'The Game Plan' filled The Rock's Disney desire
Posted: Sunday, September 30, 2007
In the comedy "The Game Plan," pro quarterback Joe Kingman's life is a series of calculated moves -- until he meets the 7-year-old daughter he never knew existed.
Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, who plays Kingman, isn't nearly as much of a planner, at least when it comes to choosing which films to make. He says he doesn't sit around pondering how best to market himself.
"I've had the pleasure of working in a lot of different genres, reaching a lot of demographics," says former wrestling superstar Johnson, 35. "But I didn't think, 'Oh, now I have to do a comedy with kids.' "
The timing was appealing -- Johnson was shooting the gritty "Gridiron Gang" when Disney approached him about "The Game Plan," which co-stars newcomer Madison Pettis as Joe's daughter, Peyton.
"I had wanted to do a movie with Disney for my own selfish reasons," says Johnson. "I have a little 6-year-old girl who challenges me every day, just like Madison challenged me in the movie, and selfishly I wanted to make a movie that not only I could take her to, but a movie that was very powerful in her eyes.
"And in her eyes, the Disney brand is the most powerful brand in the universe 'cause our household is 24/Disney. Literally, it's on Disney Channel all the time."
Johnson is "very, very happy" with "The Game Plan," and he feels good about what Disney offers his daughter, Simone.
"We all share the same responsibility as adults to our children, celebrity or not," he says. "There's that unique bond that a daddy always has with his little girl that can never be duplicated, so I am sensitive about that and sensitive about who our little girls are looking up to.
"So from my little girl's age ... up, they're looking up to a Miley Cyrus, the Cheetah Girls, 'High School Musical.' I love that because you can always count on the Disney brand delivering a powerful family message."
Johnson is on board for another Disney project, a "brand-new chapter" of "Escape to Witch Mountain" called simply "Witch Mountain." His previous films -- from "The Mummy Returns" to "The Scorpion King," "The Rundown," "Walking Tall," "Be Cool," "Doom" and "Gridiron Gang" -- haven't been age-appropriate for his daughter, much less of interest to her.
"The funny thing is ... anything I've done in the past, any successes I was able to achieve, she couldn't care less about it," he says.
"The moment ... she found out that I was gonna do an episode of 'Hannah Montana,' I'm not kidding you, her jaw dropped, 'Ahh, really?!' I mean, to the point where I flew her out to L.A., brought her to the set, had her meet Miley Cyrus. It's unbelievable. It's very rewarding, too ... when you can just make your children smile that way. It was awesome."
Johnson raves about his co-star in "The Game Plan."
"The amazing thing about working with Madison is the fact that she's an 8-year-old little girl who is unbelievably talented," he says by phone during a publicity visit to Salt Lake City. "It was a real pleasure to watch this little starlet grow and unfold right before your eyes.
"There's that old adage in Hollywood about never working with animals or children. Well, in this I had a great bulldog, who not only had a mind of its own and couldn't care less when you yelled 'Action!' or 'Cut!' but he would periodically leave us very nice gifts on the floor, and we would have to take a break from shooting and clean up ...
"But with Madison, my only concern was the comedic timing that is necessary in a comedy between the two comedic partners 'cause she's 8. And she held her own, and her timing is great ... I was really, really impressed with that."
In his wrestling days, Johnson occasionally made his opponents see stars, and no doubt he saw some himself after certain hits. But that didn't prepare him to be "BeDazzled" in "The Game Plan."
Not only does Peyton come with a full arsenal of cuteness, but she's also armed with -- as seen on TV -- a BeDazzler, ready to make Joe's life fabulous. Johnson wasn't familiar with the rhinestone-attaching device prior to making the film, but he found it fun.
"I was like a big kid on the set," he says. "There wasn't anything that I didn't play with."
(Contact Betsy Pickle of The Knoxville News Sentinel in Tennessee at www.knoxnews.com.)
Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, who plays Kingman, isn't nearly as much of a planner, at least when it comes to choosing which films to make. He says he doesn't sit around pondering how best to market himself.
"I've had the pleasure of working in a lot of different genres, reaching a lot of demographics," says former wrestling superstar Johnson, 35. "But I didn't think, 'Oh, now I have to do a comedy with kids.' "
The timing was appealing -- Johnson was shooting the gritty "Gridiron Gang" when Disney approached him about "The Game Plan," which co-stars newcomer Madison Pettis as Joe's daughter, Peyton.
"I had wanted to do a movie with Disney for my own selfish reasons," says Johnson. "I have a little 6-year-old girl who challenges me every day, just like Madison challenged me in the movie, and selfishly I wanted to make a movie that not only I could take her to, but a movie that was very powerful in her eyes.
"And in her eyes, the Disney brand is the most powerful brand in the universe 'cause our household is 24/Disney. Literally, it's on Disney Channel all the time."
Johnson is "very, very happy" with "The Game Plan," and he feels good about what Disney offers his daughter, Simone.
"We all share the same responsibility as adults to our children, celebrity or not," he says. "There's that unique bond that a daddy always has with his little girl that can never be duplicated, so I am sensitive about that and sensitive about who our little girls are looking up to.
"So from my little girl's age ... up, they're looking up to a Miley Cyrus, the Cheetah Girls, 'High School Musical.' I love that because you can always count on the Disney brand delivering a powerful family message."
Johnson is on board for another Disney project, a "brand-new chapter" of "Escape to Witch Mountain" called simply "Witch Mountain." His previous films -- from "The Mummy Returns" to "The Scorpion King," "The Rundown," "Walking Tall," "Be Cool," "Doom" and "Gridiron Gang" -- haven't been age-appropriate for his daughter, much less of interest to her.
"The funny thing is ... anything I've done in the past, any successes I was able to achieve, she couldn't care less about it," he says.
"The moment ... she found out that I was gonna do an episode of 'Hannah Montana,' I'm not kidding you, her jaw dropped, 'Ahh, really?!' I mean, to the point where I flew her out to L.A., brought her to the set, had her meet Miley Cyrus. It's unbelievable. It's very rewarding, too ... when you can just make your children smile that way. It was awesome."
Johnson raves about his co-star in "The Game Plan."
"The amazing thing about working with Madison is the fact that she's an 8-year-old little girl who is unbelievably talented," he says by phone during a publicity visit to Salt Lake City. "It was a real pleasure to watch this little starlet grow and unfold right before your eyes.
"There's that old adage in Hollywood about never working with animals or children. Well, in this I had a great bulldog, who not only had a mind of its own and couldn't care less when you yelled 'Action!' or 'Cut!' but he would periodically leave us very nice gifts on the floor, and we would have to take a break from shooting and clean up ...
"But with Madison, my only concern was the comedic timing that is necessary in a comedy between the two comedic partners 'cause she's 8. And she held her own, and her timing is great ... I was really, really impressed with that."
In his wrestling days, Johnson occasionally made his opponents see stars, and no doubt he saw some himself after certain hits. But that didn't prepare him to be "BeDazzled" in "The Game Plan."
Not only does Peyton come with a full arsenal of cuteness, but she's also armed with -- as seen on TV -- a BeDazzler, ready to make Joe's life fabulous. Johnson wasn't familiar with the rhinestone-attaching device prior to making the film, but he found it fun.
"I was like a big kid on the set," he says. "There wasn't anything that I didn't play with."
(Contact Betsy Pickle of The Knoxville News Sentinel in Tennessee at www.knoxnews.com.)
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