He was the King of Queens. Now he’s starring in the #1 comedy Paul Blart: Mall Cop, now out on DVD. Kevin James takes questions exclusively for users of Uinterview.com.

Kevin James Interview

Q: What scene did you have the most fun filming in Mall Cop and why?

A: Probably the scene where I gotta eat the lollipop on the ground because it looks dirty and everything like that to the human eye, but it was actually cotton candy and sprinkled Oreos. Anytime you get that on a lollipop, life is good!

Q: Where did you get the idea for the movie? And how is making a big Hollywood comedy different from making a sitcom like The King of Queens?

A: You know, I’ve just always wanted to have mall cops have their voice heard. Their story needs to be told. They don’t get a lot of respect, and in fact, they deserve a ton more because they have to uphold the law without any use of weapons — they don’t get issued weapons — and let’s be honest, they don’t have any real authority. Well, the difference is, a sitcom you’re doing on a weekly basis and if you don’t make as something as great in one episode you go ‘You know what? We’ll just make it up next week and try and do better.’ But in a movie you try and sink everything; your heart and soul is all in there. You’re working on it like a year before it comes out and you just want it to really connect with the public.

Q: Now that you’ve made a movie for Adam Sandler’s production company, what was Adam like to work with?

A: Oh, he’s the greatest. I’ve worked with him before; we’re good buddies. So it really helped taking his expertise and using it here. He helped with not only the comedy and editing the movie, but he always adds awesome songs and he’s got great soundtracks in his movies so I was happy to have him help out.

Q: And, are you going to keep the mustache?

A: Well, as you can see, it’s gone. It’s a commitment, wearing a mustache. It’s only a tight band of brothers – me, Wilfred Brimley, Rollie Fingers – we’re the true originals. You know what? Godspeed to Brad Pitt. He sees it, and he sees how I sport it. And he says, ya know, if he could look good with it, like I look good with it, then yeah, he’ll use one.

Q: Your comedy in this movie is so physical and so hilarious, and I’m wondering did you have doubles to do all those stunts? It was amazing.

A: I did as many as I could. Yeah, I wanted to. That was very important to me – to make this the most physical role I’ve ever done. You know, there are some things that my stunt guy, Jeff Gibson, had to do, but other than that – especially the ones where comedy is tied into it, it had to be me. That was very important, very painful, but I wanted it that way. Yeah, we’ve had a few that didn’t make it into the film that’ll be on the DVD and that is gonna be funny for a different reason because I get hurt. But other than that I think we accomplished what we needed to get the action in this movie.

Q: I noticed that you’re one of the writers on the film and I’m wondering how much collaboration and improvisation there was on the part of the cast to attain the level of humor you guys achieved?

A: You know, once we had gotten what we needed in a scene where, you know, we had the basic idea of it, we hired such great actors in this movie that we let them kind of just improv a little bit and play with the lines, and the majority of the time we used what they said. ‘Cause it was funnier than what we had written.

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Q: What scene did you have the most fun filming in Mall Cop and why? - Uinterview User

Probably the scene where I gotta eat the lollipop on the ground because it looks dirty and everything like that to the human eye, but it was actually cotton candy and sprinkled Oreos. Anytime you get that on a lollipop, life is good!

User Uinterview User
Q: Where did you get the idea for the movie? And how is making a big Hollywood comedy different from making a sitcom like The King of Queens? - Uinterview User

You know, I've just always wanted to have mall cops have their voice heard. Their story needs to be told. They don't get a lot of respect, and in fact, they deserve a ton more because they have to uphold the law without any use of weapons -- they don't get issued weapons -- and let's be honest, they don't have any real authority. Well, the difference is, a sitcom you're doing on a weekly basis and if you don't make as something as great in one episode you go 'You know what? We'll just make it up next week and try and do better.' But in a movie you try and sink everything; your heart and soul is all in there. You're working on it like a year before it comes out and you just want it to really connect with the public.

User Uinterview User
Q: Now that you've made a movie for Adam Sandler's production company, what was Adam like to work with? - Uinterview User

Oh, he's the greatest. I've worked with him before; we're good buddies. So it really helped taking his expertise and using it here. He helped with not only the comedy and editing the movie, but he always adds awesome songs and he's got great soundtracks in his movies so I was happy to have him help out.

User Uinterview User
Q: And, are you going to keep the mustache? - Uinterview User

Well, as you can see, it's gone. It's a commitment, wearing a mustache. It's only a tight band of brothers – me, Wilfred Brimley, Rollie Fingers – we're the true originals. You know what? Godspeed to Brad Pitt. He sees it, and he sees how I sport it. And he says, ya know, if he could look good with it, like I look good with it, then yeah, he'll use one.

User
Q: Your comedy in this movie is so physical and so hilarious, and I'm wondering did you have doubles to do all those stunts? It was amazing. -

I did as many as I could. Yeah, I wanted to. That was very important to me – to make this the most physical role I've ever done. You know, there are some things that my stunt guy, Jeff Gibson, had to do, but other than that – especially the ones where comedy is tied into it, it had to be me. That was very important, very painful, but I wanted it that way. Yeah, we've had a few that didn't make it into the film that'll be on the DVD and that is gonna be funny for a different reason because I get hurt. But other than that I think we accomplished what we needed to get the action in this movie.

User
Q: I noticed that you're one of the writers on the film and I'm wondering how much collaboration and improvisation there was on the part of the cast to attain the level of humor you guys achieved? -

You know, once we had gotten what we needed in a scene where, you know, we had the basic idea of it, we hired such great actors in this movie that we let them kind of just improv a little bit and play with the lines, and the majority of the time we used what they said. 'Cause it was funnier than what we had written.