Ben Stiller is indelibly etched into our minds for having had his private parts zippered and body fluids mislaid in There's Something About Mary, his chin attacked by a ferret while filming Along Came Polly, and being bombarded by inflated rubber balls in Dodgeball.
His new film, Meet The Fockers, a continuation of the comic themes unveiled in Meet The Parents, is another glorious turn for Stiller as Greg Focker. Greg and his fiancée (Teri Polo) are preparing to wed, so it's time for her parents - the reserved Byrnes (Robert De Niro and Blythe Danner) - to meet the irrepressibly liberal Fockers (Barbra Streisand and Dustin Hoffman). The result is a hilarious clash of cultures that gives plenty of room for Stiller to bathe in the humiliation caused by his wild, sexually permissive parents, played to full tilt by Dustin Hoffman and Barbra Streisand.
Ben, Meet The Parents offered some intimidation value with Robert De Niro as your prospective father-in-law and the ethereal Blythe Danner as your mother-in-law. Now you have Dustin Hoffman and Barbra Streisand to deal with as parents. What was that like?
It makes for a very stimulating atmosphere on the set because you have all these very gifted actors who can all do very serious work and now they're applying themselves to a broad form of comedy. I was bit more nervous during the first film working with Robert, but Barbra actually made me feel very loose.
My own parents were touchy-feely, but not quite as brazen as what Dustin and Barbra put me through in this film. I'm always willing to endure humiliation on behalf of my characters, although this time it rang more true because your parents have a kind of odd sanctity, even when they drive you out of your mind. I mean, it's not as if you can have them arrested on charges of psychological battery!
This is Barbra Streisand's first comedy in many years, isn't it?
Yes. It was actually an incredible shock that she agreed to do the film, because it's been a long while since we've seen her do this kind of comedy, which she did so well earlier in her career. And putting her together with Dustin was just a case of raising the comic tension several levels. It's exactly the kind of experience you want when you're making a film like this. You feel you've got to raise your game because you're working with giants of the business and then once you get comfortable with a cast like that, you feel part of something pretty special.
Robert De Niro and Dustin Hoffman are known for being fairly intense performers. Was there any tension between them on the set?
No, just the opposite. I think they both got off on being in this kind of a film where they're able to riff off their own screen personae and not take things so seriously. I loved watching them work, to tell you the truth, although I would have found it interesting to have seen them argue over some line or scene. They should have done something like that as a joke, not tell anyone, pretend to have a horrible argument, and then watch everyone's reaction after they had been putting everyone on. That would have been very funny, don't you think?
