"Don't Mess With" Adam and Emmanuelle!

It's been a while since we've seen actor/funnyguy Adam Sandler create a new comic character in film. In You Don't Mess with the Zohan, he gives us a crack Israeli army commando who secretly just wants to style hair as his alter ego Scrappy Coco! I'm not kidding! The zany comedy co-stars beautiful Emmanuelle Chriqui (Usher's love interest in his film In the Mix) as Dalia, a hot brunette of Palestinian descent, who owns a beauty salon and gives the unlikely soldier/haircutter a stylist job.

We wondered how a crazy group of Jewish and Arab actors got along on set (very well, evidently) and how Emmanuelle held up when surrounded by wacky, improv-ing male comics. Does humor conquer hate and distrust? Adam and Emmanuelle would like it to be so. Most of the film takes place in a combo Jewish/Arab neighborhood in New York City where the residents seem to get along just fine until greedy outsiders intervene to comic effect.

Picture "the Zohan" in a strange haircut (very close on the sides and longer on top) jeans and a red t-shirt by Puma. Emmanuelle had a gypsy vibe going in a pretty, cream-colored, low-cut blouse with ruffles, accessorized by big silver hoop earrings. Let's start with dishing the clothes.....

TeenHollywood: You have a great kind of gypsy look going today. Did you like Dalia's wardrobe in the film? Like, would you wear any of it?

Emmanuelle: Oh yeah. I thought everything I wore was fantastic. Ellen Lutter was the costume designer and we didn't want Dalia to be too ethnic. She's been in New York a while. She loves being in New York but she's still proud to be who she is so she has her own flair.

TeenHollywood: Adam, you play an Israeli character in the movie. Do you just like to have fun with the humor in Judaism?

Adam: I grew up in a house that liked to be funny. Everybody liked to be funny. A lot of my friends were funny, they happened to be Jewish too. No, there wasn't a point. My family's been enjoying each other's comedy for years. No, no, I can't think of a time in my life when it just happened, but yeah, I do tend to talk about it.

TeenHollywood: So did you make the film to stir up some Arab/Jewish controversy or be an equal opportunity insulter or what?

Adam: My intention is never to hurt anyone. I'm happy when people are having a good time, and I gotta tell you if someone comes up to me and is offended by anything I've done in the past, I listen to them. I'm bummed out. When we're working our asses off on the script and making the movie, I'm just picturing people having a great time. The fact that anybody walks away saying, 'oh man, I wish they didn't say that', that breaks my heart. We just want to make a funny movie. That's it.

TeenHollywood: How much effort was made to balance the humor and do you think one side is going to feel more slighted than the other?

Adam: I think the end of the movie is ultimately, 'wouldn't life be so much easier if we were just hanging out and getting along?' It is not a brand new theory. That's what it gets to and I hope that is what people will leave with. We were trying to make sure that anyone who comes to the movie feels like 'Alright, at least they said that.'

TeenHollywood: Do you feel like comedy can actually go over the edge or cross a taboo line?

Adam: Yeah, you see it and you see the audience shut down and you usually take it out of the movie. [laughter] It didn't happen too much on this movie. Our scenes in this movie are longer than most of the scenes we've done in other movies and then we kept it coming and coming and coming.

TeenHollywood: The beginning of the film on a Tel Aviv beach looks great and inviting. Any reason for going there and not shooting somewhere else and pretending it was there?

Adam: I was most excited to shoot those scenes, [glancing at his pretty co-star] besides the ones with Emmanuelle, we just wanted it to look alive, fun, sunny.

TeenHollywood: Emmanuelle, what was it like working with a bunch of crazy comic guys. Did have to be "one of the guys" or did they treat you like a lady?

Emmanuelle: They absolutely treated me like a lady. Really, it's not something I even noticed, like it keeps being brought to my attention . . . but immediately I just felt so comfortable. Adam and Dennis [Dugan the director] and Robert [Smigel, producer/writer], it was just as a family, just brothers and I really had the time of my life. But there was a lot of teasing.

Adam: Emmanuelle was very good. Dugan likes teasing everybody. She was very cool and relaxed and hung out. On the day she wasn't shooting, she was watching and encouraging everybody. She was a great presence on the set. Made us all feel great.

Emmanuelle: Aw, sweet.

TeenHollywood: Okay, Adam why Zohan, why that character?

Adam: When I was a kid I always heard about the Israeli army and you always heard about this tiny little country and how everyone around them wants them gone and every time somebody comes after them they take care of business and so as a Jewish kid you were proud of that. You were like 'Alright, they are trying to take out the Jews and the Jews ain't gonna let it happen.' And so I just admired them. And then I hung out with a lot of Israeli guys out here in California. I went to some Israeli weddings and I couldn't believe how insane it got. I had an Israeli guy who used to cut my hair. I just thought it would be funny to see an Israeli soldier who was a bad ass warrior and fearless and he had a secret dream of wanting to do something else but was embarrassed to share it with anybody. I always thought it was funny that he is a hair stylist and that someone would come in and make light of what he does and think there is no possible way he could kick his ass as much as he could. That's where it started.

TeenHollywood: Emmanuelle, you are of Moroccan and French descent, have you been to Israel?

Emmanuelle: Yes, I was in Israel four years ago. I spent three weeks there. I have family in Israel and I've always had friends who were closely affiliated with Israel.

TeenHollywood: Why did you want to be in this film?

Emmanuelle: There have been scripts along the way that talked about the Arab-Jew thing [and I] was never comfortable to even touch it. There was really bias on one side or the other. This was so funny. Reading a script you had to put down 3 times to laugh for 10 minutes is a hard thing to do, and I did that with this and just absolutely wanted to be a part of it, and I think to shed a little bit of light on a really, really bleak situation is what I think we do when people laugh at this movie. [The idea that] we can co-exist. We were Arabs and Jews together, making this movie and we've really bonded.

TeenHollywood: Dalia's brother in the film isn't too happy that she is dating a Jewish guy. Adam, did you ever have any trouble in your family for dating a non-Jewish girl?

Adam: No. I've always just had troubles with my family because I'm psychotic [laughs]. But no, nothing to do with that, nothing big. When I was a kid, yeah, my parents, wanted me to marry a Jewish girl because that was what they taught their children and thought it would be an easier life for me to raise a Jewish kid. Now I have a Jewish wife, I have a Jewish kid. They seem pretty happy about it.

Adam: I've never been excited about it. I don't have a great hair-do. It's not great hair to touch. People get sickened by it. For years I've been looking for the right stylist and then I just started shaving it right to the bone. That's the only way to make it look half-way decent. I enjoyed learning a lot about hair; how to cut hair and how much of an art form it is and how much work it is. Usually when you sit in a chair to get a haircut, you're like 'just get this done, buddy, let's move on with our lives'. Now I look at a guy and go 'you've got to do some thinking back there'.

TeenHollywood: You are pretty active in this Adam, can you talk about the crazy stunts you did? Was that all you?

Adam: No. Whenever it gets dangerous, there were about 15 other Zohans on set.

TeenHollywood: Did you really do the split that we see on the posters?

Adam: One time. Just one time.

TeenHollywood: We see your fanny in the movie. Did that freak you out doing that and did you have to exercise for that "beauty" shot?

Adam: That's a tough one. The [butt] muscle is a different kind of muscle and it has its own mind. It was a lot of just keeping it tight.

TeenHollywood: Zohan, as hairdresser Scrappy Coco, tends to give some older ladies some services in addition to just doing their hair. Are you worried that some older gals will be mad at you for joking about them?

Adam: No, I don't feel any danger. I do feel like I got it out of my system. My mother's friends and I never got to that place where we wanted to get. I feel like the fact that I did it with these women in the movie, now I can just hang out with my mother's friends and not have that weird tension [he's sooo kidding].

TeenHollywood: What was your biggest personal challenge making this movie?

Adam: Working out that long. I hated that. I had to do it every day. And not eating! Not eating as much as I'd like.

TeenHollywood: Your next film is a family film, Bedtime Stories. How do you like working in that territory?

Adam: We haven't put it together yet so I will tell you later. You feel like you're doing a nice thing trying to make a funny movie for kids. So we'll see.

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Lynn Barker is a Hollywood-based entertainment journalist and produced screenwriter.