In Daddy’s Home 2, actress Linda Cardellini reprises her role of Sara, the mom to kids co-daddy’d by Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg. We recently got a chance to chat with her before the film’s release about returning to the role of a relatable mom in her awesome legacy of unique and dynamic characters. “It’s chaos, there are more dads, Sarah’s gonna have this thing with Karen, where she’s always talking about her, I couldn’t wait to get the script. And it all happened relatively fast in terms of quality. There it was.”
She said about coming on board, “I had so much fun with the first movie and on the second movie, I had even more fun. I’d never been to Boston, I really loved it there. We went up into the Berkshires, and it was beautiful with the snow up there. It was idyllic for a Christmas movie. And the kids watching them grow, it was magical. We had a lot of fun together.”
And of course, shooting in Wahlberg’s home state came with hometown love, “We all went to dinner at his favorite restaurant there. If you needed a suggestion, you’d easily get it. He’s much much loved in that city. ”
The film is a holiday family riot that is full of heart, and shockingly fun gags that ups the ante from the first film. With the addition of the granddads, and throwing everyone together Cardellini described how that could be a recipe for holiday madness, “By the second movie, the co-daddying is going really well. Then we’re all shocked when the daughter goes up on stage and says she hates having to separate at Christmas time. I think that was a revelation for us parents–like we think everything is going along fine, but maybe it’s not okay. So this together Christmas sounds like a great idea, it will be difficult but we can do it. In theory its different than reality.” she said.
A major part of the film is Sarah’s relationship with Karen, and how they’re co-mommy’ing. “I didn’t want it to seem like we were being competitive about looks or husbands or anything like that,” Cardellini said of making sure her antagonism with Alessandra Ambrosio’s characters wasn’t male-gazey. “I wanted to make sure it was about our kids. There’s this anxiety that this woman brings out in her life about whether or not she’s a good parent, and also the idea of having to contend with a different parenting style. Here’s someone else who thinks its okay for their kid to have a little bit of alcohol, and that’s my nightmare. It’s not that she’s a bad person, its that her skill set is different than mine, and the idea that’s what makes my character’s anxieties go into overdrive. ”
During the roundtable, we also got her to talk a little about the possibility of her returning as the wife of Hawkeye and mother of his children in Avengers: Infinity War. When asked if we’d be seeing more of her as Laura Barton, she smiled wide, “Yeah–you might.” She said and went on to discuss how that character was also an awesome opportunity to create a strong role out of a surprise part, “I think that for that role it was interesting because she was a secret. It was a well-kept secret. It was really fun for more. When you get to meet her you get to understand him in a different context which I think that’s the funny thing about being in a family you get to understand them in a totally different context. I had very few scenes to accomplish that history and to me, that’s a really fun challenge. My part of that was to sort of figuring out what made them fall in love. I feel like, for instance, Laura Barton and Hawkeye–she’s really real. I think she’s optimistic and very realistic and has her feet firmly planted on the ground compared to all the chaos that he has to encounter. I feel that that was a great dynamic with him and they have a sense of humor and history together. Mostly what I try to look for depends on how heightened the situations are but have a real moment of connection, because that’s where love comes from.”
Daddy’s Home 2 opens November 10, 2017 and is rated PG-13
