TORONTO SUN 2
Sunday August 2, 1998
They got game
South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone don't play by anyone's rules
By NATASHA STOYNOFF Toronto Sun HOLLYWOOD -- The topic is BASEketball, a wacky sports comedy starring the same warped minds who created the controversial TV cartoon, South Park.
The conversation -- an Abbott and Costello back-and-forth banter of insults and insights -- is more like a raunchy game of verbal volleyball.
The rules are there ain't no rules, and no one escapes the wrath of actor/writer/producers Trey Parker and Matt Stone.
"Barbra Streisand?" spits out Parker, the blond, surfer dude of the duo, as he runs down a list of celebrities they love to make fun of on South Park. "She's a bitch."
"She's the anti-Christ," insists Stone, Parker's frizzy-haired partner in crime. "Now Sally Struthers," offers Stone, mercifully, "isn't such a bad person. But she sets herself up for jokes."
"Because you notice the fat," points out Parker of the actress' TV pleas to help Third World children. "And she's standing in front of these starving kids!"
"Right," says Stone, nodding. "And Kathie Lee Gifford. Well, she's such an easy target. But Barbra Streisand," he repeats, pounding his fist onto the Beverly Hills hotel room table, "is just ... plain ... evil."
Parker and Stone, two rumpled guys who look like they slept in their jeans, T-shirts, and BASEketball caps, have parlayed their own evil streak into a winning season this past year.
The huge success of their animated series South Park, the most-watched series in the history of cable TV, is due to their politically incorrect sense of humor.
And the controversy surrounding the show -- that it exposes kids to too much violence-- doesn't faze these two "wonderkids" one bit.
"It's all ridiculous," whines Stone. "We do the show for older people. If kids watch it, it's not our problem or responsiblilty. The airwaves are public, and you have an on/off switch on your TV set."
Tuning in recently was one youth in the U.S., who then tuned out -- permanently. "He wrote a suicide note four pages long that also listed Beavis And Butt-head," Parker says, "and we were one in the middle of the list."
"Besides," Stone jumps in, brightly, "think of how many millions of kids watch the show and haven't killed themselves."
Adds Parker: "As long as we keep it 60-40."
Acting in their first big feature film BASEketball -- about two underdogs who invent a new game (combining basketball and baseball) on their driveway, and take it to the big leagues -- they don't hold back or censor to appease anybody's PTA-going parents.
Produced by the team that brought us Naked Gun, Parker's and Stone's schtick in the film is a series of over-the-top gags.
"We don't want you to give away too much," says Parker. "It will spoil their suprise."
Then just a little warning: Beware of scenes involving liposuction and Jenny McCarthy in kneepads.
Then there's the film's sweeping, romantic finale that has the two stars in a close, compromising position. "We had a big bottle of Listermint next to us," says Stone, of the scene, "and we chugged it before and after each take so we'd have that medicinal taste in our mouths."
Shooting the actual up-close-and-personal moment, "I just blanked it out," says Stone, "like a car wreck."
Was plenty of practising in order?
"Hell, no!," laughs Parker.
The two have been inseparable since they skipped classes together at the University of Colorado, where they studied film.
"We were the only ones interested in comedy," Stone recalls. "Everybody else wanted to be Martin Scorsese."
Now that the boys have found fame, they have the likes of Steven Spielberg calling to do lunch.
"We keep cancelling on him," says Stone, smiling, about their busy schedule, "we have no lives right now. The show is king to us."
Fame does have other perqs too, it seems.
"We have bigger houses," says Parker, referring to their separate Bel Air digs.
"And once in a blue moon, we'll meet some hot girls," says Stone, smirking. "But who has time?"
Next up for the writing partners is a script for the sequel to Dumb And Dumber.
"For us," says Stone, "it's just another gig."
"Yeah, we've done a lot of great shit," says Parker, "and we're gonna keep on doing great shit and keep on learning."
With South Park "ordered through to 2001," says Parker, they take their inspiration where they can get it.
"The best is when there are girls around, and we're trying to be funny. If there are girls around that we're trying to impress, we're the funniest."
They speculate about where they might be if such inspiration were lacking in their lives.
"I'd be playing music in some piano bar," says Parker.
"I'd be working at Denny's," says Stone.
But upon learning that BASEketball posters -- of the two of them holding up giant baseballs at their waists -- have just been banned in Boston -- the guys get excited.
"They found us offensive?" squeals Parker. "That's great!"
"You can tell them," says Parker, smiling, "that we find Boston to be offensive."
*website owners note: my stupidass town pulled the same sh*te as boston and didnt put up the posters..talk about things that suckass..