Full text transcript of the 'Fred Claus' Unscripted with Vince Vaughn and Paul Giamatti

Full text transcript of the 'Fred Claus' Unscripted with Vince Vaughn and Paul Giamatti

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Vince Vaughn: Hi, welcome to Moviefone's Unscripted. I'm Vince Vaughn here with Paul Giamatti to talk about our movie, 'Fred Claus.'

Paul Giamatti: Were going to ask each other some of your important questions and ask each other some of our own.

Vince Vaughn: Hey Paul if you don't mind, I'd like to start and ask the first question. I'd like it to be one of theirs.

Paul Giamatti: Fire away, fire away.

Vince Vaughn: So this is to you from Beverly in Tulsa, OK. I see that Beverly is a girl but it could be a very tough gentleman from Tulsa. Its unclear at this point. Beverly wants to know, how is it to play a beloved image like Santa Claus after being in so many different types of movies? Can you give us a sample of your "ho, ho, ho"?

Paul Giamatti: You want me to do the "ho, ho, ho?" I come up with a good ho ho ho? That's her ...

Vince Vaughn: Or him, all we know is that its someone named Beverly.

Paul Giamatti: Here we go, tough guy. "Ho, Ho, Ho."

(Interview transcript continues below.)

Vince Vaughn: Very nice.

Paul Giamatti: Was that good? I worked on it. Do you know how hard I worked on that?

Vince Vaughn: When you do that, I go back into character. Wait a minute, I'm back into Fred for a second. That's good.

Paul Giamatti: But I don't know, everyone knows what Santa Claus is like.

Vince Vaughn: But you've played such a variety of roles. You are a great actor and when you got a call to come and play Santa Claus, how was your approach to that?

Paul Giamatti: Well you know it said in the script that I was going to be a neurotic miserable guy underneath all the jolly stuff. So the idea was to work up a good "Ho, Ho, Ho" as I just did for Beverly. Mr./Mrs. Beverly. So I had all of that and then underneath it, the guy's a wreck.

Vince Vaughn: A real humanity though.

Paul Giamatti: Hopefully.

Vince Vaughn: A lot of it.

Paul Giamatti: Thank you sir. What is your favorite Christmas memory, Vince?

Vince Vaughn: My favorite Christmas memory ... you know Sully, Paul, thanks for asking.

Paul Giamatti: Absolutely.

Vince Vaughn: I go back to Buffalo Grove, Illinois circa 1975.

Paul Giamatti: Here we go.

Vince Vaughn: Midwestern kid with a dream of a choo-choo train. And that dream came true.

Paul Giamatti: Did it? You got exactly what you wanted?

Vince Vaughn: That's right. Actually I don't remember. I made that up. It's not a good ... I remember as a kid though nothing like getting up Christmas morning and being so psyched to get the gift that you asked for. So here's the deal, when you are a kid and your aunt gets you socks, or you pick up a shirt, that's like to the wasteside like that. You don't even look at it.

Paul Giamatti: Disappointment. You know what's going to be in there.

Vince Vaughn: Right. If you get a toy ... so then when you get to be like 21 or 22, all it is are socks. But when kids come in, you have a son ... then you get excited through their eyes.

Paul Giamatti: True, no you do. I couldn't sleep. I just remember not even sleeping. In your footsie pajamas with your Dallas Cowboys ...

Vince Vaughn: So good.

Paul Giamatti: Fantastic. This is Jeff, Boston, MA. You a Boston fan, Vince?

Vince Vaughn: Oh that's a question you are asking me? I'm a Cubs fan. Chicago Cubs. 99 Years. Next year is my good luck.

Paul Giamatti: 99?

Vince Vaughn: It's been 99. Sometimes you can't spell fan without the word pain in it.

Paul Giamatti: So you are a fain?

Vince Vaughn: That's right.

Paul Giamatti: When it comes to comedy, do you prefer playing the straight man or the wacky sidekick?

Vince Vaughn: I don't know why you are asking me. This is a crazy question. Oh my goodness! Do I really have to answer something like that!

Paul Giamatti: I think you have your answer, Jeff out there in Boston. Did you come up doing sort of improvisational stuff? How did you ... sorry I keep interrupting you

Vince Vaughn: That's part of improv.

Paul Giamatti: Only say yes though when I keep interrupting you. Is it a skill that you've always had or is it something that you feel like you ...

Vince Vaughn: You know, more so when I was a kid, both of my parents worked so I would play sports. I was just an average athlete, never a great athlete. I would get into different activities and one of them was sort of acting at a young age. So we did musicals, but it was childrens theater, you had to be 13 or under right and there were a lot more girls in it than there was guys. So you'd be like 11 playing Daddy Warbucks and Annie would be 13 and bigger than you. You'd be like "Annie, you gotta straighten out, you are going to be an adult soon." I was only Daddy Warbucks by default.

Paul Giamatti: You'd be a great Daddy Warbucks.

Vince Vaughn: There were only 10 guys in the thing! Someone had to be Daddy Warbucks. Some kids were five, six, or seven years old. I was seven when I did my first one, so maybe you couldn't be below seven.

Paul Giamatti: When you played Warbucks?

Vince Vaughn: No, I was seven when I was in the chorus of 'South Pacific.' But here was the thing. The songs that we would learn but the lines were improvised. We would go through it and they would say "Here's what you need to say in the scene: we need to get chitty chitty bang bang and we need to fly somewhere," whatever it was, so we would not have scripted lines. The songs were scripted but that's how I sort of started. And then I went down to Chicago once I had a car and I could drive to Del Close who started Second City, where all those great guys came out of, but I only studied there for about three months but it was very helpful training. This is from Deidre. Deidre lives in London, England. Father Christmas for the folks out there in London. What is your favorite Christmas carol?

Paul Giamatti: Good heavens. What is the one with the "God rest ye merry gentlemen, let nothing you dismay, when Christ was born, our savior was born on Christmas day, to save us all from Satan's path when we had gone astray, oh, tidings of comfort and joy. Comfort and joy. Oh, tidings of comfort and joy"?

Vince Vaughn: That's an early Christmas gift for you, Deidre. You thought you were going to get a pink little spoon, Giamatti gave you the whole sundae.

Paul Giamatti: Merry Christmas, Deidre.

Vince Vaughn: Enjoy it.

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