Not content with his job as a bouncer at a local Beantown bar and a bit of an embarrassment to his accomplished family, Doug Glatt (Seann William Scott) dreams of the kind of success enjoyed by minor league hockey goon Ross Rhea (Liev Schreiber).

When a chance encounter with an on-ice thug leads to a bloody fist fight that Doug easily wins, the coach of the Halifax Highlanders sees potential in this mammoth sized man who is only hampered by his lack of any hockey playing ability and his brother’s old figure skates.

Standing up to the taunts of the other players, Doug manages to join the team, and with the encouragement of his hockey obsessed best friend (Jay Baruchel) quickly becomes a rising star. Soon he’ll have the opportunity to face off against Ross “The Boss” Rhea and perhaps finally land a girlfriend. Now – all he needs is to learn how to skate.

Hockey – it’s as Canadian as donuts which is why producer David Gross couldn’t help but feel frustration that the quintessential movie about the sport, Slapshot, was made by someone other than a Canadian. And damn it, David Gross was going to do something about it.

Together with producer Jesse Shapira, Gross found screenwriter Evan Goldberg (Pineapple Express, Superbad, The Simpsons) and asked him if he’d like to write a Canadian hockey movie. Turns out that being an expat Canadian, Goldberg had been chomping at the bit to do something about the old country.

He liked the idea. He was excited about the idea. He wanted to write the screenplay. There was just one problem – he knew nothing about hockey (a fact that could lose him his citizenship, but we won’t go there right now). So he turned to actor/writer Jay Baruchel.

Now Baruchel is a different story. He’d been weaned on hockey and his time spent in the California sun hadn’t leached that out of his sub-zero Montreal-winter blood. “All of my knowledge or interest in hockey comes from my father,” he said. “I was raised in a household where the Montreal Canadians were effectively our religion: Jewish on Dad’s side, Catholic on Mum’s, all Habs fans.

And Dad’s favorite players were always the tough ones, the enforcers – or the goons for lack of a better term: Chris “Knuckles” Nilan, John “Rambo” Kordic, Larry “Big Bird” Robinson, friggin’ Lyle Odelein.”

Baruchel met with Goldberg, Gross and Shapira and everything fell into place. “It was almost five years ago when we finished the first draft,” he said. Writing the script was a bi-coastal process – Goldberg in LA, Baruchel in Montreal. They tweaked it back and forth via email. “Then we brought some other really talented writers into the writers’ room: Kyle Hunter, Ariel Shaffir and my writing partner, Jesse Chabot.” This was teamwork, through and through.

‘Goon’ is inspired by the book, Goon: The True Story of an Unlikely Journey Into a Minor Hockey League, about Doug Smith, a late bloomer, who didn’t start playing hockey until age 19 and came equipped with the unlikely skill of an amateur boxer. No one in the Goon camp remembers who found the book first. Best guess is it was Jesse Shapira.

The guiding light in the story evolution was simple. “We knew the character of Doug Glatt, our hero, had to be an underdog,” said Baruchel. As the story progressed, Glatt – a newcomer to the game of hockey – became an amalgam of two ideas: first was Baruchel’s father, who had played hockey in his youth on the Bethel Wings, an all-Jewish hockey team.

“I grew up hearing stories about when they would play French teams in east end Montreal. Spectators would throw pennies at them as they skated onto the ice,” he continued. “I coupled that with this real hockey player named Mike Bajurny who’s not Jewish, but played on the Laval Chiefs which is part of the North American Hockey League. Both Bajurny’s father and his grandfather are doctors, his brother’s a filmmaker and he’s the guy who gets paid to fight and skate for a living.”

Bajurny is the subject of a documentary called Le Chiefs, produced by his brother, and it’s about one season in the blue-collar minor leagues, complete with awkward suppers with his family. “They keep asking Mike, ‘Why are you doing this? Why are you slumming? You’re one of us. You can do better.’ And he says, ‘No, I love it.

This is what I’m good at.’ Those two things coalesced in my mind and out of that, I said, ‘What if we just make Doug stupid as hell?’ I mean, he’s a good man, an honest man, everything is very old fashioned and simple with him, but let’s write this so he’s maybe not the crunchiest chip in the bag,” said Baruchel (Baruchel is quick to add that his dad is not nearly as slow-witted as Glatt).

It was at that point that David Gross called in Don “The Hammer” Carmody. Carmody liked that Goon was a comedy and that it “was a terrific reimagining of the minor league hockey milieu”, and he liked the players involved (director and actors). That was all it took for him to agree to help finance and produce the film.

‘Goon’ is available on DVD on May 29, 2012.

Image Courtesy of   http://www.magpictures.com

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Mike “The Captain” Dowse is a director with hockey in his DNA. “I was a Flames fan first because I’m originally from Calgary. When I moved to Montreal, it took me four years to switch over to being a Habs fan, but having a kid helped me get into it. I also started playing hockey again for the first time since I was fourteen. When you get right down to it, I love hockey.”

He and Jay Baruchel, the writer, had been circling each other for the past few years, initially, on a different project they were batting around, but it afforded them the opportunity to discover they worshipped at the same shrine – hockey. It was a solid match, especially given the sentiments Dowse had expressed in an article on ‘Fubar II’, “I love hockey and I love violence and I love comedy.”

Of the three elements, comedy, hockey and violence, the first was the easiest for this particular director. He had established that with ‘Fubar’, ‘Fubar II’, and ‘The Foundation’. The idea of shooting hockey was more challenging because it’s one fast game. Players skate up to 45 km/hr. And then there is the violence.

“That’s a big part of the game, but it’s also a big part of physical comedy,” said Dowse. Violent comedy (or comic violence) is a nuanced genre, one Tarantino made a name for himself by mixing the banal and the hyper-real, but in the context of ‘Goon’, Dowse noted, “Hockey gives you a nice bubble to do that with.”

“When it came to casting Doug “The Goon” Glatt, Seann William Scott was always in our minds,” said …well, everyone said that. It was more than just that. “Once Seann’s name was mentioned, it ruined us because there was never anybody else who could play him. So if, for whatever reason, we didn’t get the chance to hire him, we would have been shit out of luck,” explained Baruchel. “He’s just unbelievable. He’s heartbreaking, he’s compelling, and he’s sympathetic.

And his acting is – in the best possible use of the word – simple. It’s direct, to the point, and exactly what it is’s supposed to be. He’s someone we always wanted for his physical size and his acting ability and especially his comedic abilities. And he trained hard, not that he’s portrayed as a fabulous skater, but as somebody who can do the fights and take the physical action.”

For Seann William Scott, the character of Doug Glatt was a “dream role”. He was approached two years before filming started and that was it. “I wanted to work with them so badly and they thought I’d be right for this part. This was the kind of movie I always wanted to do when I moved out to Los Angeles to pursue acting because, like every kid’s dream come true, you get to be a badass fighter. Honestly, this was the best experience I’ve ever had – and I’ve had a lot of wonderful experiences. My whole M.O. was to make sure I didn’t screw it up.”

“Jay Baruchel as Pat was a natural choice because the part was written for Jay Baruchel, by Jay Baruchel and Evan Goldberg. So we were kind of saddled with Jay Baruchel, said Don Carmody. “No, seriously, he’s terrific in the role and no one else could have pulled this off this combination of complete wacky weirdness and high energy profanity-spewing. Yes, Jay Baruchel is Pat.”

Doug Glatt’s erstwhile and somewhat surprising girlfriend, Eva, is played by Alison Pill. A romance born in a bar, Doug and Eva are definitely an odd couple, each nurturing their own extreme quirks. “They do seem destined for each other. Alison is incredibly adorable, but she’s not playing this as drop dead gorgeous or the beauty queen. She’s somebody we believe could fall for a slow-witted hockey player. The chemistry between the two of them is extraordinary,” said Carmody.

Eugene Levy is cast as Dr. Glatt, Doug’s accomplished father. He and Seann have had a relationship that dates back to 1999 and the first of the American Pie series. Eugene is a comic genius and the filmmakers feel fortunate to have secured Levy as part of the cast. He plays the baffled father whose whole family is intelligent and overachieving, and while disappointed in his son, he nonetheless tries to support him as much as he is able.

Sporting an end-stage Movember horseshoe moustache, Tony- Award winning, classical actor, Liev Schreiber stepped up to play Ross Rhea, the penultimate hockey goon. Shapira and Gross campaigned hard for this innovative casting and won. “He is terrifically menacing, funny and self-aware – as a good goon should be. I think this will be a real surprise when his legions of fans see him in this role,” said Carmody.

Finally we have Marc André Grondin as Xavier LaFlamme, the young, hotshot French-Canadian hockey star, who has fallen on hard times and succumbed to the temptations of stardom. Many will know him from his star turn in the wonderful (and multi-award winning) coming-of-age movie, C.R.A.Z.Y. He’s charming. He’s handsome and a natural talent on the ice, as well – a perfect counterpoint to Seann’s performance.

When all is said and done, ‘Goon’ is a tribute film. “A few years ago in Montreal, I had a dinner with this couple in their 50s,” recall Baruchel. “The wife had gone out with my Dad back when they were teenagers and the husband had played hockey alongside my Dad. I asked him what kind of hockey player my father had been and the man said, ‘Your Dad liked to finish his checks.’

[Translation for non-hockey types: When a player has another player lined up for a clean hit, he follows through or finished his check. If he pulls up, he just nudges or glances or brushes. In the olden days, a guy who finished his checks showed commitment and a willingness to muck it up.] “Back then, your father raised you to think either Gretzky was the man or Gretzky was a pussy.

My Dad was a ‘Gretzky is a pussy’ guy. So ‘Goon’, the goriest, rowdiest, coarsest language, awesomest, hockey flick ever made, is in large part for him.”

Image Courtesy of   http://www.magpictures.com

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Because the entire original cast wanted to come back, populating the film was easy. Says Jon Hurwitz, writer and director: “What’s been exciting about the entire cast is that everyone came here motivated to kick ass.

They care about their characters, and it was fun getting input from the actors. We were writing it as fans, and we were writing it as filmmakers. But talking to each of these actors to shape the character and where they are now with them has been amazing.”

Jason Biggs returns to star as the perpetually horny Jim, and he now tackles the additional role of executive producer. “Jason is unbelievable,” commends Hurwitz. “Every take, he gives you so many different options. He’s absolutely fearless. When we were in preproduction and doing rewrites, we discussed the idea of adding one more set piece for him. I sent him an e-mail asking, ‘Do you have any interest in showing your dick?’ His reply was, ‘I will do anything for comedy, as long as it’s funny.’ And he did.”

“As an actor I went further than I’ve gone before,” reveals Biggs. “We had the freedom to go to these places comedically that many actors don’t. That’s why we’ve been able to avoid being gratuitous with the comedy. This series has never been about being gross just to be gross or trying to insert shock value. It’s all earned because these are characters people relate to. There’s real heart in the movies, in all of them.”

Biggs has long believed what many of us see in the films of the franchise: The wildness of the antics is balanced by heart. Still, he’s not above going, ahem, balls-out for a laugh. “I hope people respond, because I put myself out there,” he says. “I put out more than I’ve ever shown, and I’m not talking emotionally. I literally showed more of my body than ever before. I don’t know how to top that…maybe the next stop is porn?”

Alyson Hannigan returns as sexy band geek Michelle, now a mother of a young son. She is married to Jim and taking on the role of the quintessential mom/wife, while fighting to keep her sex drive alive. “Very much like Stifler, Michelle was sort of one-note in the first film,” explains Hurwitz. “It’s fun that as the franchise has grown, she has developed into much more of a three-dimensional character.”

The past 13 years have been good to the actress, who has become one of the most recognizable faces on TV with her enormously successful CBS series. “We’re huge fans of Alyson’s,” says writer Hayden Schlossberg. “We love her on How I Met Your Mother and in these movies. She’s got great timing and great heart. With just a look, she brings so much.”

Discussing her character, Hannigan says: “Obviously, Michelle has aged, and I was worried about how to bring her quirkiness into an adult level without her seeming like she was still in high school. But Jon and Hayden did such a great job with the script, and it wasn’t hard to find a happy medium.

She has matured, but she’s still quirky.” When it comes to her on-screen husband, Hannigan was happy to be part of the reunion. She reflects: “Jason and I have always had such a great chemistry and rapport, and it’s fun to play off of one another. We don’t have to work hard to create chemistry; it’s just effortless.”

Seann William Scott returns as the culture-defining Stifler and also earns his stripes as an executive producer on the film. Comments Schlossberg: “Seann’s such a sweetheart, and yet when he turns it on as Stifler, he can make you easily laugh. His face is chiseled; it’s like a comedy weapon. He knows how to use his eyes, smile and his jawline, and he has great comedy instincts. The combination gives him a unique energy that is virtually trademarked to this character.”

“What was fun for us is that we had Seann stretch his skill set beyond what you’ve seen with Stifler,” adds Hurwitz. “Seann’s fearless, and we get to be emotionally invested in the character now.

He will bring you tons of laughs, but a lot of the emotional core of this movie is through Stifler. Seann got into it, and you feel for Stifler.” Still, one of the scenes the directors wanted to pay homage to was Stifler walking through parties— shooting on his Steadicam and harassing women in the office, as opposed to at his high-school house parties. That Stifler never will change.

The actor says that working again with his longtime friends brought back a flood of memories. When Scott got the script for the first American Pie, he had been in Los Angeles for three years, auditioning while he worked at Home Depot. “The character wasn’t very likable at all,” Scott recalls.

“He was in three scenes, and he was just a straight-up jerk. I was thinking, ‘I’m not sure I would even want to play this role.’ But I felt comfortable taking a risk.” Scott says he came up with a character who was a combination of five different guys with whom he’d gone to school. He added a bit of improv, and Stifler was born. “I wanted him to be the guy you’re not supposed to like.” Scott acknowledges that the role “is so much more fun now.

My sense of humor has changed. I’m weirder and a little bit bolder. It’s fantastic to play a character who is in his thirties and doing things that other 30-year olds really want to do. Stifler is the person who hasn’t changed, but the world around him has. He’s still living in the world of high school.”

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