Two Vince Vaughns Are Better Than One for the Director of ‘Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice’

Writer/director BenDavid Grabinski tells IndieWire about the surprising complexity behind his time-traveling buddy comedy.

BenDavid Grabinski has written for television, film, and video games, and no matter the media, sometimes the answer to making something better is to make it a little bit dumber.  

Well, dumber isn’t quite right — and is only meant affectionately by Grabinski himself. The writer recently partnered with Bryan Lee O’Malley on “Scott Pilgrim Takes Off,” the alternate universe TV continuation of “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World.” He also pitched the concept for the even more out-there game, “Scott Pilgrim EX,” and created another tale of genre-savvy time-travelers: his latest film, “Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice.”

Grabinski’s second directorial effort follows Mike (James Marsden) and Nick (Vince Vaughn), partners for a gangster organization, in what starts as a buddy comedy. But the movie throws in one added complication: a time-traveling Nick from the future (Vaughn) who arrives to prevent present-day Mike from being killed by the very organization they’re all working for, after their boss (Keith David) is lead to believe that Mike is a snitch, responsible for sending his son (Jimmy Tatro) to prison. Also wrinkling matters is Eiza González as Nick’s wife Alice, who also happens to be Mike’s secret lover.

For Grabinski, what unites all of these projects is the fine art of creating a world that is emotionally smart yet deeply silly, fun, and expressive.

But Grabinski always wants the heightened comedic beats and the action setpieces to reflect an emotional reality underneath. “I find musicals and action movies, sometimes, kind of interchangeable in terms of how they’re constructed. Choreography is choreography,” he told IndieWire. “Sometimes, a big Jackie Chan fight is similar to a dance sequence, to me. So this movie also has that feeling to it. Part of the reason I cast Marsden is because I watched ‘Hairspray.’ I think that if you can do a really good dance number, you can do [action].” 

Pulling off a really good dance number or a really good action sequence is a trick in and of itself, but for “Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice,” there was a constant high-wire act of “twinning” Vince Vaughn, which made even simple shots complex to achieve. The math for a bog-standard walk-and-talk through a hotel hallway between Nick and Future Nick is staggering. 

“You want to get a steadicam dolly, handheld, two guys talking, we’re covering the thing. But it’s the two Vinces, so I have to have a motion-control camera. It has to be a computer-controlled rig, so it has to be on a crane. So I have to build that hallway on a sound stage, and I have to figure out how big is the sound stage? Where can I put the crane? How much track can I build so I can have this whole crane move back so I can repeat the motion with the second Vince, when we reshoot it?” Grabinski said. “ And on the day, Vince might say, ‘What if I stop here and turn and look at that guy when I’m talking?’ What if that’s a great idea? What if that makes the scene better?” 

The fun of directing for Grabinski, though, is in problem-solving. “ I love prep. I love solving the issues of ‘how much time do we have in this location versus this one? Can we combine this with this?’” Grabinski said. “The more you solve that, the more you also discover things about the scene and what’s important to you and what’s necessary. There’s like a feedback loop between the practical logistics stuff and then creative intention and tone.” 

With that kind of engineering work, it’s only fitting that Grabinski rewards himself with “fun dumb gangster guys” who spend most of the movie partying before they confront the time-travelers and their friends. “It’s both a combination of chasing every creative idea that is exciting to me, but also creating rules for myself because it’s supposed to be a really fun ride that maybe ends up being more emotional than you’re expecting.” 

“Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice” is now streaming on Hulu.