Amy Poller Explains Why It’s ‘Super Fun’ for a Teen to Play ‘Duncanville’

Amy Poller is known for playing candid and confident characters – Imagine Leslie Knopp parks and recreation And Joy at Pixar Inside out. As he puts it, the roles he plays are often “engines that drive things.”

The protagonist he voices in the Fox animated series. DankanvilleWhat Pohler created with animation veterans Mike Scully and Julie Tucker Scalim is not…

Duncan is a 15-year-old who does things for a 15-year-old, which means rolling his eyes at his parents (voiced by Pohler and Thai Burrell), having fun with his friends, and making “big mistakes”. he told her the hollywood reporter. Წین Dankanville”Season three premiered on Fox on Sunday, Poller said. THR By doing a pandemic season, joining a cast of actors who voiced the kids on Fox’s animated shows and letting the animated show blur the line between “fundamental and crazy.”

what was it like to do that Dankanville The last two years? Its first season ended before the pandemic, but how has all that changed?

It was pretty crazy to do this during a pandemic and animation was one of the places where you could really do something that brought you a lot of luck. We wrote the entire blog this season through Zoom, we never met in person. We had to record in the studio, but everyone was zoomed in all the time. There was no one there with us. It was strange, isolated. However, because this cast is so good, when we saw them and saw ourselves reading at the table, we felt really good. I think everyone really enjoyed the day listening to these fun scripts. [being performed]. I’m proud that we continued to do this at a time when many people were unemployed.

How do you get used to remote typing?

The writers’ room was completely on Zoom. Mike and Julie and the entire team, like everyone else, had to adjust. I think there were some pros and cons to that. Obviously, there was an idea that we could keep working, but I think a lot of people realized that with Zoom, you just have to simplify your day, otherwise you’re going to go crazy. [laughs] So we were constantly adjusting.

A lot of the characters you play are very energetic and strong-willed women, and lo and behold, you’re a 15-year-old boy.

Yes!

What made him attractive to you?

When we started talking about this idea years ago, I was excited to work with Mike and Julie. i worked with mike parks and recreationAnd I’m a big fan of it the simpsonsAnd doing an animated Fox show was important and exciting to me. A great pantheon of women, be it Nancy Cartwright [who voices Bart Simpson] Or Pamela Adlon [Bobby on King of the Hill], which the youngsters played very well. And I’m playing a lot of characters who, as you said, are the engines that drive everything. It’s really cool to play a person who likes to control his impulses. [laughs] Teenagers are like that: they don’t care, most of the time, to listen, to help the team, to get things done. It’s really fun to do that energy as a character.

Why did you turn that age to him? Because as far as I can remember, when I was 15, it wasn’t always so good.

Yes. In our first episode [of season three]We have this wonderful and famous Twitch streamer Ninja [aka Tyler Blevins], Guest. What I really like about this episode is that Duncan, when he’s with friends, he really feels like an adult. At that age you couldn’t believe how people treated you as a child and when you look back it’s like, “I can’t believe how young I was.” 15 year olds don’t feel young. So when he’s with his friends and playing online, he’s the king of the world. But because the increase in his forehead was not over, he did. [messes up] And your whole life was destroyed.

Characters of this age are a lot of fun to play because they make big mistakes and have big thoughts about themselves. They’re not fully formed, which always makes the character fun, at any age I think.

If you’re shooting a scene between Duncan and his mother, Ann, can you switch between two voices, or do you need to shoot one side first and then the other?

As I read, I try to go back and forth, which is a lot of fun. When we write, I do it separately. I try to do everything I can at first when I need all my energy and I get up and really do it. When I had to play Duncan, as the character, I was tired and my voice was rubbish. Help make Duncan a second time.

What stories are you telling this season?

We have Mr. Michi, the glorious vice caliph, who has been offered a promotion to vice principal if he passes a drug test. Duncan sees his mother naked, which is very traumatic. We met Ani’s hardworking husband. We’re back to Annie’s not-so-good brother, played by Jason Schwartzman, coming back into her life. Duncan and Mia [Rashida Jones] Share your first kiss – a lot happens.

The show takes place in the everyday world, but because it’s lively, you can enjoy all these fantastic flights. When you break down the stories, how do these elements come into play?

Mike and Julie are experts at this because of their experience in the world of animation. They remind us and the writers very well that there is a reason why this show needs to be animated. You really want to write an animated script for an animated show if it makes sense. They have such an incredible experience in this world that they will say, for example, “Maybe Duncan’s arms are too long here and his Adam’s apple trips.” “This is where Annie gets on the bus.” These are really fun ideas to draw and write.

But I think like the script. [live action] TV series, you have to understand the game of the characters, you have to take care of them somehow, you have to have something grounded to begin with. He appears every day when Jackie and Annie are trying to tell the kids the time of their arrest. But then you go crazy after that. That’s a fine line between grounded and crazy, but with animation you can really do both.

What other projects do you and your Paper Kite company have?

Russian doll Season two just came out and we’re thrilled it came out so strong and well. I applied the function on Amazon, lucy and desi, which people can see now. At Paper Kite we are preparing for the second season harlem And we have some unwritten shows that we’re working on right now, as well as a lot of animated features and script material. We’re always excited about what’s to come. season three experience [of Duncanville] And I hope more from this show – I just ask people to reconsider the actors and how deep and funny it is. We are very lucky to have these voices. We hope we won’t be able to farm Duncan for many, many years and never learn anything.

Interview corrected and compressed.