Bridesmaids 10th Anniversary: 10 Things You Didn’t Know About The Movie
The movie was not only entertaining on screen, but also had a lot going on behind the scenes. Find out what was behind the curtain of Bridesmaids.
Released in 2011, raunchy comedy Bridesmaids has recently hit a decade of making people laugh the world over. With evergreen performances by a stellar cast of Kristen Wiig, Melissa McCarthy, Rebel Wilson, Maya Rudolph, Ellie Kemper, Rose Byrne, and Wendi McLendon-Covey, the ill-fated life of Annie and her unfortunate tenure as a Maid of Honor for Lillian was peppered with seriously hilarious one-liners and strange antics for fans to enjoy.
The movie was not only entertaining on screen, but also had a lot going on behind the scenes. Famous actors were filmed but left on the cutting room floor, nationalities of characters evolved through production and that one scene (everyone knows which one) wasn't actually met with unanimous approval by everyone on the team. Find out what was behind the curtain of Bridesmaids.
Despite being hilarious in supporting roles in Date Night, and lending her voice to How To Train Your Dragon and Despicable Me, Kristen Wiig had not landed a lead role in any movies before Bridesmaids.
Her performance as Annie in the movie was so seasoned that one would think she was used to leading movies all the time, but this was her first time carrying a movie on her shoulders, along with other fantastic actors. After this, Wiig has had an illustrious career of leading roles of many varieties, not just comedy.
Kristen Wiig played a minor role of Jill, an annoying middle manager in Judd Apatow's Knocked Up, which completely impressed Apatow. According to Wall Street Journal, Wiig caught Apatow's eye with her great performance in the supporting role, and he ended up asking her to write a movie which he would produce, and that she would star in.
Therefore, Kristen Wiig wrote the screenplay for Bridesmaids with Annie Mumolo, and it ended up being nominated for Best Original Screenplay at the Oscars. Apatow made a calculated move which paid off in spades.
One of the funniest scenes in Bridesmaids is the food poisoning scene, where Lillian's dress fitting goes terribly awry because of some funky Brazilian steaks the gang ate earlier.
Kristen Wiig has been vocal about how much she hated the puking scene, "When people say, ‘Oh, we're gonna give more female-centered movies a chance,’ you're not reading the fine print, which is, ‘Oh, but, they have to be like this.’ They want to see women acting like guys." She had not written it in and it was added later by Apatow, much to Wiig's dislike.
Everyone's favorite leading man Paul Rudd was scripted into Bridesmaids, and he also filmed his scenes which were later chopped off to keep the movie more succinct and easier for audiences to follow.
According to Paul Feig in Entertainment Weekly, "Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo wrote Paul Rudd the very specific role of blind date-turned-crazy man. Producer Judd Apatow convinced him to spend the day throwing his body down on an ice-skating rink, running around the set like a deranged fool and tossing expletives at small children." It's a pity that viewers missed out.
The cast had been in talks about a Bridesmaids sequel or spin-off at various points in time, and it deserved one, but that will forever stay a dream. Several actors, including Wendi McLendon-Covey and Wiig herself have flat out denied all possibility.
According to US Weekly, Kristen Wiig said "“It wasn’t a hard decision. We knew during the first one, this was it. We would have made a lot of money if there was a second one, but that’s not my goal in my creative life.”
Hollywood heartthrob Matt Damon was slated to be in Bridesmaids. Wiig and Mumolo had written him into a fantasy scene in Annie's mind while dress shopping, but it was deemed too disconnected from the movie so that scene was scrapped before it could be filmed.
According to Feig "There was a sequence that Kristen and Annie had written, which was funny, but it (involved) trying on the dresses, and then Kristen’s character had this fantasy about what would she would do in this dress. It was really funny, but it was crazy: It was about running through the woods and suddenly Matt Damon shows up…" The puking scene replaced this one.
Chris O’Dowd played Officer Rhodes, the immensely likable police officer who had a soft spot for Annie, and he won hearts with his endearing character and performance as him. He was well loved by audiences, but his original tries at the character involved an American accent.
However, everyone quickly realized that his original Irish accent might work better with Rhodes' sweet character, and it worked like a charm. He got marriage proposals through Twitter after the movie released.
Megan, played by Melissa McCarthy was an iconic character, and her very androgynous self was based on the legendary Food Network chef Guy Fieri. On a talk show, she revealed, “When I first read it, the first person I thought of was Guy Fieri.”
With the Kangol hat, bowling shirt, shades that sometimes went to the back of her head, the resemblance and inspiration was obvious. She even tried to spike her hair for the role.
Co-writer for the movie and Wiig's partner Annie Mumolo originally had a larger part in the movie, which was cut out due to her sudden pregnancy news, according to IndieWire. However, that didn't mean that she couldn't appear in the movie at all.
The nervous girl on the plane who sat next to Annie in Economy class was actually Mumolo, who played her part to the tee.
Bridesmaids was one-of-a-kind, and it spawned amazing memes, but it was intended to be even more surreal and have more hijinks than it already does. The humor was intended to be a lot darker and a lot more absurdist, according to Wiig and Mumolo.
They said “When we were running around to find Lillian, we were going to find a woman lying on the ground. We’re like, “It’s Lillian — she’s dead!” And then we were like, “Oh wait — it’s not Lillian.” And then we just keep running.” It's worth thinking about what the movie would have been like, then.