ABOUT THE FILM

Woody Harrelson recently chose to be a part of the award-winning cast of No Country for Old Men, which won the Oscar® for Best Picture.
And he follows up that choice with a movie called Zombieland? The actor says that he was impressed by the script. “Tonally, it rides the line between comedy and the impending danger of the zombies. It's tricky – you have to keep up a level of reality, or it becomes farce, but that presents its own challenges.” Plus, the guy gets to kick zombie butt. What more could an actor ask for?

“I always saw Zombieland as Midnight Run with zombies,” says Ruben Fleischer, director of the film. “Like that movie, it crosses so many genres at once. First and foremost, it’s a comedy, a road movie. It’s obviously got a horror element to it, and there’s romance as well. I was excited because of all the different aspects of the film, and my goal was to keep it grounded and strike just the right tone.”

Zombieland began with the original screenplay by Paul Wernick & Rhett Reese. “What attracted everybody to the project was the script,” says Fleischer. “It’s so strong. And Rhett and Paul could not have been more collaborative while – and I respect them for this – staying true to their original vision.”

“It reminds me a bit of what we used to do on ‘Cheers,’” says Harrelson. “If a joke doesn’t work, they figure something else out – right there, while we’re shooting, they’d come up with some new, funny line.”

“We wore multiple hats out there,” says Reese. “One is the producer’s hat – we were looking at the overall picture and making sure that the movie was coming together the way we envisioned it.”

“But there were various moments when lines had to change and we were writers again,” says Wernick, picking up the thread. “The sand
shifts under your feet and you have to adjust. Seeing it all come together was a great experience – in a way, it was like film school for us.”

Harrelson takes on the role of Tallahassee, a man who dies hard and slays harder, a dude ready to slay any zombie that comes between
him and the planet’s last remaining Twinkies. “When I read the script, the first actor who came to mind was Woody Harrelson,” says Fleischer. “I saw elements in Tallahassee that reminded me of Woody’s character in Natural Born Killers, but with a humor laced through it.”

“When I read the script, what I loved about Tallahassee was that he was a guy who essentially lost everything, so he has nothing left to lose, and as a result, he’s fearless when it comes to his approach to the zombies,” says Harrelson. “After a great meeting with Ruben, I was eager
to be a part of it.”

“We had all seen No Country for Old Men around the time we began the casting process,” recalls Gavin Polone, “and Woody just popped off
of the screen. He was always our first choice.”

“Tallahassee is childlike, impulsive,” says screenwriter and executive producer Rhett Reese. “It made such sense to us that the Twinkie would be his greatest desire: it’s a metaphor for the past, a piece of his former life, something he clings to – we all cling to things from our childhood, but he’s clinging to something from the pre-apocalyptic days. Plus, it stays fresh on the shelf for a quite a while.”

For the role of Columbus, Fleischer also had a specific actor in mind. “There are a lot of talented young actors who we considered, but
Jesse Eisenberg was always at the top of my list,” says the director. “I had loved him in Roger Dodger and in meeting with him, he displayed
an innate humor and sensitivity. He’s intrinsically funny, and his body language makes you believe he’s the biggest coward in the world.
He was Columbus.”

“I loved the character when I read it,” says Eisenberg. “I could certainly relate to Columbus’ obsessive-compulsiveness; he’s the type of guy who can’t let himself enjoy anything. It was written very honestly, and I looked forward to being able to find the balance between that truth and the inherent humor in it.”

“I loved the script, its sense of humor,” adds Eisenberg. “When I met the writers, Rhett told me that they based Columbus on him. And that
was evident upon shaking his hand.”

“It’s kind of a bummer,” admits screenwriter-executive producer Rhett Reese, “but yes, I’m Columbus. I’ve spent my life afraid of just about everything at one point or another. It was amusing to see Jesse run with that.”

Joining Columbus and Tallahassee on their quest to survive are Wichita, played by Emma Stone, and Little Rock, played by Abigail Breslin. “There are very few beautiful, young actresses who have the comedic sensibility and the diversity to be able to show all the sides of the character that Emma has created in this movie,” says director Fleischer. “She’s already proven her comedic prowess in films like Superbad and The House Bunny, but the character of Wichita is not necessarily a comedic role. She’s a femme fatale, a classic hot, badass chick.
What’s amazing about Emma is that she can portray all that and also has the comedy to back it all up.”

“This script was very different than anything I had ever read,” says Stone. “There have been zombie comedies before, but this wasn’t a satire
in any way. The zombies are very scary, and they pose a very serious threat to the characters. They’re not jokes by any means, but the four
main characters are also very funny in their own right. The honesty and the humor made me feel that I could actually relate to how someone would feel and react in this zombie-ridden, post-apocalyptic world. That was enough reason to want to be part of this film.”

“I loved that this movie is funny, but not a rip-roaring slapstick, and it’s scary, but not a terrifying nightmare-inducer. It manages to strike a balance between those and be its own thing. It’s a multifaceted zombie movie. Who knew you could make that?”

For Little Rock, Wichita’s partner, the director had a very specific idea. “When I read the script, I said, ‘Abigail Breslin would be great for the
part of Little Rock, but there’s no way she’d ever do it, so we’ll just have to find someone like her,’” says Fleischer. “And that’s how it went fo
r a really long time. Then, amazingly, she wanted to do the movie, and suddenly I had two Academy Award®-nominees in our zombie movie.”

“I really wanted to do this movie, because it’s different than anything I’ve ever done,” explains the actress. “Little Rock is a very feisty character, and I’ve enjoyed doing all this action. I had to learn how to shoot guns, which I’ve never done, and when we shot in the amusement park,
I got to go on a lot of the rides when we weren’t filming. I had a lot of fun.”

Breslin gave everything to the role that the director had hoped for. She more than acquitted herself among her co-stars who couldn’t have
been more appreciative of her talents. “Abby is thirteen,” says Woody Harrelson. “And I will never have acting chops like she has. She did
one scene where she had to cry, and she did it in every single take. Sobbing. And even when she wasn’t on camera, doing someone else’s close-ups, she still gave it her all, and cried just as convincingly for the other actors. She is phenomenal, and really fun to hang out with.”

“What was amazing to watch was the chemistry between Emma and Abigail,” says Wernick.

“They slowly melded into one creature – Emmagail,” adds Reese. “But what was really shocking was how the 13-year-old and the
20-year-old – the people you might think would be immature or naïve – were the wily veterans.

Helming the project is Ruben Fleischer, who makes his directorial debut. “I never had any anxiety whatsoever about Ruben,” says the
producer, Gavin Polone. “I’ve worked with many first-time directors, and I was confident that Ruben had the vision and the commitment the project needed.”

“Ruben has a wonderful eye and a great sense for comedy,” says Reese. “He’s such a sweet, ego-free, inclusive person. When things go
well, he’s never the one to take the credit – he’s quick to lavish praise on the people he works with.”

Fleischer says that he was excited for the challenge of directing Zombieland – after all, “as a first time director, every scene was something
I’d never done before. On my first day, we were killing zombies, and soon after, we were shooting in a giant mansion. Every day was a new experience. But the core is the same: you start with a script and you think about how you envision it, but it really comes to life when you get
the actors, the production designer, the director of photography – they make it look spectacular.”