Pedro Almodóvar may have directed some of the greatest Spanish films of the last 25 years, but according to his “I’m So Excited” star Javier Cámara, he doesn’t always act his age. In a good way, of course.
“He’s like a child,” said Cámara of working with Almodóvar, with whom he previously collaborated on “Talk to Her” and “Bad Education.” “Shooting a film he’s like a child. It’s like, you are working with Pedro Almodóvar, he’s pretending to be a child. Playing with friends.”
Again, this isn’t a dig. Cámara clearly has a great level of affection for his three-time director, and he made sure to stress that when it comes to getting things done, Almodóvar can just as easily shift into “task master” mode – particularly when it comes to shooting something as complex as the elaborately-choreographed flight attendant dance sequence featured in the airborne comedy’s attention-getting trailer.
“I remember one day when we finished the choreography, every take was elaborate, and everybody’s yelling, ‘Oh, wow! Come on, yeah!'” recalled Cámara. “And Pedro was calm. ‘Everybody calm down, please! We are shooting a film!’ Because this period is, everybody was laughing and shouting and yelling and very funny moments. And he was the only one who tried to calm down everybody. He’s like, ‘okay, we’re doing a film, you have to calm down.’ But his spirit is to provoke all this energy. But at the same time you have to control the rhythm, the tone, the comedy…the mathematician of the rhythm of the comedy. And he’s…you have to be on the case. You have to try every single moment, and he controls that.”
To hear more from Cámara, as well as from his strapping young co-star Miguel Ángel Silvestre, you can check out the full interview in the video above.
“I’m So Excited” hits theaters in L.A. and New York this Friday.