Colin Hanks Literally Howled When Garry Marshall Went off-Script on ‘Orange County’ (Exclusive)
Colin Hanks said he busted out laughing to the point of howling when actor/director Garry Marshall added his signature flair to the comedy Orange County.
Hanks described the moment, which was when Arthur Gantner (Marshall) decided to deny Shaun Brumder (Hanks) a shot at getting into his dream college, Stanford. Arthur basically flees from the unfolding circus inside the Brumder home – only to be chased to his car by Shaun himself.
Garry Marshall left the cast howling with laughter
Hanks said that the moment when Shaun grabs onto Arthur’s car window was completely off the cuff. He still laughs about it to this day. “I’ll never forget, we were rehearsing the scene with Garry Marshall,” Hanks recalled to Showbiz Cheat Sheet. “And he gets into the car. I run to his car and I have my hands on the door.”
“Basically, all he has to do is say, ‘You’ll never get into Stanford as long as there’s a bone in my body. Or breath in my body,'” Hanks said. “And because my hands were on the car door, he had to roll up the window. So he just added, ‘Watch your fingers.’ And it made us howl laughing. I mean we just thought it was the funniest thing ever. And so when it’s like that, yeah. Let’s do one like that. And that ended up making it.”
“So there’s always those little moments,” he continued. “The little things that pop up and kind of become part of the film.”
Colin Hanks is still surprised that ‘Orange County’ continues to gain fans
Hanks can’t believe Orange County continues to have such staying power. Released in 2002, Hanks continues to get noticed as his character Shaun. This is in light of being in huge blockbuster hits like Fargo, Dexter, and many more.
“Well, I mean, it is kind of crazy,” he reflected. “I mean, I’ve now got people telling me that, you know, their first date with their wife, was to go see Orange County, you know what I mean? Like, I’ve had some very cool moments lately where people have sort of said how important that movie was to them. Which, you know, look, that’s incredible. And I’m still blown away that you are even asking me a question about a movie that came out in 2002.”
“But, the thing that I remember most about that film and there’s a great deal, I just remember all of us kind of marveling at just how many people came on board to play,” he remarked. Adding that he is still stunned by the incredible talent on display in the film.
The talent in ‘Orange County’ was incredible
“Can you believe we were able to like amass that many people in one movie?” he wondered. “I mean, it’s kind of common now. You almost kind of have to do that now in order to get any kind of sizable budget together. But back then, you didn’t have to do that. That only happened when the material was really good and when this story was kind of touching and it sort of spoke to a greater thing.”
“And so I’m still kind of blown away by just how many people we got on that thing. And, you know, we did find things on the day, I wouldn’t necessarily call it improv, you know, improv kind of changed dramatically and sort of become this new sort of method within films, obviously. As you know, how moments are sort of made.”
