John Cho and Kal Penn are reflecting on how the marketing campaign for “Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle” back in 2004 “refused” to take race out of it.
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The duo star as the titular best friends who set out to fulfill a craving for White Castle burgers while stoned. The 2004 comedy led to two sequels.
“I remember the trailers were all about race , and they should have been about friendship,” Penn told Rolling Stone during a 20th anniversary oral history piece. “The first cut of it mentioned that this movie starred ‘the Asian guy from “American Pie” and that Indian guy from “Van Wilder.”‘ I said, ‘I would love for you to not refer to us with racial signifiers because the movie speaks for itself.'”
Penn continued, “ They refused , and instead added the line, ‘From the white guy who directed “Dude, Where’s My Car?”‘ I mean, if you’re looking for a movie to laugh at with your friends on a Friday night, that’s not necessarily a calling card.”
Penn’s co-star and fellow lead actor Cho added, “I think they were trying to be cheeky about it. But it bothered me. I didn’t like it.”
That marketing faux pas also in part led to the film tanking at the box office, despite its strong test audience performance.
“It was such a bummer. We got our asses kicked,” Cho said. “I know we opened at Number Seven at the box office. All my worst dreams had come true.”
Producer Greg Shapiro weighed in on the marketing campaign, which was fronted by studio New Line.
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“I just think the studio was brave to take this movie, full stop. But I don’t think they knew how to reach an audience,” he said, “and their campaign was not terribly original.”
Executive producer and then-New Line director of development Luke Ryan even labeled the marketing tactics as being “ cringey .”
“I admit the marketing never captured anything that really played to the essence of the movie,” Ryan said. “That bore itself out. When I look back on it now, it’s cringey.”
Ryan continued of taking on the indie film, “I was a junior executive, and I was there when the script came in. This was the first movie I really went to bat for. I thought it was incredibly fun and emotional. The comedy was absurd, but there was truth at the center of these friends’ discussions and race and stereotypes. So I really had to lobby with [studio president] Toby Emmerich and [CEO and founder] Bob Shay. Toby sent me an email because I was advocating so hard and said, ‘Do you really want to fall on the sword for this?'”
Ryan reflected on how the studio even wanted to forgo a theatrical release in the first place.
“It tested phenomenally, but there was still a conversation about making it a direct-to-DVD release. That was insane to me,” he said. “There’s a lot of ass-covering in Hollywood. So I think the expectations were really measured. Nobody wanted to say it was going to be a huge hit.”
The film went on to gross $24.3 million overall, but didn’t really find its cult status until its DVD release. Later sequels “Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay” and “A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas” were released, after the initial planned Amsterdam-set follow-up was squashed at the time due to the underwhelming box office results.
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