Kyle Mooney as James in Brigsby Bear.
Dave McCary and Kyle Mooney, two thirds of the team behind the delightfully eccentric comedy Brigsby Bear, were middle-school besties and rival class clowns in San Diego. In the sixth grade, McCary's appendix burst, landing him in the hospital for a week. Because his abdomen was supersensitive, the boy's visitors were instructed (unbeknownst to him) to refrain from making him laugh. So, when his pal Mooney came into the room, he brought baseball cards but not the funny.
"I was feeling completely miserable," recalls McCary, speaking over the phone. "I was so looking forward to him cheering me up. It was so odd feeling his energy, and it was so not him. To see him subdued like that, against his will, was the strangest childhood moment we ever had. I lost Kyle, for a short while, for the sweetest reasons."
Childhood experiences and the love of looking back is something of a theme to Brigsby Bear, directed by McCary and co-written by Mooney, who is also the film's peculiar protagonist. Charming, sincere and perhaps a little dark, the first feature from the pair involves Saturday Night Live's Mooney as James Pope, a childlike young adult literally in his own little world.
Comparisons will inevitably be made to 1998's The Truman Show, starring Jim Carrey. Kidnapped as an infant, James lives in a desert bunker with his very unnatural (and loving, if excessively protective) parents. His overriding passion is Brigsby Bear Adventures, a cheaply-made children's television series made, we find out, for an audience of one: James, played with a gentle, nerdy innocence by Mooney.
"I'm sitting in my bedroom right now," says Mooney, who spoke to The Globe on a separate phone call from McCary. "There's an Alf poster above my bed and a Mickey Mouse poster to the left of me. I immerse myself in things that meant something to me while I was growing up."
Is that so.
"I feel like I'm a relatively well-adjusted person," continues Mooney. "It's just that these things that I love and connect with bring me some sense of joy."
There's nothing wrong with keeping nostalgic mementos, and there's certainly nothing wrong with holding on to old friends. A third public school pal of Mooney and McCary (who works with Mooney on SNL as a segment director) is Kevin Costello, who co-wrote Brigsby Bear.
Mooney and McCary went on to study film at the University of Southern California.
There they formed the video sketch-comedy team Good Neighbor with current SNL cast member Beck Bennett (who has a small role in Brigsby Bear) and Nick Rutherford.It's quite an incestuous group, with Mooney and McCary being particularly close. "We have twin-speak," says Mooney, age 32.
"We understand each other," says McCary, also 32. "He's a warm, sweet person who doesn't hold grudges. I'd like to think I don't, either."
Not to reveal too much of the story, but a large part of it has to do with Mooney's character James endeavouring to complete the adventures of the fake-show's ursine hero by making his own DIY film. He does so with the help of new-found friends.
"This is crazy how meta this is," says Mooney. "I'm playing a guy in the movie who's making a movie with friends, and I'm actually doing just that.
Brigsby Bear, among other things, is about artful passions and the drive to create. Asked about making the film with friend, Mooney says he feels fortunate. "Filmmaking can be a scary thing, but this has been rad and wonderful. I just want to keep doing it."
Independent filmmaking undoubtedly is a scary thing. A lot of things in adult life are frightening, and we can see the long-sheltered James looking to break out of his treasured (if weird) childhood to start an adult life in the real world.
Asked if Mooney was channelling another of their childhood friends for the role of James, McCary doesn't deny it. "The subtleties of his performance are so nostalgic to me, because I know, without speaking with him, where he pulled a specific moment from. It could be a kid we grew up with in the ninth grade."
Perhaps the ninth-grade kid would be invited to the film's premiere?
"Sure," says McCary. "In fact, I hope all the Jameses come. This is for them."
Brad Wheeler