17 Again Press Conference with Zac Efron, Leslie Mann, Matthew Perry, Thomas Lennon, and Michele Trachtenberg

Did you ever get taped to a toilet or did anything weird happen to you?
Zac Efron: "No, I wasn’t bullied that bad or anything like that. I just wasn’t the ‘it’ guy at school."

Michelle Trachtenberg: ""And look at him now."

What about you, Matthew?

Matthew Perry: "I was the ‘it’ guy in school."

You were?

Matthew Perry: "No. I went to a high school that didn’t have many people in it. There were like 60 people in my senior class, but I still was not the cool [guy]. There was like a group of cool kids and then a group of really dorky kids, and I was probably the coolest of the dorky kids."

Zac Efron: "I’m stealing that answer, bro’."

Matthew Perry: "Take it, buddy!"

Zac, I was wondering if you could talk about what it was like defending yourself against a light saber-wielding sci-fi techno-geek?

Zac Efron: "That was serious."

Tom Lennon: "That was good. We rehearsed that scene for about a month every single day in the parking lot of an Arby's in Hollywood with sticks. Zac really, really hurt me pretty badly one day on the shoot, nailing me in the head. I think it was just a warning, just a reminder."

Zac Efron: "Yes, the day I did hit Tom - there were a couple injuries - but I hit Tom pretty hard one day and I just thank God it was during rehearsals with the rehearsal light sabers because if we had been filming a real take, we’d use real light sabers.

I’m pretty sure he would have had less face right now."

Tom Lennon: "I wasn’t that bright to begin with before that injury. Insurance says I can’t do anything about it."

What did you get in trouble for most in high school? Was there anything that you should have gotten busted for you got away with?

Zac Efron: "Yeah, I looked at a couple papers taking tests and stuff like that. It was small things. I got in trouble once. I actually got sent home from high school because I went up to the front of my Spanish class, in Spanish 3, and I was going to write a sentence on the board and my pants fell down in front of the class. Everyone starting laughing. It wasn’t that big of a deal, but the teacher got really flustered and upset and sent me home. And that was probably the most I got in trouble."

How did that happen accidentally?

Zac Efron: "I don’t know."

Was there a wardrobe malfunction?

Zac Efron: "I guess you could call it that."

For Zac and Tom, there is so much physical comedy in this movie, how was it trying to contain yourself? Were there particular scenes where you just kind of lost it and had to do over and over?

Thomas Lennon: "Pretty much every single scene either you cracked me up or…well mostly you cracked me up, I suppose. I think you can tell there were a lot of interesting things in between the lines that is either Zac trying to crack me up and me trying to crack him up. Like him referring to me as looking like Clay Aiken which I was not expecting at all."

Zac Efron: "Yeah, that was the fun thing with Tom is we didn’t necessarily have to stick to what was written. We tried to, but it was virtually impossible with Tom."

Tom, how did you prepare for speaking Elvish?

Thomas Lennon: "The Elvish is actually an ancient form of Irish because Elvish is a registered trademark of the Tolkien family and you can’t use it. …So what we’re speaking is an ancient form of Gaelic or Irish. And the way I prepared is I had it on an iPod. I listened to it day and night for weeks leading up to the scene and then I got there and Melora Hardin hadn’t worked on it at all. So, she had hers written on the plate in front of her."

Matthew Perry: "She was just thinking about how difficult fame is for Zac."

Leslie, I think this is an interesting turning point for you. You’re a mom so it’s not a stretch to play a mom, but is it something that you have to get your head around and say, "Okay, now I’m viewed as the mother of a teenager?"

Leslie Mann: "I know. I think that was a huge mistake. [Laughing] I do because she’s like 24, right? There’s no way that she could... [to Michelle] She played 17?"

MT: "No."

Leslie Mann: "15?"

Michelle Trachtenberg: "Yeah."

Leslie Mann: "How old did you play? 18?"

Michelle Trachtenberg: "16. I don’t know. That’s a Burr Steers question. It changes every day."

Leslie Mann: [Laughing] "Yeah, I think it was a huge mistake because I can never go back."

That’s why I was wondering whether it’s a turning point in your career?

Leslie Mann: "I guess so. I mean, the smart ones are like … There’s a TV show on right now, I don’t know what it’s called, like First Time Mothers."

Michelle Trachtenberg: "In the Motherhood?"

Leslie Mann: "Yeah, and they’re like 50 years old which would be like a medical miracle. Right? There’s no way. I mean, that’s like impossible. So, they were the smart ones because they could play the young girl for much longer and I was dumb."

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