Interviewing Phyllis Smith and Richard Kind

Interviewing Phyllis Smith and Richard Kind

*Disclosure: I received an all expenses paid trip to Los Angeles for the coverage of several press events for Disney, Pixar and Google. All opinions are 100% my own.

The movie Inside Out is about a girl named Riley and the emotions that go on inside her head. While many of us have often wondered what it is like inside someone’s head the folks at Pixar knocked it out of the park with this one. Growing up is a hard thing to do and with each life event comes many emotions. The main emotions that are covered in this one of a kind film include Anger, Fear, Disgust, Joy and Sadness. But what happens to our imaginary friends? In Riley’s story Bing Bong was her imaginary friend and he gave up a little of himself for the better good. Much like the role parents play in our child(s) life. While in San Fransicso earlier this month I had a chance to sit down and interview Phyllis Smith the voice of Sadness and Richard Kind the voice of Bing Bong. Saying that it was surreal is probably an understatement but one that I will always cherish because they are two of the nicest people I have ever met.

Our first question to this dynamic duo was “Were you surprised at the popularity of your characters?” Their answers kind of surprised me because Phyllis didn’t realize that her character was so popular. But they both fed off of each other and told us all about the other person’s character. Richard said, “It’s a perfect voice performance and a perfectly written part by these guys because it’s such a touchy character because no one wants to be sad and yet we identify with you. So I am so taken by your performance because although it’s down in the dumps it’s not  it’s not depressive. It’s simply sad. And I think that that’s an amazing thing that they and you did.” I couldn’t have agreed more with that statement about Sadness. It was the perfect character in every sense of the word.

Phyllis then took the stage so to speak and told us about how she loved Richard’s character Bing Bong because the heart of the character is everywhere. She loved his character but he quickly inserted that he did as well and they both should be equally proud of their characters. I feel that both of them touches us in the heart in different ways and makes us relate to their characters it is a true Pixar magic moment.

Staying in character

For some reason when I envisioned Phyllis performing her lines, I saw her doing really sad things. Such as attending a funeral, crying in the vehicle before work and remembering the most horrible times of her life. That’s how I would get into character for sure, but she said she remained truthful with the line or scene she was doing. But with Peter Docter’s directions it was basically her personality shiny through for Sadness. Richard also gave props to Peter Docter and how he would say a line, and then Peter would say, “I want to do it this way. It’s nothing like that.” Or “It’s, wow, that’s fantastic.” They knew exactly what was expected of them and worked as a team to deliver their best work.

Richard told us that they were there alone most of the time when it was time to do their lines. But they made their characters their own when they could. But for the most part their lines were written for them in a script and it told a good story so there wasn’t a lot of room for improvement. Phyllis on the other hand had sessions with Amy and the emotional scenes they were able to feed off of each other especially the big clown scene. Phyllis also said that when she started her role as Sadness that she was insecure, which she felt like helped her character.

Phyllis’ character Sadness was fed by her real insecurities which resulted in an amazing performance. Richard’s energy went into his character because he’s more animated off stage, but that he lives his life with morality and ethics. He’s more positive and Bing Bong was pure and free of negativity. He gave Big Bong heart which is more than apparent when watching the show. These two were genuinely happy to be there with us and some of the nicest people I have ever met.

Be sure you pick up your own copy of Inside Out on November 3rd! I promise you will love it as much as I did!