By Summer Rogers
Daily Titan Staff Writer

The SLS Hotel in Beverly Hills was the hub for the Gentlemen Broncos interview, a strangely inappropriate yet appropriate place for the creators of such characters as the socially awkward Napoleon from Napoleon Dynamite. The thing is, the hotel has a pretentious feel to it, yet the décor has no continuous theme and nothing seems to match or belong together.

In a chilly conference room sat eight journalists at a round table, facing the Hess couple, a husband and wife team of independent filmmakers. The couple was funny and warm, despite the chilly room, and were more than willing to chat about anything and everything, from their celebratory make out sessions to their family Christmas parties.

The couple had a cult classic hit in 2004’s Napoleon Dynamite. Jared Hess directed and wrote the film and Jerusha Hess co-wrote and designed the costumes.

“With Napoleon and just kind of the cult status that it has kind of taken, I don’t think anyone tries and anticipates that. You just try and make the film that you’ve always wanted to see and kind of the monster that it becomes is … out of your control a little bit. Consciously going into it like, ‘I want to make a cult film,’ I don’t know if anybody ever does that. We definitely don’t do that at all; we just want to make films about the people we’re interested in and the stories that inspire us,” Jared said.

Jared wears a pink button-up shirt with the sleeves rolled up past his elbows. His arms are crossed until he answers questions. Only then do his arms and hands become animated and used to emphasize what he says.

Jerusha sits to his left, slouched down in her chair, arms crossed; she remains in this position for most of the interview. She wears a simple long-sleeve T-shirt and jeans.

Daily Titan: Where did the title Gentlemen Broncos come from?

Jared Hess: My mom had this really weird parenting book. I have five younger brothers, and it was a book called So You Want to Raise a Boy written in … the ’50s. There was a chapter in there where it talks about the age from 16 – 17, and the author referred to it as the “gentleman bronco” phase of life, where teenage boys like to take their shirts off and mow the lawn.

DT: Did both of you relate to the main character, Benjamin Purvis?

Jared: Yeah, definitely. A lot of things that happened to Benjamin in the film, happened to me, other than the plagiarism thing. We kind of use that as a device to see the different bastardized versions of his (Benjamin’s) work.

Jerusha Hess: I think Jemaine (Clement) thought I was (Benjamin) because the mother is very much like both our mothers.

DT: It says in the press release that when you guys are writing and something really works out, you make out. Is that true?

Jared: I wish that would happen.

Jerusha: It totally happens that way; he’s just being shy. Because every time something good is written, he’s like, “Hey baby.”

DT: Do you two ever disagree if something isn’t good enough for a make out session?

Jared: Yeah, she’s like, “That was not good.”

DT: How did you two meet in film school in Hollywood?

Jerusha: Kip (Aaron Ruell) from Napoleon Dynamite introduced us. He’s a good friend.

DT: Are you both sci-fi fans?

Jared: I’m a big sci-fi fan; all my favorite movies growing up as a kid were science fiction. I actually really wanted to be a special effects dude, working for Industrial Light and Magic or something. A lot of my first movies were really lame, just like the Yeast Lords movie that Lonnie Donaho makes. That’s an accurate representation of my early works.

DT: Jerusha, as the screenplay writer, how much input do you have on the set?

Jerusha: I’m so fine with him being the director. I love having my little stamp on it in the beginning, but he’s such a great director and I know what it’s going to be, and I trust him completely. When I’m on set, I often just whisper in his ear, “Hey, maybe we should change the line to this.”

DT: In the press release it says you watched Snow Angels and thought of Michael Angrano for this role. The differences between his dramatic role in Angels and this deadpan comedic role are vast. How did you determine he was right for Benjamin?

Jared: The first time I saw him was in Snow Angels. He’s very convincing (in his roles) and a real genuine person. He really brought the character to life. A lot of the other characters we knew people we wanted to work with; we knew that we wanted Jennifer (Coolidge) to play the mom, and we knew that Mike White would be Dusty. But the main character in the movie, we had no idea who was going to play him and (Michael) came to the audition and was just really effortless.

DT: What did you see Sam Rockwell in that made you think he was great for the role of duel characters?

Jared: I’m a fan of all Sam’s films: Galaxy Quest, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. He was so funny in (The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford). It’s a dark movie, but dude, he’s funny as crap in that movie.

DT: How did Jemaine Clement get involved with the film?

Jared: We were fans of (Flight of the Conchords), and we didn’t know if we would be able to work with him just because most TV people are really busy. But we sent him the script and he’s like, “Yeah man, I’m into it. I’ll do whatever you want, man.” He wanted to play Chevalier as … an American, but we said, “Dude check out Logan’s Run, and I want to hear you try and do Michael York’s voice.”

DT: What was it like using special effects for the first time in one of your films?

Jared: Like I said earlier, I wanted to be a special effects dude as a kid and being able to do that on the film – I mean, we use a lot of models, and we tried to do as much on camera stuff. It has a little more comedic charm, I think, than all the CG stuff we have now.

DT: Was it difficult to work with the lynx?

Jared: That cat actually had a larger role on paper, but we could not get that sucker to do anything, and it was trained with cell phone beeps. They would put … a big thing of cat food on a phone and make it ring, so while we were shooting, a grip’s phone went off and the cat went wild.

Jerusha: We were like, “How could we write these (scenes with the cat) out?”

Jared: We had all these storyboards (with the cat), and we couldn’t get (it) to do anything. That cat ran off for … four hours. We were at the Great Salt Lake, and (the trainers) were like, “Here kitty, kitty, kitty!” We couldn’t get the cat to do anything, man. We actually had a dummy that we threw through the window and it lands on the guy.

DT: How did you feel having to use the dummy instead of the real cat?

Jared: I wanted it to look real, but then I thought, “Dude, embrace the cheese.”

DT: Is it easier to get actors for films now that your films have been successful?

Jared: Yeah, once you have a couple films under your belt.

Jerusha: Jared’s being humble; people call him all the time.

DT: Is it harder or easier to make independent films in this economy?

Jared: I think more recently with the effects of the economy … it’s effecting every level of film production – independent and at the studio level.

Jerusha: It seems that maybe independent has an edge though (because) we can keep the budget down.

Jared: I think definitely the more films can keep their budgets down, the more creative control they can have, the more license they have to cast who they want. The bigger the budget, the more you’ve got to fill it with big names just as an insurance policy.

DT: What’s next? Do you have something in mind already?

Jared: Yeah, we’re probably going to have to go to Wal-Mart a few more times. I’m just kidding. No, it might be at the Hess family Christmas party.

Jerusha: That’s where we got the popcorn (ball) idea.

Jared: I remember my grandma, she had made these popcorn centerpieces that were Christmas trees. But they were made of Christmas Captain Crunch that she had bought 10 years before, and it was hard as a rock. Family members were getting knives and going, “Uh, uh, uh!” (pantomimes stabbing) to break off pieces because they couldn’t pull it off. It was like a dangerous weapon. People’s teeth were breaking. It was bad.

Jerusha: I just wrote a romantic comedy without Jared.

Jared: I’ve been holding her back all these years.