The Addams Family 2 is the latest iteration of the classic franchise, which pokes fun at the traditional family unit of the U.S. by reimagining it as an over-the-top group of horror and gothic-loving archetypes. The newest take on the classic franchise made its debut in 2019's The Addams Family -- with animation veteran Conrad Vernon (Shrek 2, Sausage Party) serving as co-director on that film and its upcoming sequel, The Addams Family 2. With Wednesday (Chloë Grace Moretz) questioning her place in the family, her father Gomez (Oscar Isaac) decides to take his loved ones by taking them on an impromptu road trip.
Ahead of The Addams Family 2's release on Oct. 1, CBR spoke with co-director Conrad Vernon about what elements of the film were always going to be in the movie and discussed what makes Wednesday Addams the most quietly compelling member of the beloved family.
CBR: After the first film really explored the Addams Family finding a home and settling in, The Addams Family 2 is a vacation film through and through. Was that always the plan with this film?
Conrad Vernon: Well, the idea to get them out of the house and out into the world was always there, first and foremost. We know how we were going to do that. When we first started, we just knew that them interacting with normies around the world or even around the country was what we wanted to do. We wanted to get them out and into situations that we recognize and relate to and see how they turned it on its head. We definitely wanted to do that.
I think that whole idea of an Addams family vacation just naturally came to us. And so putting them into their creepy, wild, weirded-out RV was something that sounded really fun. It wasn't until later that we actually came upon the idea of putting the mystery of whether or not Wednesday was an Addams came later. It was a great thing to put on the road trip. It was kind of a great stacking of stories there that really worked well together.
This film, the previous one, the 1990s' live-action films, and upcoming ones like the live-action series coming to Netflix, all tend to place Wednesday Addams at the center of the narrative. What do you think it is about that character that makes her so compelling?
She's definitely the audience's focal point of the family. The family kind of revolves around her a little bit. They all have their own stories and their own personalities and everything. Wednesday being a teenager is halfway between childhood and adulthood. So I feel like she's the one that we focus on to really hit the centerpiece of a family film, where you can do things that are a little more adult than entertain the adults, but she's also still a kid. So she can do things that kids totally relate to and love. So I feel like that's why audiences kind of just get drawn to her. And then, of course, you've got Thing and Cousin Itt and Lurch where they're just funny and people just love seeing them do weird things.
She's the one that provides the heart and the story because again, she's the one going through the most change right here. Pugsley is still 10 years old. He hasn't hit puberty yet. Morticia and Gomez are adults and so is Fester. She's the one, I think, going through the most change and has the most questions. Even in the first one, she was the one that asked, "What's outside those gates?" And then Morticia said nothing. There's no reason you should go outside there. In this one, she's saying, "Who am I? Why do I feel so alienated from these people I've lived with for the last 13 years?..." Unfortunately, what she realizes is that all 13-year-olds feel a little alienated from the people they've lived with.
This film also finds some surprising ways for Lurch and Cousin Itt to have real moments of pathos with Wednesday, which is especially impressive considering both are jokey characters.
Well, that's part of the fun of going into these sequels is being able to take those characters and go deeper into them and find new aspects of their personalities and bounce them off one another. We had an early version of the story where Lurch was wondering where he came from and what his family was like because he doesn't feel connected. He's connected to the Addams family, but he's not blood-related. We really liked that idea. We didn't want to make a whole movie about that, but we definitely wanted to bring in a little bit of color to Wednesday's story.
With Cousin Itt, I love the idea that this swinging, partying, living large guy with an entourage, lots of money, obviously, lots of women... Has real emotional knowledge that is deep within him. And we can't understand any of it but the other Addamses can. He's one of those people that comes up with a perfect saying to underline and solve any sort of problem that he might have. He's just a fixer in the family. That's kind of the way we wanted to deepen and go further with him and we'll go further. If there's a three, we'll go further even more.
The Addams Family has existed in so many different forms over the years -- it's a truly generation-spanning series, that typically remains true to itself regardless of the era it's released in. What's that like bringing into the modern era with this film and the previous one?
I think if you're a fan of The Addams Family, there's a love for them and an excitement about working with them. I don't think there's any way you could make a good movie unless you had that type of connection to them and you had a history with them. I worked with a lot of people who didn't really know about the Addams Family, and didn't really understand the Addams Family, or never watched the Addams Family really. When they try to write for the Addams Family, it doesn't come off as genuine or real because the first place you go when you don't know the Addams Family, and you try to write for them, is the gross humor. Well, we did that in Shrek because he's an ogre. He eats eyeballs and martinis and he pulls wax out of his ears.
That's all funny, gross stuff that an ogre might do, but it's not the same thing that Addams Family does. The Addams family... It's the idea that Morticia and Gomez in order to bond as husband and wife torture each other. Morticia, when she's put the head clamp on, Gomez is like, "I love it when you tighten it." That type of stuff. "Can we do the spinning wheel tonight?" And she's like, "Sure." And he's like, "I want you to use the hatchet." It's not gross. It's just weird and kind of dangerous. It's that type of stuff that I think makes them so fun to work with, and so understanding who they are is important to the process of coming up with stories and the way they react in situations. It's very important.
The Addams Family 2 debuts in theatres and on-demand Oct. 1
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