November 19th, 2020 
Jackson Murphy 
It’s been more than seven and a half years since DreamWorks Animation released The Croods, the caveman family adventure comedy that earned nearly $600 million worldwide and an Oscar nomination. A sequel has been in development, on and off, ever since. Now, finally, The Croods: A New Age is here and will be opening in theaters this Wednesday November 25th. Director Joel Crawford (of the 2017 special Trolls Holiday) talks story, casting, release strategy and more.
Jackson Murphy: At that point in November 2017 when Trolls Holiday was airing, where were you in production on this?
Joel Crawford: I think I had just started diving into [this]. The Croods came-out seven years ago and the studio has been trying to make a Croods sequel for that long. There’s a couple reasons why. One was Universal just bought DreamWorks and kind of put everything on hold and were evaluating projects to go forward with. The other thing is: sequels are really hard to make… GOOD sequels are really hard to make.
Joel Crawford:The first movie is so beloved and it’s such a great story. And the characters are awesome… and I can say all that because I didn’t work on it. I’m such a fan of it. Approaching the movie I was like, “Okay – what have they tried before? What scripts on 2 have been attempted? And what can I pull from that?” To build on the ideas that had already been developed.
At that point [Nov. 2017], there was a script from a past version that both [producer] Mark Swift and myself had just started to read as a way in to go, “Is this the story we’re telling?” The end result is quite different than the script. But the key thing was: it was The Croods meeting another family, and it feels like the obvious next big event in The Croods life.
JM: It does. It makes sense. And I’m glad because I was seeing some headlines for a few years: “What’s happening to The Croods 2?” “Is it getting made?” I interviewed Chris Sanders and Kirk DeMicco when the original Croods came-out in March 2013. They have story credits on this sequel. Did you work with them a lot on this?
JC: I was working side by side with Chris and Kirk. I was working on the Trolls franchise, and I would go to brainstorms with them as they were working on this early on. When I took on directing this Croods sequel, Chris Sanders wasn’t at the studio anymore. He was working on some other projects out. But he was nice enough to come back in and give me notes on the script… give me insights into things they’ve tried… and help me understand the characters, which was an awesome hand-off to go, “Okay, now run with it.” That was really empowering and I really appreciated that.
JM: It’s been a bit since Nicolas Cage, Emma Stone and Ryan Reynolds first voiced these characters. So what kinds of things did you do to help bring them back into the mindset of voicing these characters?
JC: (laughs) You know what? With these amazing characters I just kind of get out of the way. “Here’s enough context: GO!” Nic Cage? He always surprises me and I think himself as well with certain things he’s into. He’s always pulling from different inspirations in his life or different cinematic history. He taps into other actors. Our cast is amazing. One of the challenges I’d say was with the returning cast… they’re an amazing source of talent. Whoever we brought-in had to match and go toe-to-toe with the Croods family. When we got Leslie Mann for Hope Betterman and Kelly Marie Tran for Dawn Betterman, the daughter and Peter Dinklage for the father, Bill Betterman, they were all the perfect match to elevate the comedy between these two families.
JM: When you said that Nic Cage surprises himself and you, I think Nic Cage surprises everybody… every moviegoer. With all of his film choices. One of the last films I saw in a theater with a packed crowd was his sci-fi movie Color Out of Space. Everybody got so into the craziness that Nic Cage goes through.
JC: You know what’s so great about him? He wants it to be fresh. He does so much, right? How do you not get stale as an actor and repeat yourself? And he doesn’t repeat himself. Those are the ones where Nic will go, “Oh, that reminds me of Prince.” And I don’t know what the connection is, but I go, “Go with it.” You don’t have to know the reference point, but there’s something magical in that performance. “I’m using that take!”
JM: (laughs) And a surprising element is that Emma Stone’s character Eep and Kelly Marie Tran’s Dawn become friends. They’re not frenemies. They’re not enemies. This love triangle for Guy doesn’t happen, which I thought it was gonna, but I like this refreshing take that you do. Why did you decide to go in this direction?
JC: That was actually one of the first big changes we made from where the script was at. When we came in… and it wasn’t the Chris & Kirk script – there had been some other iterations… when Mark and I read the script there was this element of when Dawn and Eep met, they were jealous of each other. We backed it up. There’s kind of two qualifiers for approaching this sequel: I wanted to be true to the characters because I love the first Croods. I want everything to come from our characters’ point of view, not just for entertainment. Bring it back to the honesty of the character. And also positivity. I want to feel like this movie is a celebration and it brings this joy to the world.
JC: With those two qualifiers: when Eep, who’s with her family all the time. She’s met Guy and has a boyfriend. But when she comes across another teenage girl, there isn’t high school. There aren’t all these other people around. The reality is: you would be overjoyed, and she is. Let’s turn that up to Level 11 with Eep picking-up Dawn and going, “I have a girlfriend!” And from there, we thought it’s so fun and refreshing to see girls not only in a scene not talking about a guy, they’re so fascinated with each other. And there’s actually so much comedy that comes from their interaction together. A lot of times it’s a trope to relegate the comedy to the guys, and it’s fun that it’s comedy with the guys and the girls.
JM: That’s very smart. One of my favorite parts of the film was watching Thunk experience the window as television. How did that concept come about?
JC: (laughs) Everything has to challenge The Croods family’s world view. Everybody’s going through change. Eep and Guy are ready to leave the pack, and Grug’s not okay with that. And The Bettermans bringing this modern idea to The Croods, it seemed like the perfect platform to have, essentially, the world’s first tablet or iPad or TV. To have it as simple as a window, but what that might’ve been for a cave person to go, “Wow! I can see outside!” And later to make a portable one. Also having young kids myself and having them all day on the computer, it just seemed like a no-brainer.
JM: It’s very clever. A key member of the DreamWorks family who contributes some songs to this movie is Jack Black (Kung Fu Panda & Shark Tale). How did he decide to get involved in this DreamWorks movie?
JC: One of the first big things that felt right for the music side of things was tapping into Mark Mothersbaugh as the composer for the music. Mark brings so much personality and life to the score that already he’s an amazing talent. One of the cool bonuses is that he’s friends with Jack Black. And they’ve wanted to collaborate. Mark brought Jack in, and for us, independent of Jack being part of the DreamWorks family, his energy is so fun that it seemed perfect to have him do a cover of “I Think I Love You”.
JM: At the beginning of this COVID pandemic, DreamWorks made headlines for taking Trolls World Tour from indoor theaters to VOD and Drive-In theaters. And it did so well in both outlets. The Croods: A New Age is going to be at indoor theaters on November 25th. How did you and the studio come to that decision?
JC: 2020, it’s a hard year to plan. The studio’s been awesome. Everybody here is really excited about Croods and really excited to share it with the world and figuring out the best way to do that. Half of this movie was completed at home. One of the cool surprises for me: I’m approving shots of final lighting on a laptop and over the last couple months, we actually started coming into the studio to see what it looks like on the big screen, and it’s amazing. It looks even better than what I thought! I love that we’re planning for a theatrical release.
What it comes down to: I’m excited for people to see this movie any way they can. Except for pirated. Maybe not pirated.
JM: Yeah. That wouldn’t be good.
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