Elizabeth Allen discusses "Ramona and Beezus"

 

MakingOf: How did you get involved with the story? Was working with an adaptation daunting for you?

 

Elizabeth Allen: Well, I got sent the book property and a version of the script a few years ago and Fox 2000, who I had done my first movie with, called and said that they would like to offer it to me. I could not believe it, because it was really, for me, one of my favorite books growing up. I had got the chicken pox when I was 5 and my mom got me the whole book series and we read them together. It was one of the first real books I read that I completely related to. It is one of those books that, you know, really speaks to young kids because it is identifiable and it is real. Anyway, I was thrilled to death that they offered it to me. I spent about a month with a highlighter going through all the books and trying to figure out the best moments from each one of them because I was allowed to just pull from all of them. Unfortunately there is not really that much drive or plotting in the books because they are more a slice of life and so much of what the audience is doing is getting caught up in her mind set. But that is very difficult to dramatize that kind of writing because it is about what this girl is thinking inside. So, for example, the books could spend three chapters on the fact that she is worried that she is going to get a bad school picture and the stakes fell so high because Beverly’s writing is so beautiful, but how do you make that into a sellable movie? You know. So a lot of what I had to do is just find those really great cinematic moments from all of the books and then create a spine to interweave all of them because people were expecting these little antics she would get into, but also had to have a plot and a drive.

 

(MO): And then how did you go from having... once you had pulled all of the material and know the story you were looking to tell, were you heavily involved in the casting of the film and selecting the key players that were going to be involved in the production?

 

(EA): Yeah, I think it took three years from start to finish to make “Ramona and Beezus” and one year was about the development of the script and then we felt like we were ready to start submitting it to actors. We had to spend about a year trying to find a 9 year old girl who could carry the movie on her shoulders because that is such a big responsibility. And she needed to be comedic, which is difficult to find someone that age who has an ear for comedy. It’s one of the few things that you can’t teach a kid. They have to know how to hear, how to deliver a punch line, you know, what is funny. That is something that either inherent to a kid or not. And so many of the kids we auditioned were all dolled up with their makeup, you know, with their stage moms. So to find that kid who is bubbly and confident and really knew how to identify with the material on a deeper level was very difficult. 

 

Because we had a 15 year old and a 9 year old to star in the movie, what Fox asked me  to do was to leverage the 15 year old first because that girl is going to actually be more appealing to the young audience, and there are more girls that are well known that are that age. I spent about a year also auditioning and negotiating with various different girls. I read probably every girl you can think of that is on the Disney Channel or Nickelodeon and anyone we heard of that is about to pop and what not. And finally I brought in Selena. She was 15 and she was remarkable. I mean, she was so good. She responded to direction and I would work with her and she really changed herself for me as I kind of guided her through the performance. What was funny is that she hadn’t quite popped. She wasn’t on the studio’s radar at that point. So I had to really pull a ton of publicity on her. The casting director and I were trying to present her in the best light possible. Really, she is this girl that kids are going to be clamoring to see in a year. What is funny now is that I am already reading in the press, oh they are trying to capitalize on Selena’s popularity, but it was quite the opposite. It was her talent that drove me to want to cast her and we are lucky that she is actually starting to become really popular among our demographic. 

Because we had a 15 year old and a 9 year old to star in the movie, what Fox asked me  to do was to leverage the 15 year old first because that girl is going to actually be more appealing to the young audience, and there are more girls that are well known that are that age. I spent about a year also auditioning and negotiating with various different girls. I read probably every girl you can think of that is on the Disney Channel or Nickelodeon and anyone we heard of that is about to pop and what not. And finally I brought in Selena. She was 15 and she was remarkable. I mean, she was so good. She responded to direction and I would work with her and she really changed herself for me as I kind of guided her through the performance. What was funny is that she hadn’t quite popped. She wasn’t on the studio’s radar at that point. So I had to really pull a ton of publicity on her. The casting director and I were trying to present her in the best light possible. Really, she is this girl that kids are going to be clamoring to see in a year. What is funny now is that I am already reading in the press, oh they are trying to capitalize on Selena’s popularity, but it was quite the opposite. It was her talent that drove me to want to cast her and we are lucky that she is actually starting to become really popular among our demographic. MakingOf: How did you get involved with the story? Was working with an adaptation daunting for you?

 

Elizabeth Allen: Well, I got sent the book property and a version of the script a few years ago and Fox 2000, who I had done my first movie with, called and said that they would like to offer it to me. I could not believe it, because it was really, for me, one of my favorite books growing up. I had got the chicken pox when I was 5 and my mom got me the whole book series and we read them together. It was one of the first real books I read that I completely related to. It is one of those books that, you know, really speaks to young kids because it is identifiable and it is real. Anyway, I was thrilled to death that they offered it to me. I spent about a month with a highlighter going through all the books and trying to figure out the best moments from each one of them because I was allowed to just pull from all of them. Unfortunately there is not really that much drive or plotting in the books because they are more a slice of life and so much of what the audience is doing is getting caught up in her mind set. But that is very difficult to dramatize that kind of writing because it is about what this girl is thinking inside. So, for example, the books could spend three chapters on the fact that she is worried that she is going to get a bad school picture and the stakes fell so high because Beverly’s writing is so beautiful, but how do you make that into a sellable movie? You know. So a lot of what I had to do is just find those really great cinematic moments from all of the books and then create a spine to interweave all of them because people were expecting these little antics she would get into, but also had to have a plot and a drive.

 

(MO): And then how did you go from having... once you had pulled all of the material and know the story you were looking to tell, were you heavily involved in the casting of the film and selecting the key players that were going to be involved in the production?

 

(EA): Yeah, I think it took three years from start to finish to make “Ramona and Beezus” and one year was about the development of the script and then we felt like we were ready to start submitting it to actors. We had to spend about a year trying to find a 9 year old girl who could carry the movie on her shoulders because that is such a big responsibility. And she needed to be comedic, which is difficult to find someone that age who has an ear for comedy. It’s one of the few things that you can’t teach a kid. They have to know how to hear, how to deliver a punch line, you know, what is funny. That is something that either inherent to a kid or not. And so many of the kids we auditioned were all dolled up with their makeup, you know, with their stage moms. So to find that kid who is bubbly and confident and really knew how to identify with the material on a deeper level was very difficult. 

 

Because we had a 15 year old and a 9 year old to star in the movie, what Fox asked me  to do was to leverage the 15 year old first because that girl is going to actually be more appealing to the young audience, and there are more girls that are well known that are that age. I spent about a year also auditioning and negotiating with various different girls. I read probably every girl you can think of that is on the Disney Channel or Nickelodeon and anyone we heard of that is about to pop and what not. And finally I brought in Selena. She was 15 and she was remarkable. I mean, she was so good. She responded to direction and I would work with her and she really changed herself for me as I kind of guided her through the performance. What was funny is that she hadn’t quite popped. She wasn’t on the studio’s radar at that point. So I had to really pull a ton of publicity on her. The casting director and I were trying to present her in the best light possible. Really, she is this girl that kids are going to be clamoring to see in a year. What is funny now is that I am already reading in the press, oh they are trying to capitalize on Selena’s popularity, but it was quite the opposite. It was her talent that drove me to want to cast her and we are lucky that she is actually starting to become really popular among our demographic. MakingOf: How did you get involved with the story? Was working with an adaptation daunting for you?

 

Elizabeth Allen: Well, I got sent the book property and a version of the script a few years ago and Fox 2000, who I had done my first movie with, called and said that they would like to offer it to me. I could not believe it, because it was really, for me, one of my favorite books growing up. I had got the chicken pox when I was 5 and my mom got me the whole book series and we read them together. It was one of the first real books I read that I completely related to. It is one of those books that, you know, really speaks to young kids because it is identifiable and it is real. Anyway, I was thrilled to death that they offered it to me. I spent about a month with a highlighter going through all the books and trying to figure out the best moments from each one of them because I was allowed to just pull from all of them. Unfortunately there is not really that much drive or plotting in the books because they are more a slice of life and so much of what the audience is doing is getting caught up in her mind set. But that is very difficult to dramatize that kind of writing because it is about what this girl is thinking inside. So, for example, the books could spend three chapters on the fact that she is worried that she is going to get a bad school picture and the stakes fell so high because Beverly’s writing is so beautiful, but how do you make that into a sellable movie? You know. So a lot of what I had to do is just find those really great cinematic moments from all of the books and then create a spine to interweave all of them because people were expecting these little antics she would get into, but also had to have a plot and a drive.

 

(MO): And then how did you go from having... once you had pulled all of the material and know the story you were looking to tell, were you heavily involved in the casting of the film and selecting the key players that were going to be involved in the production?

 

(EA): Yeah, I think it took three years from start to finish to make “Ramona and Beezus” and one year was about the development of the script and then we felt like we were ready to start submitting it to actors. We had to spend about a year trying to find a 9 year old girl who could carry the movie on her shoulders because that is such a big responsibility. And she needed to be comedic, which is difficult to find someone that age who has an ear for comedy. It’s one of the few things that you can’t teach a kid. They have to know how to hear, how to deliver a punch line, you know, what is funny. That is something that either inherent to a kid or not. And so many of the kids we auditioned were all dolled up with their makeup, you know, with their stage moms. So to find that kid who is bubbly and confident and really knew how to identify with the material on a deeper level was very difficult. 

 

Because we had a 15 year old and a 9 year old to star in the movie, what Fox asked me  to do was to leverage the 15 year old first because that girl is going to actually be more appealing to the young audience, and there are more girls that are well known that are that age. I spent about a year also auditioning and negotiating with various different girls. I read probably every girl you can think of that is on the Disney Channel or Nickelodeon and anyone we heard of that is about to pop and what not. And finally I brought in Selena. She was 15 and she was remarkable. I mean, she was so good. She responded to direction and I would work with her and she really changed herself for me as I kind of guided her through the performance. What was funny is that she hadn’t quite popped. She wasn’t on the studio’s radar at that point. So I had to really pull a ton of publicity on her. The casting director and I were trying to present her in the best light possible. Really, she is this girl that kids are going to be clamoring to see in a year. What is funny now is that I am already reading in the press, oh they are trying to capitalize on Selena’s popularity, but it was quite the opposite. It was her talent that drove me to want to cast her and we are lucky that she is actually starting to become really popular among our demographic.