'Dirty Grandpa's' Adam Pally: 'I wanted to work with De Niro before he died'
When a movie is such that a studio prefers critics not review it, it says a lot about the movie.
When a movie is such that a studio prefers critics not review it, it says a lot about the movie.
That's the case with Dirty Grandpa, in theaters Friday, the new Zac Efron-Robert De Niro vehicle in which the May-December pair go on a road trip that leads to debauchery and sex, and, of course, ooey-gooey life-changing moments.
Dirty Grandpa may be avoiding reviews, but it does have an enviable supporting cast for TV lovers of a certain comedy brand. Parks and Recreation's Aubrey Plaza, The League's Jason Mantzoukas, journeywoman Mo Collins, and even Dancing with the Stars' Julianne Hough, who gamely plays Efron's uptight fiancée, all support the road-tripping duo.
Rounding out that cast is Adam Pally, best known for the much-beloved, little-watched Happy Endings (it's on Hulu, and it's fantastic), and the kinda-beloved, little-watched The Mindy Project. Pally plays Efron's cousin, a screwup who vapes at his grandma's funeral and is very clearly running a puppy mill.
"This movie didn't need me," Pally said, laughing. "I wanted to work with De Niro before he died and I thought this was my best shot."
Pally is familiar with Philadelphia - he's not from here, but a bunch of his college buds from the University of Arizona hail from the area, and he was set to hit up Center City sneaker store Ubiq after his media duties were over (he's got more than 100 pairs of kicks). In 2013, Pally filmed the sweet indie romcom Slow Learners in Media. After a theatrical release last year, the locally produced movie recently hit Netflix, where the film has gained a whole new audience.
"There was something about those characters that spoke to me," Pally said about Slow Learners. "There's this person in America that's just kind of there. They're floating through life and they have good jobs, but they haven't found their soul mate yet. They're still interesting and dramatic."
Dirty Grandpa is very different from Slow Learners. The hard R movie fits the classic road-movie formula: Two very different people are forced to travel together and experience the stresses and revelations associated with their journey. This time, the formula leverages the generation gap between De Niro's titular grandfather and Efron's grandson. "As people get older, there's more similarities between generations," Pally said about why he liked the movie. "The humor is usually that the old people can't relate, but here it's that the young people can't understand that they'll get it."
De Niro certainly plays against type, as the sexed-up, expletive-spewing Dick Kelly, whose main goal in the movie is bedding Plaza's college coed. "It's like meeting the Hall of Fame, it's like meeting Cooperstown," said Pally, who shares only a few minutes with De Niro on screen. "Sometimes, he'll make a face, and you'll know that face from Casino."
Efron, on the other hand, has a different sort of charisma. "You look at him and think, 'Oh my God, I'm a bridge troll. I should be stopping kids from crossing the road with riddles,' " Pally said.
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