  Raise a glass! The Trailer Park Boys -- (from left) Julian (John Paul Tremblay), Bubbles (Mike Smith) and Ricky (Robb Wells) -- bid farewell in their new movie, out tomorrow. (Alex Urosevic, Sun Media) |
The Trailer Park Boys pose in front of a nice hotel in a somewhat dodgy Toronto neighbourhood -- family court a few doors away, homeless shelters a few blocks down. That part, at least, seems right.
And two out of every three cars bombing down Jarvis Street have someone leaning out the window screaming, "Hey Bubbles!" or "F----- A, Ricky!"
Robb Wells (Ricky), John Paul Tremblay (Julian) and Mike Smith (Bubbles) are game even if they are tired and hung-over (they'd been up reuniting with their number one fan and guest star, Rush guitarist Alex Lifeson).
"Julian" is holding his trademark highball glass, "Ricky's" scimitar sideburns stand out anywhere. And Bubbles has on his trademark Coke-bottle glasses -- without which he is surprisingly unidentifiable.
The attention bodes well for the movie Trailer Park Boys: Countdown to Liquor Day, ostensibly the final farewell to Halifax's pot-growing, jailbird legends -- Ricky, Bubbles and Julian. It opens in theatres tomorrow.
It occurs, watching the commotion, that if these guys were this famous anywhere but Canada, they'd be stinking rich. After all, doesn't the first Trailer Park Boys movie hold the record for biggest domestic opening weekend by a Canadian movie ever?
"Yes," says director Mike Clattenburg, "$1.3 million, which we owed to our investors. People hear 'hit TV show' and they think Friends, and a million an episode. This is Canada. Believe me, none of us are millionaires."
Which means that Tremblay and Wells (friends since high school, and Clattenburg's TPB co-creators) and Smith deal on a daily basis with all the demands of stardom -- minus the mansion and sports car.
Interviewers are given the choice of interviewing them "in or out of character."
I chose out, because I prefer to talk to real people, and because they seem so exhausted, it's probably merciful to spare them the private performance.
"Don't get me wrong, we appreciate the attention," Tremblay said. "But if you're having a bad day or grocery shopping ...
"On the street, it's, 'Where's your drink, Julian?' Of course, there's lots of free liquor, free dope everywhere."
Added Wells: "A lot of people assume you're just like those characters. Some are f---ed up."
"Like last night on the red carpet," Smith added with a smirk to Wells. "That guy tugging on your arm trying to talk to you during an on-camera interview. Guy is, like, 'Hey, Ricky!' "
"Yeah, I'll be with my grandmother," Wells continued, "and somebody'll say, 'Let's go smoke a joint!' Uh ... no?"
Which may be why, though they'll still be working together, Tremblay's, Wells' and Smith's next project will feature characters "unlike Ricky, Julian and Bubbles in any way, shape or form," Smith said.
In the meantime, there's Countdown to Liquor Day, which begins, as all Trailer Park Boys stories must, with release from jail. There they discover the fabled Sunnyvale Trailer Park deserted, its inhabitants moved to a shiny, new development owned and operated by the malevolent, no-longer-closeted and no-longer-drinking Mr. Lahey (John Dunsworth) and his toady/lover Randy (Patrick Roach).
This disturbance in the Trailer Park Boys' universe turns relationships upside down. Ricky and Julian fall out. So do white-rapper J-Roc (Jonathan Torrens) and his DJ Tyrone (Tyrone Parsons), and Lahey and Randy.
Kind of sounds like they're breaking up that old gang of ours. "I don't think we wrote it knowing it was going to be 100% the last movie," Tremblay said. "We challenge ourselves as writers to outdo the last thing we'd done."
They admit others in the cast would prefer to carry on.
"I think John and Pat would like to keep her goin', " Smith said, "and I think maybe everybody else."
But as Clattenburg said, "This is like our 12th feature film, since we've done seven seasons and two specials."
The wrap party, he said, was "a lot of fun, throwing beer bottles ... and smashing stuff."
So what's next for the boys?
How about a series called The Drunk And On Drugs Happy Funtime Hour?
The pilot -- "about a kids' show gone horribly wrong" -- is to shoot in the spring with, yes, Alex Lifeson in the cast.
As well, Tremblay, Wells and Smith say they're set to play six different roles each, "with a lot of heavy prosthetics," Tremblay said.
It may indeed take a combined 18 roles to get those three out of our heads.
