Writer-director David Wain has been responsible for some of the most iconic and out-there comedies of this century (Wet Hot American Summer, They Came Together, Role Models), and he returns to the big screen this weekend with his latest collaboration alongside frequent collaborator and co-writer Ken Marino, Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass, which premiered earlier this year at the Sundance Film Festival.
Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass follows its titular heroine, played by Zoey Deutch, a hairdresser from the midwest who’s excited to get married to her high school sweetheart, Tom (Michael Cassidy). But her hopes of wedded bliss are put in jeopardy after Tom is inexplicably able to cash in his “celebrity sex pass,” a forgivable hook-up with the celebrity crush of his or her dreams should the opportunity present itself. Flustered and egged on by a psychic and her best friend/co-worker Otto (Miles Gutierrez-Riley), the naive Gail – who has never left her home state before – travels to Los Angeles to hook up with Jon Hamm (Jon Hamm) for the sake of saving her impending marriage. She’s helped (and hindered) along the way by an intern who’s desperate to become a Hollywood agent (Ben Wang), a burnt out paparazzi with anger issues (Ken Marino), and an unhinged John Slattery (John Slattery). She’s also pursued by a mob boss (Sabrina Impacciatore) whose secret briefcase of important blackmail documents have accidentally fallen into Gail’s unknowing hands.
We talked with Wain (who, as you can see from the video, was absolutely in his Toronto offices) about Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass, his approach to comedy, working with friends, making movies that can feel like family reunions for the cast and audiences, filming some of his sequences without being noticed on the streets of LA, and much more.
Gail Daughtry and the Celebrity Sex Pass opens in Canadian theatres starting Friday, July 10, including at TIFF Lightbox in Toronto.
