have it and rises up and defeats fear."
How do you teach someone to be afraid?
Tony Hale: "Many ways. I teach Despereaux how to cower, how to stay away from the cats, how to kind of cut corners. They always go to a library to kind of chew books, and I try to teach him how to chew the books but then run away really fast. You know, there's many ways to actually teach someone how to be afraid."
And you actually got to work with other members of the voice cast in this, right?
Tony Hale: "Yes. I was able to work with William Macy on the day that I did my voice, and Matthew Broderick. Matthew Broderick was in New York and I was in LA and we were able to do our voices together."
How many days did you actually work on it?
Tony Hale: "I think three, yeah. But this film, it's amazing how long animation takes. It probably took them a good two and a half years to get this together. It's a beautiful film."
Do you look at storyboards as you're doing your voice?
Tony Hale: "I do. They have the characters drawn out when we did it and so I was able to see Furlough's face and Despereaux's sweet, big-eared face and all that kind of stuff."
Did you have to stick to the script?
Tony Hale: "Sometimes. Sometimes we can kind of go off of the script. But also with animation it's so close to…they've done so much work so you've got to be careful how much you improv because you've got to kind of work how they've done it, you know?"
And speaking of going off scripts, Arrested Development the movie – is it greenlit?
Tony Hale: "Supposedly it's happening. We got a call to all see if we're open. And of course we're like, 'Yes, yes, yes!' But I think it's a matter of kind of seeing what the higher-ups decide, because we'd all love to. And also everybody's schedules are kind of crazy right now so it's getting everybody together, but of course we'd all love to do it. We'd love to hook up and do it again."
Do you have any suggestions about where they'd take your character in it?
Tony Hale: "I want Buster's arm to be bionic. I want my hand to become bionic. That's my goal. I don't know if Mitch [Hurwitz] is going to do it, but I want my hand to be bionic."
Last question, rats versus mice – any favorites?
Tony Hale: "Rats or mice? At this point I'd say mice because we just found a rat in our car. So I'm a huge fan of mice right now. Rats, I don't know, not so much."