After enduring years of malfunctioning products, Wile E. Coyote teams up with a local personal injury attorney, Kevin Avery (Will Forte) to take on ACME, the manufacturer of anything and everything used by the Looney Tunes characters.
Coyote vs. Acme was the movie you were never supposed to see. Shelved by it’s original distributors in 2023 for “tax reasons”, the backlash from fans all over the world and withing the industry itself led to the film being bought by Ketchup Entertainment and finally released in cinemas this year! As the film prepares to hit Australian cinemas on September 17, Nick L’Barrow caught up with the film’s director Dave Green, and spoke about his intial feelings towards the film being shelved, and how he made a convincing courtroom drama that included all of the insanity of the Looney Tunes’ characters.
Nick: I love courtroom dramas and conspiracy thrillers, and you nail that genre in this film. I truly believe that it is one aspect of this film that is going quite under appreciated within all of the praise. What were some of the inspirations from the genre that you looked to for Coyote vs. Acme?
Dave Green: Thank you so much for saying that. That means a lot. When I first came on to the project and started talking to Sammy Birch, the screenwriter, we did this deep dive into courtroom dramas and thrillers. The one that I came into my pitch with was The Insider. Because we invest so deeply into Jeffery Wigand’s quest, and his pain, and his turmoil in that journey. There’s not a moment in that movie where you’re let off the hook and you feel like it’s so unfair what is happening to Wigand. So, I used that as a north star because I wanted to get you to care about this movie just as much. But there were a whole lot of other films like The Verdict with Paul Newman. That was a big one for us. A Few Good Men. Erin Brokovich. Michael Clayton, also. We looked at how these movies were constructed, and pulled references from them where we could mine some humour. Like finding out what could be funny if this was a Looney Tunes gag. That’s what we were going for – cross pollinating courtroom dramas with Looney Tunes.
Nick: When I watch Wile E. Coyote get run over by a truck or blow himself up with dynamite, I find it hilarious! But I also wonder if there is a limit to the insanity? Can you get “too ridiculous” with cartoon violence? Or are all bets off when it comes to a character like Wile E. Coyote?
DG: It’s a good question. I don’t know if there is a limit. I mean, they did some pretty wild stuff back in the day with the shorts. And they continue to do wild stuff. There’s a great show on HBO Max which I think is the funniest version of the Looney Tunes since those shorts, and they do some wild, surreal, almost Ren and Stimpy-like oddball humour. We never quite went for that here. There is one gag that was kind of weird that didn’t make it into the final cut. We had a sequence where Wile E. Coyote was exploring his hotel room, and he sees a hair dryer for the first time. And he kind of gets his face sucked into the hair dryer, and it spits his face out, turns it around, then the hair dryer blows his eyeballs out of his head – [laughs] it’s so gross! Then he’s blind, looking for his eyeballs on the ground. And they’re like these two over easy eggs that he flops into his eyeholes. That did not make it into the movie, but we were laughing a lot when we saw that sequence.
Nick: That sounds wild! But it also speaks to the tone that Looney Tunes have maintained over the decades. What was your experience in bringing that iconic Looney Tunes sarcasm into a story that does actually feel quite sincere?
DG: I mean, if you look at a movie like Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, I think what makes that movie work is the balancing of tones. That movie is very dark, but it’s also very silly. So, it’s this intersection of tones that we are doing – silly and dumb – but you’re right, we are sincere. Our goal was to never be saccharine. Sammy’s script was brilliant because she didn’t want to go so far to create moments that were too much. The character of Dottie, who is played by Martha Jones, is a great example of this because she is so dry, and funny, and real. And she has a great line towards the end of the movie that just completely cuts down everything Will Forte’s character has just done for the last half an hour. And I love that moment because it cuts out the saccharine and keeps things real. So we were always finding ways to balance those tones, and keep the movie truthful, honest, silly, and real all at once.
Nick: There are so many moments where real life people are interacting with animated characters. But you also have blends of animation and VFX too. What was the process in getting the actors to understand the vision of this film?
DG: So, we had a year of prep on the movie, and that process was me meeting with the animators and talking about what Wile E. was feeling, what his goals were, from scene to scene. We had that locked down. The only issue is that Wile E. Coyote is the only actor who isn’t coming to set! So the voice of his character really is the animators, and they were coming up with ways for him to express himself non-verbally. Then we brought the entire crew to Alberquerque, where we filmed the movie. I never wanted to burden the actors by showing them all these drawings and ideas of what we wanted it to look like. Instead, we had a puppeteer – an incredibly talented puppeteer named Dave Barclay – who worked on Roger Rabbit, among a ton of other things. And he would puppeteer a life-size Wile E. Coyote puppet that would then be the eyeline for Will or Lana, or PJ and John to have something to physically react to. Then in post we removed the puppet and the animators would then draw Wile. E into the film.
Nick: I’ll close out on this, and I feel comfortable asking this because not only has the film actually been released, but it’s great and is receiving well deserved praise. When WB was shelving the film, was there ever a point where you went, “What did I do wrong? Have I made a movie so bad it can’t be released?”
DG: That’s a great question. Honestly, I’m still processing it all. I do have to say, in the period of time where the movie was in the dark, we never lost hope because we were able to make the movie. We got away with this. And for myself, the cast, and the crew – this filmmaking family – we all kind of felt like we’d robbed the bank and got away with something special. Like, this is a courtroom drama with Looney Tunes characters… it’s absurd! If you look at this movie from a 30,000 foot view, in so many ways, it shouldn’t exist! As a group, we were so proud that we made this movie. And though it took a long time for people to see it, it at a point felt good enough that we got to make it. We pulled off what we set out to achieve. But now, the reward is even bigger and greater than the work because it can actually be shared with people, and that’s the entire reason we do what we do.
Thank you so much to Dave for his time, and to Pinnacle Films and NedCo PR for organising the interview. Coyote vs. Acme is in Australian cinemas now.
