BARNYARD: THE ORIGINAL PARTY ANIMALS

About The Characters
The lead role is Otis, the fun-loving “party cow” who spends all his time secretly indulging in all things human, from riding around in cars to watching TV to playing practical jokes on the farmer. Sure, he’s rebellious and immature and has no sense of responsibility – who needs that when you can spend your life singing and dancing? Oedekerk’s first and only choice to play Otis was Kevin James. “I knew he was gonna be a movie star from when I first saw him on ‘The King of Queens,’” Oedekerk says. “What I love about Kevin is he has this Jackie Gleason sensibility – he’s so funny when he’s frustrated. Otis ends up dealing with a lot of things he doesn’t want to deal with; his Dad’s always trying to get him to do stuff he doesn’t want to do. Getting the comedy to come from this frustration was essential and Kevin’s great at that.

“I’m a huge Steve Oedekerk fan,” says James. “He wrote a really funny script, just like he did with ‘Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls’ and ‘Bruce Almighty.’ I’d never done animation before, and it was something I wanted to try.”

In addition to the outrageous comedy that is Oedekerk’s trademark, James was also attracted to the heart and emotion in the role. “There are a ton of pranks in this movie – the cows all go crazy together and do whatever frat cows would do, but they also have to come together, accept responsibility in life, step up to the plate and be a man. Or cow. Whatever.”

James went whole hog learning his role. “I’m a method cow,” he says. “I’d graze for hours before a recording session.”

For the role of Daisy, the sensible and caring cow who provides Otis with the inspiration and trust he needs to become the leader of the barnyard, Oedekerk cast his friend Courteney Cox, best known for her role on the mega-hit TV show “Friends.” He says, “For the role of Daisy, I wanted an actress who the audience could fall in love with instantly. Courteney definitely has that quality. Daisy is the girl next door, very authentic and sweet, a good soul,” says Oedekerk. “It can be challenging playing pure goodness. In order to give dimension, you have to go to a very vulnerable place. Courteney did an awesome job.”

“Steve’s a friend of mine – he’s such a talented guy that I was really excited about doing this movie,” says Cox. “For Steve, this is real life – he writes about the things that kids go through and witness. For him, it’s not an imaginary world – it’s real.”

The actress says her role is “pure sugar – Daisy is so sweet. I’m kind of a sarcastic person, so it was interesting for me.”

Wanda Sykes plays Daisy’s best friend, Bessy, a cow with an acid tongue and nononsense ‘tude. “Bessy is all attitude,” says Sykes. “She tells it like it is. Still, even though she’s got a tough exterior, she’s got a big heart. She’s very protective of Daisy, keeping an eye on her and making sure she doesn’t get mixed up with the wrong crowd.”

“Wanda is a walking comedy machine,” Oedekerk says. “If she has a funny line, she hits it out of the park. If the line ain’t funny, Wanda’s still coming off great. I just think she can pretty much do anything that she wants to do.”

Veteran actor Sam Elliott plays Ben, the well-liked, respected, and organized leader of the barnyard... and also the loving but somewhat beleaguered father of Otis. Responsible where his son is juvenile, out on watch while the boy is partying, Ben loves his son deeply for who he is but wishes he’d learn to grow up a little.

Oedekerk says, “I think one of the most alarming moments I had on the feature was when we were recording Sam. There’s this one line in the film where Ben walks in on Dag, the evil coyote in the chicken coop, and he just goes, ‘Put the hen down, Dag.’ Everybody in the sound booth simultaneously went, ‘Whoa!’ He’s an amazing actor and an amazing person. He brings so much to the table in terms of his performance.” Miles the mule is, according to Oedekerk, “the soul of the piece. Miles becomes Otis’s guide after Ben’s gone,” Oedekerk says. Ben’s right-hand man and best friend, Miles is the voice of wisdom. Due to his old age and experience, he sees and understands more than the rest of the animals. (At the same time, he’s not above boogieing when it’s party time.)

“Danny Glover was my number one choice for Miles,” Oedekerk continues. “I could already hear him in my head when I was writing. “He came in and effortlessly knocked down the character as I pictured him. There was perfect symmetry between what I wrote and Danny’s performance.”

Andie MacDowell plays Etta, the matriarch of the hens in the barnyard. She is the Coop Sergeant, the wise old hen who takes care of the chicks and teaches them her ways. Maternal and intuitive, she’s one of the first to realize that Otis is troubled, but never discusses it, realizing that the cow needs time to work things out on his own. “I love Andie’s voice,” says Oedekerk. “She has such an authentic nature to her; I get a wonderful feeling every time I hear her.”

MacDowell was attracted to the role by the chance to please her family. “My kids will think it’s a lot of fun to go to an animated movie and see their mom as the mother hen,” says MacDowell. “They think I’m a mother hen in real life, so they’ll think that’s ridiculously funny.”

The actress shed her natural Southern accent for the role. “I wanted to sound like an old-fashioned, storybook mother hen,” she says. “The voice came naturally to me – I just didn’t think she should sound Southern.”

Otis’s best friends rival him in their ability to goof around, play tricks, and have a good time. Pip the mouse (voiced by Jeff Garcia) is Otis’s small and carefree best bud. This little guy with a big voice is outspoken and opinionated, always throwing in his two cents on every topic. The neurotic Freddy the ferret (voiced by Cam Clarke) is not the brightest animal in the barnyard, but he’s got good reason to be a little mixed-up: he’s just trying to keep down his natural desire to eat his best friend, Peck the rooster (voiced by Rob Paulsen). Peck is soft-spoken, level-headed, good-hearted – you almost wonder how he ended up with these jokers. The last member of the quintet is Pig (voiced by Tino Insana). All Pig’s ever wanted to do is eat and party in mud and slop. The good news for Pig is that he’s a pig – so that’s exactly what he gets to do all day long. Pig is the most well-adjusted animal in the barnyard.

The most mysterious animal in the barnyard is Wild Mike. If music’s playing, he’s out of control – Wild Mike is the party animal of all party animals. A tangle of hair and arms and legs and who knows what else. “You can’t quite tell what kind of animal Wild Mike is,” says Oedekerk, “and that was really the goal. Right now, I’m the only one that knows; everyone else will have to wait for the ‘Barnyard’ series on Nickelodeon. And he’s really Otis’s weak spot – when Wild Mike starts dancing, Otis cannot hold still. He has to dance with Wild Mike.”

For the voice of one particularly obnoxious character, the whiny, bad-tempered, cow-tipping little creep known as Snotty Boy, Oedekerk had to look a little closer to home: Oedekerk supplies the voice (not only for Snotty Boy, but several characters). “Yeah,” he says ruefully, “with Snotty Boy it’s really a question of ‘Who could be that annoying?’ I realized no one exists that’s that hateable so I had to do it myself. That’s sadly, sadly what that came down to.”

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