'Everybody Wants Some!!' Stars Talk Baseball, Film & Working With Linklater

While I might have been the only person on Earth who wasn't totally into Everybody Wants Some!!, Richard Linklater's "spiritual sequel" to Dazed and Confused, it's hard to deny that the movie is fun. If anything, that's precisely what the movie has going for it. Instead of following some wild plot about freshmen students looking for hookups in the early '80s, Linklater focuses his laid-back lens on the hyper-competitive and alcohol-soaked atmosphere of a college baseball house as the new players start living with their upperclassmen teammates.

At the center of it all is Jake (Blake Jenner), a freshman pitcher who serves as the movie's main character. Like several other Linklater leading men, Jenner is tasked with carrying the film on his face, a feat which he pulls off with apparent ease. Helping him the task is a humongous and often funny cast, featuring the likes of McReynolds (Tyler Hoechlin), the mustachioed just-about-to-go-pro hitter, and Roper (Ryan Guzman), the dude whose pants fit tighter than anything seen on the thighs of today's hipsters.

The three were recently in town for an event at the Mall of America, and I had a chance to speak with them about the similarities between sports and acting, working with Linklater and the philosophical messages the filmmaker fits in amid the debauchery.

Below is an edited version of that conversation. Everybody Wants Some!! is playing at the Lagoon Cinema. 

How do you bring your history of sports into acting?

Tyler Hoechlin: I started acting when I was 9, and I played baseball forever, so I kind of grew up with both. But I think baseball specifically is such a game of failure that you learn from failure more, obviously, than success.

So, it definitely helps with being persistent. You know, you have a bad game, you go 0-4, you've got to get up the next day and play again…it's the same thing in acting. You go to a lot of auditions and get a few of those jobs.

Ryan Guzman: The competitive aspect. I always compete with myself rather than anybody else, because the second I try to outdo somebody else's performance I take away from my own. So, there are different things to take and give from the athletic world to the theatrical world.

Is the Richard Linklater set as easy-going and collaborative as it seems?

TH: Yes.

RG: It's a dream.

Was there improv? Did you draw upon experiences to base your characters?

TH: Improv, we'd say, is a strong word...We workshopped the script really well. So, we had three weeks of rehearsal beforehand on Rick's property.

We would do a script reading every day…[Rick] would encourage us to talk about different ideas away from the reads just to see what we come up with. Some days he was like "feel free to try some stuff"…If he liked it, he'd make a note of it, and it'd be in the next draft. Every once in a while on set something would happen, like an accident would happen, and he'd always encourage us to go with it.

The film is built around the chemistry of the team on screen. Did you guys do anything to bond outside of rehearsing?

RG: Oh yeah. Every second, every minute. We lived together for two-and-half weeks on Rick's estate in bunk beds, so we were literally sleeping on top of each other. Then, yeah, just hanging out, any time we weren't working, we'd come to the set and hang out and watch and cheer the guys on. Those were some of the best times I've had being a part of any kind of production.

Blake Jenner: 100 percent. I always say that that [bonding] was the most import homework we could have done was just living together for two weeks. We really got to know each other we really got to form a bond, we really got to form our little inside jokes and versions of f-with-ery. Yeah, I'm totally grateful for that time.

When you were all hanging out, Rick would have you watch films together. Were there some that were particularly influential?

BJ: I really loved the Dock Ellis documentary No No.

RG: We also watched another documentary about one of my favorite collegiate coaches ever, Augie Garrido. It was a dream of mine to go to UT, so to meet him and talk to him after watching his documentary was incredible.

TH: I liked Animal House. It was fun to watch that with the guys. I think, all in all, it was great to have our little Q & A discussion session with Rick afterwards and just try and feel out what he wanted us to take from each one that we watched. Sometimes it was an attitude, sometimes it was a swagger…it was really kinda cool just to sit there with him and discuss these films.

How do you think Rick approached college in "Everybody Wants Some!!" different than he approached high school in "Dazed and Confused?"

RG: I think high school was more of "succumbing to the man" and being told what to do and living under a regiment. College, rather, is a completely free experience, and finding out who you are and what you're capable of. So…two different experiences, two different time periods and two different ways of telling a story.

You guys are playing college-aged kids, but some of you are also that age. What do you take away from that experience?

BJ: Just with all the distractions there are today, like with social media you know...everything is so abrupt and direct and immediate. You kinda find yourself thinking about the past and the future a little bit more than you should. What I think this movie does so well is teach everybody to live in the now, be grateful because the first three days of something could affect you for the rest of your life. You might look back on it and write a movie about it.

RG: There are many messages throughout the whole film, but there a couple that stick out to me. One is "letting your inner strange out," I guess, not letting judgment force you or put you in a corner. Just be true to yourself and go that route.

TH: I agree with both of them. I love the way that Rick can have a movie that this much fun but have so many moments that are profound and you kind of sit there and go, "Oh, wow, that actually makes me feel and think something!"

One of my favorite scenes is when Wyatt Russell's character, Willoughby, is speaking to young Jake and he says, "Be weird. When you do that, you bring who you are and never who they want, and that's when it's fun."

What was the audition process like?

BJ: The first time, it was more like an interview. You know, talking about your hobbies, what you like to do, what kind of person you are. After that, we were invited back to do some dialogue. We were asked to put a baseball tape together, like with our baseball experience and talents. Then after that there were a couple more auditions, and I think that was it.

Did you have a favorite movie of Rick's?

RG: This one now…Dazed.

TH: Dazed is pretty high up there. The Before series is pretty high up there. I really loved Boyhood. I thought it was an amazing accomplishment and I loved the fact that it was one of those movies where, over the course of that many years, you would assume there's going to be one moment in the movie that is this life-shattering moment, and then by the end of it you're like, no, it's just these little tiny moments and conversations in life that can shift it and skew your opinion on something and make you who you are.

BJ: One that I really, really enjoy watching – I've seen it a few times – is Waking Life. I really, really dig that. I dig all of Rick's movies. I think Bernie is awesome. I think that's the best Jack Black has ever been.

Have your wardrobes/playlists changed at all after this movie?

TH: Playlists. Wardrobes…I'm still trying to get a hold of certain pieces, but I haven't gotten any yet.

RG: Playlists for sure…I can't fit into those shorts anymore.