EXCLUSIVE: Jenny Slate Talks Singing, Gina Rodriguez, & her New Movie, “I Want You Back”

Jenny Slate stars as Emma in Amazon Studios’ new movie, I Want You Back. Also starring Charlie Day, Slate’s Emma and Day’s Peter team up to win their exes back. However, neither are prepared for their team up to lead to something more.

We got the chance to hear from Slate regarding her new movie, her castmates, Gina Rodriguez, her singing in the movie and so much more. Check out what she had to say below.

On whether or not she has worked with the cast before: “We didn’t know each other. It was a delight to meet each other and work with each other. I had only met Gina [Rodriguez] in passing and Charlie [Day] in passing and had not met Clark [Blanco] or Scott [Eastwood]. So that’s that answer, sort of boring and basic. But what I have to say about it is that when I did meet truly all of these people, it was just a big yes. It was really, really exciting. It was kind of like for anyone who went to camp, finding out you got a really good bunk. You’re like, ‘We’re never going to go to sleep. We’re just never going to go to sleep. It’s going to be so much fun.’ And that’s what it was like.”

On working with Gina Rodriguez: “On the first day that she [Gina Rodriguez] got to set, she was working with all of these kids. It was the scene where she’s sort of handing out costumes and they were asking her questions about how the set worked. And she gave every child so much respect, fully answering all of these questions. I was like, ‘Is she a teacher?’ And then they were like, ‘Rolling.’ And then, I forget what the kid’s name was, but she was like, ‘You know what, Richard? I’ll tell you more about that in a minute. Okay. Let’s go.’ She was like, ‘We are going to come back to your concerns, but now we’ll make the film. I’m a true pro and I’m super nice.’ It was really, really cool.”

You can read the rest of our interview below the jump. I Want You Back arrives on Prime Video on February 11.

Source: Amazon Studios

On performing “Suddenly Seymour” from Little Shop Of Horrors: “It was fun and it was fun in all of the ways that you expect in that it’s really fun to sing loudly with a child who is very good at singing. This young actor, little Manny, we called him, his name was Manny too. He was like Mariah Carey or something. He was like, ‘All I want to do is sing. It’s my whole life. I love singing and I’m super good at it.’ And I was like, ‘Well, I’ll jump on that vibe. Not that I’m as good as you, but I feel joy when I sing.’ And it was really, really fun. No one has ever asked me to sing anything in anything before, and so I really jumped at the chance. But as an actor, also to have to balance the fact that the character really is very sad when she’s walking onto stage and very embarrassed and that this truly is a nightmare that many people have that they’re somehow in full hair and makeup and in a play that they have never been cast in. It was really wonderful to try to hit some sort of a balance while wearing a huge blonde wig.”

On whether you would attend your ex’s wedding: “I think it’s got to be case by case, but I would land on no. I would probably land on, ‘It is so wonderful of you to invite me. And I’m so glad that I hold meaning in your life. And I think you’re a wonderful person, but I just have a press junket for I Want You Back and I’m just not going to be able to get out of it. I’m not confident enough to be like, ‘No, thank you. All right?’ I think I would be like, ‘I’m strong enough to do this, but I’m busy.’ I have to soften it a little bit.”

On a love tip she learned from I Want You Back: “I think that looking back on it, there’s a really funny breakup montage at the start of this film, that time, that grief, that feels like it will last forever, but it’s actually just a short moment of detox before you can get back to the equilibrium that exists in solitude and who are when you’re just making friends with someone and you’re not trying to be hot for them. I think that’s how Emma, my character and Charlie’s character Peter meet. They’re both sad, but they’re also not trying to be anything but themselves and kind of their worst selves in a way, their most hurting self, their most desperate selves. And that’s the most important part. There is a gift in the grief. Not that I’d go looking for it.”

On her go-to karaoke song: “I’m a tie between ‘I’m So Excited’ by The Pointer Sisters and ‘I Just Can’t Wait to Be King’, which is of course from The Lion King.

*This interview has been edited for length and clarity