James Franco Went off Script in His ‘Pineapple Express’ Fight With Rosie Perez: ‘He Bit My Butt’
Seth Rogen once recruited veteran actor Rosie Perez for his and James Franco’s 2008 comedy film Pineapple Express. But Perez admitted that work got a little wild between herself and her co-stars while filming.
Why Rosie Perez was pissed with what happened to her fight scene between herself and James Franco in ‘Pineapple Express’
Perez played a cop in Rogen’s stoner comedy about a marijuana dealer on the run after witnessing a murder. She was drawn to the movie as soon as she received the script, and immediately found it funny.
“As soon as I read the script I was like, this is hilarious,” she once said according to CBS.
One of the most memorable parts of the film was a fight scene between Perez’s and Franco’s characters. At first, the fight was supposed to involve Perez’s stunt double. But The Flight Attendant star was eager to get in on the action. The sequence eventually led to an off-script exchange between Franco and Perez that didn’t make it in the movie, which upset Perez.
“I did a lot of it,” she said. “There’s only two shots with the stunt [double]. After a while I was like get rid of the stunt chick. I’m doing it all. James Franco and I kind of threw away the choreography, too, and went for it. He went for my butt, too! He bit my butt, which wasn’t great and it didn’t even make the movie and I am kind of pissed off about that.”
Rosie Perez initially couldn’t stand this about working on ‘Pineapple Express’
Perez held Rogen’s raunchy comedy in very high regard. To her, Rogen and the rest of her castmates appeared more normal than some other co-stars she was used to working with in the past.
“It was nice to work with people who were regular people,” she said. “They don’t come with pomp and circumstance. It was a blast.”
The Do the Right Thing star had such a good time that Pineapple Express reawakened Perez’s long lost affection for the film industry. Especially at a time when she was enjoying working in theater more.
“I would say that right now that my heart is still with the theater. I would say that this movie, and this is no bulls***, this movie reignited my love for moviemaking. This one and the one I did previously, with John Leguizamo, The Take. those were two movies where I got to do something different. Only the theater did that [before],” she once told Cinemablend.
But she had admitted that Rogen and her co-star’s acting style was difficult getting used to at first. There was a lot of improv and ad-libbing for Express, which Perez had little experience with.
“Initially I couldn’t stand it. It was nerve-racking, because I just did all the Broadway—I did three Broadway plays back to back. You cannot deviate from your play. So I’m sticking so strongly to the text, and David’s like ‘Let it go.’ Once I let it go, and once they paired me with Gary Cole, then I was able to relax and go forward,” she said.
Rosie Perez was interested in doing a sequel to ‘Pineapple Express’ before it was canceled
Both Perez and Rogen showed interest in doing a follow-up film to Pineapple Express.
“I don’t think it’s so precious that I wouldn’t want to ruin it with a sequel,” Rogen said in an interview with E News. “So yeah, I would be [into it]. We talk about it. We joke around about it.”
Perez also had an enthusiastic outlook for a Pineapple sequel.
“I would love to do a sequel with those guys,” Perez said.
Rogen revealed years later that a sequel was shot down by the studio.
“We tried to make one and thanks to the Sony hack you can actually find the email when Sony decided to kill the movie and not make it,” Rogen once said on The Howard Stern Show (via Variety). “It was something we were very open to several years ago, but Sony was not that interested in it.”
Rogen theorized that cost was the likeliest reason why the movie wasn’t made.
“I think we probably wanted too much money. Studios, they don’t like giving away money. Weird thing,” he said.
