By Chuck Darrow
Every generation has its touchstone movies. And one that is definitely beloved by millennials is “Napoleon Dynamite,” the 2004 indie comedy about a socially awkward teen in a small Idaho town (played by the pitch-perfect Jon Heder) who finds purpose in helping a fellow outsider run for class president.
Though made on a small ($400,000) budget and released with little fanfare, “Napoleon Dynamite” struck a huge chord–especially with young people–to the tune of $46 million in box office gross revenue. To celebrate the 20th anniversary of the flick that gave Tater Tots their 15 minutes of fame, three cast members—Heder, Jon Gries and Efren Ramirez—have been on a tour that brings them to Ocean Casino-Resort on March 9. According to Ramirez, who portrayed Pedro, the candidate with the limited English vocabulary, this won’t be your father’s film-retrospective program.
“Normally, with tours like these, people will screen a film and then they just go up on stage and they do a Q-and-A,” offered Ramirez during a recent phone chat from Orlando. “But my relationship [with Heder and Gries]…we’re brothers. And because we’re actors, we make it interactive. So it’s become sort of a vaudeville event [apart from the film screening] where we sing on stage as an opening number. And [Heder] shows up on a bike and we do a whole performance on stage. And then we talk about having to go back in time. I literally built an original time machine with lights and everything.
“We have lasers and everything, so it’s become some kind of a spectacle. And it’s hilarious. It really brings us back in time as we talk going back to 2003-2004 for the making of the film, 2001, with the idea of having to create the short film and how we all got involved. And then after that, it’s us having to really interact with the audience and talking to them about the making of the film, what it was like through our point of view, our experiences.
“Sometimes, we pull some of the audience–most of the audience is dressed up as the characters, whether it’s Pedro, Napoleon, or Uncle Rico. We had a whole entire family one time dressed up as Rex Kwan Do, which is really funny. It’s amazing to be able to pull them from the audience and put them on stage. Sometimes we reenact some of the scenes. So it’s pretty heavily involved with the audience being up on stage and acting with us.”
For the record, Ramirez, 50, was not particularly overwhelmed by his introduction to the film.
“I didn’t even get the script. I only got like, pages of the script,” he recalled. “I just read the sides and I thought like, ‘This doesn’t make any sense. What is this?’ It was just so odd.”
Nonetheless, he continued, “I raided my father’s closet and I put on his clothes and I auditioned. And they liked what I did.
At the same time he was getting involved with “Napoleon Dynamite,” Ramirez, who co-stars with Danny Trejo in the upcoming supernatural thriller, “Se7en Cemeteries,” and was also up for a role in “The Alamo,” the big-budget story of the seminal event in Texas history starring Dennis Quaid and Billy Bob Thorton.
“I remember having to go into the callbacks for both films,” he offered. “When I went to callbacks for ‘Napoleon Dynamite,’ the director was there, the producer was there, they gave me notes to go at a slower pace. And I thought, ‘Oh, this is unusual. Is there something different about this film? Maybe who knows?’”
Ramirez ultimately booked both roles, meaning a decision had to be made. For help in making it, he sought advice from his dad.
“My father was like, ‘Listen to your heart. Follow your heart; that’s the right thing to do. That’s the best way to go.’ And I thought, ‘Wait a minute. In the script, Napoleon’s sister tells Pedro, ‘Follow your heart.’ I thought, ‘Alright,’ and I made that choice.”
Ramirez added he soon enough realized he’d made the right move. “I remember [meeting Heder] for the first time, and he had his big hair and his big glasses, and he was dressed [like the title character]. He said, ‘Hey, are you Pedro?’ And I felt wow, maybe this film’s gonna be different.”
Given the picture’s enduring popularity and vociferous cult following, it seems odd there hasn’t been a sequel. So, is that a possibility?
“People are still asking for that,” he said. Will there be a sequel? Can there be a sequel? Who knows?” he said.
“I don’t think the door of ‘Napoleon Dynamite’ has been closed. I mean, there’s so many fans out there. If a script, somehow comes in by [husband-and-wife screenwriters Jared and Jerusha Hess] where they create something that’s very fulfilling and deep as the exploration of these characters and the world, then maybe we’ll do it.”
For tickets, go to ticketmaster.com.
Chuck Darrow has spent more than 40 years writing about Atlantic City casinos.
