George Clooney And Julia Roberts Ditched The Script For Their Beer Pong Scene In Ticket To Paradise
George Clooney and Julia Roberts have slowly become one of the more iconic movie duos of the past 30 years. The two movie stars worked together for the first time in 2001's "Ocean's Eleven" and in the 15 years that followed that film's release, Roberts and Clooney went on to star opposite each other in 2002's "Confessions of a Dangerous Mind," 2004's "Ocean's Twelve," and 2016's "Money Monster." Now, six years after the release of "Money Monster," the pair has reunited yet again for "Ticket to Paradise."
The new romantic comedy stars Clooney and Roberts as a divorced couple who agree to put their differences aside in order to sabotage their daughter's shotgun wedding in Bali. In the days since its release, the film has received notably mixed reviews from critics (via Rotten Tomatoes). However, everyone who's seen "Ticket to Paradise" also seems to agree that the film, once again, proves just how electric Clooney and Roberts can be when they're given the chance to appear on-screen together.
Nowhere is Clooney and Roberts' magnetic chemistry in "Ticket to Paradise" more apparent than in the film's beer pong scene, which sees its two stars go absolutely wild while facing off against Kaitlyn Dever's Lily and Maxime Bouttier's Gede. The scene is not only one of the most memorable that "Ticket to Paradise" has to offer, but it turns out that it also gave Clooney and Roberts the chance to exercise their improvisational muscles.
George Clooney and Julia Roberts took full control of Ticket to Paradise's beer pong scene
Throughout the beer pong scene in "Ticket to Paradise," George Clooney and Julia Roberts' David and Georgia Cotton don't just get progressively drunker, but they also dance, laugh, and find every way imaginable to embarrass their daughter, Lily (Kaitlyn Dever). The scene is loose, chaotic, and one of the funniest that audiences will see in "Ticket to Paradise." Taking that into account, those who go see the film may be surprised to learn that the sequence itself was largely improvised.
During a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, Clooney and Roberts revealed that they ultimately chose not to rehearse what they were going to do in their standout "Ticket to Paradise" scene. "It was funny because when we got to the set, everyone was like, 'Okay, we're going to talk about the scene.' Julia and I were like, 'Let's just shoot it, man. Don't worry. We know what to do. We've been down this road a few times,'" Clooney said.
For her part, Roberts noted, "I think people thought we might warm up [before the scene]. They thought we'd start off a little slow, and we just came in going 100 percent from the beginning — and we left some people speechless." The stars' comments were supported by "Ticket to Paradise" director Ol Parker, who told EW, "There was a choreographer available to them if they wanted, but they didn't."
For what it's worth, it seems safe to say that Roberts and Clooney made the right call in playing their unforgettable "Ticket to Paradise" scene the way they did. After all, while critical opinions about the film itself may be divided, the consensus surrounding Clooney and Roberts' beer-pong antics seems to be overwhelmingly positive — and justifiably so.