Interview (Written): Todd Phillips

A Little White Lies interview with writer-director Todd Phillips whose writing credits include Road Trip, Old School, and the recently released War Dogs.

There’s a lot of talk about how we’ve now entered the post-satire age. What’s your take on that?

It certainly seems that way. Also there’s a thing going on right now where the world as a whole is waking up to the fact that the system is rigged, that the shit is stacked up against the little guy. So when you get movies like The Big Short or Money Monster or hopefully even this movie, you realise that these characters are pawns. I do feel like that’s become more of a thing recently in movies. It happens to be Trump’s theme, even though he couldn’t be more part of the fucking system if he tried. The guy has balls, you’ve got to give him that.

Whether it’s The Hangover films or this, do you always get to make the movies you want to make?

I would say so. I’ve been offered some pretty big movies, superheroes movies and other stuff of that ilk. Those aren’t the movies that I go see. The stuff I make generally lies within my taste at that particular point in my life. I wouldn’t even make Road Trip now but at that moment that was a movie I would have gone to see. I kind of go with my taste above thinking of my career and what would be a smart movie for me to make. I had built up a lot of goodwill at Warner Bros; we made four movies in five years that all made a good amount of money for them which is what they worry about. So I was able to use some of that goodwill to get War Dogs made. This isn’t a movie that would get made in most studios.

Was it a ‘one for me’ type deal?

A little bit, sure. The thing is, in Hollywood goodwill is perishable — it doesn’t last forever, so you’ve got to use it while you can. So that’s what I did, because I wanted to tell a story that was a little bit different from what I’ve done before. What I’m saying is, it’s not like the studio were dying to make this movie. They’re whole thing was, ‘Okay, we believe in you, put a good cast together and go.’

For the rest of the interview, go here.