The wait is almost over! Inside Out 2, the sequel that has been eagerly anticipated by Disney and Pixar fans for nearly a decade, is just around the corner.
Inside Out 2 takes us back into the mind of a teenage Riley, where the headquarters are being demolished to make way for something entirely unexpected: new emotions! The familiar team of Joy (Amy Poehler), Sadness (Phyllis Smith), Anger (Lewis Black), Fear (Tony Hale), and Disgust (Liza Lapira) who have been running the show, are in for a surprise when Anxiety makes her entrance. And it seems she’s not the only new emotion. Maya Hawke voices Anxiety, with Ayo Edebiri as Envy.
Geeks of Color was invited to an advanced media day at Pixar Studios to talk with the team behind the project and how they brought this to life. Kelsey Mann is stepping into the director’s chair for Inside Out 2, bringing his unique vision to the beloved franchise originally helmed by Pete Docter. Although this marks Mann’s directorial debut for a feature-length film, he’s no stranger to Pixar, having contributed his talents to various projects. Among his credits are the Monsters, Inc. short Party Central, which Mann wrote and directed, and involvement in films such as The Good Dinosaur, Onward, Luca, andTurning Red. Mann was joined by Mark Nielsen, reuniting with Pixar as a producer after his involvement in Toy Story 4.
I sat down with Mann and Nielsen to delve into the film’s narrative and explore their motivations for telling Riley’s next chapter. Throughout our conversation, they elaborated on the casting decisions and the significance of this film for audiences of all ages.
Check out the interview with Kelsey Mann and Mark Nielsen for Inside Out 2 below:
Mann explained that tackling the sequel was a no-brainer for one of Pixar’s most beloved movies.
Mann: All these movies have to start with a good story. All of our movies always start from there. And so I remember very early on, Pete asking me to think of possibilities for us going back into this world. And I went back and watched the movie with Pete. And there’s that line at the end of the movie where Joy’s character says, ‘After all, Riley’s 12 now. What could happen?’
When I was here at the studio when they were making it, I was on another movie. And so you know, we watch each other’s movies, even though you’re on another project. So I was always coming to this theater, watching their screenings and giving my notes. So, I was able to come in from an audience perspective. And I was just excited to see what happened next. And so Riley, being a teenager, felt like the right thing to do.
Pixar is known for conducting extensive research before bringing a new project to life. The team was asked what research was done to ensure that Inside Out 2 accurately depicted new emotions.
Nielsen: Research is a big part of what we do. And I’d say a lot of the research went into determining what the new emotions should be or could be in this film. We knew we wanted new emotions in this; it seemed like the right thing for the next chapter in Riley’s life. But what could they be? There are so many to choose from. We wanted to lean into the ones that are really kind of most present in teenagers and that you see really kind of come on strong at that age. So we leaned on a lot of experts, and we had a lot of meetings with, like Dacher Keltner, who’s a professor at UC Berkeley. He’s an expert in emotions. And we brought him here multiple times.
Mann: He was actually on the first film. He’s one of the first people I met with; I brought him back, and I go, ‘Okay, what happens up here when we become teenagers?’ He’s just like, ‘Where do I begin? Because there’s a lot that goes on at that age.’”
Nielsen: And then another one was Dr. Lisa Damour. She’s got a book right now called The Emotional Lives of Teenagers. She’s a clinical psychologist, and so she meets with girls about their emotions. She’s also written a bunch of other books, and they were both such great sounding boards. We auditioned a lot of different emotions in this movie and earlier versions of the story before we landed on the new kind of big four that we have, Embarrassment, Ennui, Envy and leading the way, Anxiety.
New Emotions
While Poehler, Smith, and Black reprise their iconic roles, Bill Hader and Mindy Kaling stepped back from their roles as Fear and Disgust due to prior commitments. Nevertheless, their replacements fit like glove talent. Tony Hale, known for his roles in Arrested Development and Veep, embodies Fear, while Liza Lapira, recognized from NCIS and The Equalizer, brings her unique flair to Disgust. After seeing the first 35 minutes, I can confirm they both knocked it out of the park.
I asked Mann and Nielsen what it was like working with some of the original cast and bringing on new additions.
Mann: I was so excited for a couple of reasons. One, got to work with the original cast. Yes, Pete Docter who drafted the original, and Jonas Rivera, who was the producer on the original were like, ‘You’re inheriting a wonderful cast. We are friends with a lot of them and they’re wonderful.’ The first time I met Amy Poehler online, I fell in love with her. She’s amazing and so kind. And so I’m like, ‘How do we expand this family and keep the feeling that we have?’ They not only are wonderful individuals, but as a group they’re so great together. And so we’re super excited to expand that cast out a little bit.
Nielsen: Yeah, with Tony Hale coming in as Fear, I worked with him on Toy Story 4 and he was our Forky. He’s the funniest guy ever and just has such a handle on freaking out. And he is so good at being at being that character. And with Liza Lapira, I don’t know if you ever seen The Equalizer but she knows how to fight and she’s taught us some moves, but she’s also funny. What some people might know about her is that she was also in Crazy, Stupid, Love. And she’s been in comedies and she wants to do more humor than she’s allowed to in TheEqualizer, so she brought a ton to this film.
Mann and Nielsen then proceeded to discuss the introduction of the new emotions and the additions of Maya Hawke and Ayo Edibiri to the cast.
Nielsen: We kind of took it one emotion at a time—we didn’t do it all at once. It was like, okay, Anxiety—let’s dig into what she’s like and what she sounds like, and we ended up finding Maya.
Mann: A fun story, I auditioned Maya from Disney World. I was going with my family to Disney World, right? And then they were like, ‘Mark I’m so sorry, the only time that Maya is available is when you’re on vacation to Disney World. We could find a way – you can maybe do a Zoom.’ A lot of the auditions are over Zoom now because it’s a lot easier. And everybody’s working for free when you’re auditioning so you want to make it as easy as possible. And so they got me a computer. And I escaped through the Mexico Pavilion and went into some business office.
And I met somebody who had a laptop and they hooked me up with Zoom. And that’s how I auditioned. I knew right away and I was like, ‘Yeah, it’s Maya,’ because we ended up talking about the movie and why I want to make it and she completely connected with it in such an emotional way. I think I even cried when talking to her. Putting your heart in it is an easy thing to do in a movie about emotions.
Nielsen: Ayo Edebiri is just the greatest thing in the world. It’s been so fun to watch her blow up this year. But The Bear was already out so we already knew how great she was when we met her. We were recording with her and she got a phone call and it was SNL calling asking her to host in the middle of our recording sessions. They were like, ‘We have an emergency call for Ayo. Can you stop the session?’ I’m like, ‘Oh, yeah, of course.’ I thought it was going to be like someone in our family is hurt and she came back and she’s like, ‘I’m gonna be hosting SNL!’ We were like, ‘WHAT! That’s not an emergency but that’s amazing haha.’
Since Inside Out 2 features Reilly at the age of 13, I asked the pair if they could revist their 13-year-old selves and give them some advice or words of wisdom, what would they tell them?
Mann: You know what, I wish I had a movie like this when I was a teenager. I looked at my own life and what happened to me when I was a kid, at this age. I really loved who I was when I was a little kid then suddenly I became a teenager, and I got really hard on myself. I still kind of carry that through even now. I’m a lot better at it, but I was hard on myself at that age. I can kind of see it in my kids and just teenagers in general. I want people to walk away from this film with a sense that they aren’t alone with what they’re thinking and feeling because a lot of times you won’t talk about it. Because you’re afraid you’re the only one dealing with it.
That’s the power with this movie, is to put something out in the world and say you’re not the only one. And you don’t have to be so hard on yourself and cut yourself a little bit of grace. And it’s okay to not be perfect and to be a flawed person. And you know, you can find a sense of self-acceptance with who you are right here and now not a perfect version, you’re viewing in the future. But the imperfect, beautiful thing that you are right now. And I wish I had that when I was this age. I want it for all my kids to feel that. And I want everyone to feel that because you do need to be reminded that even when you’re an adult so that’s ultimately why.
Nielsen: I would have told young Mark the same exact thing. I think this is why it’s a great partnership between you and me on this movie. I felt the same way as a kid, and I think the fact that we both did, I think it is a universal message in this film and I think it is going to reach a lot of people that also felt like they were the only one at that age wrestling with this stuff.
Inside Out 2 hits theaters on June 14.