Working with Robert de Niro and Zac Efron: interview with writer John M. Phillips

I actually wrote the movie in 2009 when I was living in New York and always pictured Robert De Niro in the title role, so when he officially attached to the project a few years later it was just totally surreal. I couldn't believe he was doing this extremely R rated material I had written, although if you look at movies like Goodfellas and Midnight Run, he obviously has a facility for delivering R rated lines. I mean, have you seen Goodfellas recently? It's definitely fucked up and violent, but it's also one of the funniest movies ever made and De Niro is hilarious in it. As for Zac, Neighbors was kind of a revelation for everyone in terms of how funny he could be. And we were all blown away on set at how funny and prepared he was to play this admittedly dipshit preppy corporate lawyer. We really put him through a parade of indignities in the movie and he was always game for anything.