We Visit the Party Girls of ‘Piranha 3-D’
Like any fright film that wants to be a hit, Piranha 3-D promises two key elements – shocks galore and beautiful women. I spoke with two of the latter during my recent visit to the film’s set in Lake Havasu, Arizona (just a few days before shooting wrapped) – Jessica Szhor and Kelly Brook. Szhor (best know for her role on Gossip Girl) play’s the film’s nominal heroine, Kelly, a girl who grew up in a spring-break party town, and now finds herself at an age when she must decide if she wants to join the party. Brook (a former judge on Britain’s Got Talent who appeared in Smallville and The Italian Job) plays Danni, a lovely Brit for whom there is no decision – she’s all too eager to bare it all in the film’s Girls Gone Wild-esque video Wild, Wild Girls. Check out what both party girls told me after the jump.
Jessica Szohr
We saw you working underwater yesterday. Are a lot of your scenes underwater?
I have just in the last couple days, but we’ve been on a boat basically the entire movie. We just recently got back on land.
So have you seen the original film?
I’ve seen it, yeah. That’s one of the reasons why I was really excited when I got the script and went in, and met with everyone and put myself on tape. You were at the edge of your seat, and it was very intense. Then I found out the cast that was doing this; and the director has a really cool vision. So I was like, “Oh my God. This is going to be so fun – on a lake!” It’s weird because even on our days off, we’re in the lake, our one day off a week, we’re on the lake. And I freak out and go, “What if there are here?” I know there’s not but, I’m like, “Oh my God. Something’s going to happen to me…”
Can you talk a little bit about your character in the film and what she goes through?
Kelly is a girl that grew up in Lake Victoria. She’s the local, and grew up seeing all the crazy stuff on the boat – the kids that come in for spring break and the weekends and stuff like that. I think because she’s so used to it she’s not really into it. She’s seen it so much growing up that she’s kind of like, “Oh, I’m over it. I’m not gonna be the girl that has all the tattoos. I’m not the girl that goes and gets wasted on the boat and shows my body to everyone.” She’s kind of done it, seen it all, over it. And she has had a crush on Jake for a long time. She runs into him when she comes back from college, and somehow gets persuaded to go on this boat. Not really persuaded – she wants to go on because Jake is going on, but that’s not her thing at all. So she’s kind of stepping out of her character when she goes on the boat. She goes on and does a couple things that’s not really like her, because of her feelings for Jake. Then they start getting attacked by .
Can you talk about the humor in the film?
I think the comedy is really definitely Jerry O’Connell’s character. He took it to a whole other level in one day. But it is also funny with the two girls, the Wild Wild Girls, because it’s a crazy spring break thing. So it’s not in everyday life that you see this, you know what I mean? Growing up where I’m even from, Wisconsin, people are going to see this and be like, “Is that really what goes on?” My little sister is going to be like, “I’ve never even seen anything like that.”
Have you done your own stunts in this?
I’ve had a stunt double for some of the things. I’ve done some of my own as well. I think with some of the stunts, it would have been, months of training, which, working with the show and then this, I don’t think, schedule-wise, would work. I can’t imagine jumping out of buildings and stuff like that, but doing a water thing… I’ve learned a lot about myself, and a lot about water, and it’s really difficult. I give all the stunt people total mad credit, because, it’s intense.
You said you saw the original – are you a fan of the genre?
I’ve seen a lot actually, and I’m a fan of them. I like movies that… You know, there’s a ton of really big in a lake, but the tone of the movie is such that everything feels really realistic. The way Alex made you feel this love story, and the relationship with Jake and his mom, and the relationship of these two girls are just… We don’t care, we’re having fun. And Jerry’s character is kind of this douche-bag guy, but he’s charming – and that’s why he does get all these women to do what he does. There’s a realistic tone to it, which I always find great in movies, whether it’s a cartoon or not. There’s a real story that you can connect to.
What’s your greatest fear?
Being underwater. [Source]
Luckily, the actress—who admits that she spent much of her lonely first year in Los Angeles “crying myself to sleep”—has adjusted to Manhattan quite well. Her costars have helped: “We’re all young,” she explains, “and everyone was new to New York, so we’ve had so much fun. I’ve heard horror stories from other actors about egos, people who don’t get along, but we’re all friends. There are people from this job who will be in my life for a very, very long time.” Including, perhaps, her boyfriend and castmate, Ed Westwick? The two hooked up more than a year ago, after first getting to know each other, Jessica says, “as friends.” Once both were single, they decided to give romance a shot. “It can be a little awkward,” she admits, “when all of a sudden [you have feelings for] someone you’d call to talk about a different boyfriend. But there wasn’t a lot of thinking and talking. It kind of just happened. We had fun together, and we were like, ‘All right, let’s see where this goes.’”
Gossip Girl (2007-2010)
Piranha3D (2010)
