Greg Mottola Talks Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, and ‘Paul’

When you visit a set, it’s difficult knowing you’re a bit of an interruption. No one actually treats you as such, of course, but you have to wonder what it would be like if someone came to your place of work and started chatting about your life and work. On sets, this is especially evident in directors. They’re up against all kinds of crunches and pressure, they’re trying to concentrate, and they have to come and explain it all to you.

Greg Mottola was a super busy man on Paul. He took his time with everything. The scenes we saw were small — Clive (Nick Frost) and Graham (Simon Pegg) stand open-mouthed at the exhibit hall as the camera whirls around them. They examine the schedule, and run in opposite directions. They take part in a virtual reality battle with two young boys. (Watching these kids clumsily bow and punch was hysterical.) It was all energetic and loose, yet painstakingly plotted out. I’m anxious to see it come together. This is, as Pegg and Frost took care to point out, not an Edgar Wright film. But I’m not sure it’s what you might expect out of Mottola, either.

But let’s just let him talk, shall we?

It’s funny, out of Comic-Con in 2007 when they had the Superbad premiere there, and Edgar [Wright] and Nick [Frost] were there, it seemed like there was this moment where basically these two groups kind of came together and just formed all of these projects. Did you feel that also, that that was the central point of [the relationship/project]?

Greg Mottola: Yeah, I mean that’s where I met those guys. It was a collision of kingdoms.