On a busy Saturday at the Bedford Playhouse, Meg LeFauve sat in an emerald-decorated room, secluded from the hustle and bustle of children choosing movie snacks and parents shuffling them toward their seats. Feet away, LeFauve’s smash-hit film, “Inside Out 2,” played to a group of enamored audience members.
From the film's mental health connections to the power of emotions as teachers, “Inside Out 2” has resonated with audiences all over the world. And the box office numbers show it; the movie has already grossed $1.46 billion worldwide, reaching that level faster than any other animated film in history.
So when LeFauve recently visited the Westchester County town of Bedford, it was the perfect opportunity to talk all things “Inside Out 2,” and some of the processes she and the creative team used to make the movie such a success.
Here are five things we learned from our one-on-one conversation with Inside Out 2’s screenwriter, Meg LeFauve.
(This conversation contains spoilers. Some quotations have been edited and condensed for clarity.)
1. The movie had a team of expert consultants to inform the story, including a group of teenage girls.
According to LeFauve, when it came to capturing some of the mental health themes that are in the movie, she talked with consultants Lisa Demure, who’s an anxiety expert for teen girls in particular, and Dacker Keltner, an expert in emotions.
She also worked with a group of eight to 10 teenage girls that she affectionately referred to as “Riley’s crew.”
“We would talk to them about what felt real, (what felt) authentic,” LeFauve said. “I loved them. They saw every version of the movie.”
2. Parts of the movie were, in part, based on LeFauve’s own experiences with anxiety.
“Both the director (Kelsey Mann) and I have anxiety,” LeFauve said. “Everybody on the team is bringing their authentic experience — the head of story, John Hoffman, and the editor, and everybody's bringing their authentic human experience with anxiety.”
“For example, I always knew, the end of the film, I wanted them to give anxiety a seat because that is what would worked for me and my anxiety, was to talk to her,” LeFauve said. “I learned that you can't cut a piece of yourself out. You can't ask a piece of yourself to disappear. It has something of value for you.
“So you can talk to it,” she continued. “You can say ‘thank you very much. I know you're trying to protect me.’ First you need to acknowledge that it's there, that it is trying to help you. But you can say, ‘but I'm not going to die when I go in and pitch this idea.’ And I did this long before I even did Inside Out. I would picture a little chair and ask her to go sit down and watch.”
3. One of the “Inside Out 2” characters was originally a monster.
It was the character of Anxiety, who appears in the film as an orange-colored emotion, who wears orange stripes, has a mouth bigger than her face and has hair coming out of the top of her head.
“She did start out as a monster,” LeFauve said of Anxiety. “She disguised herself as a worker. And then they discovered one night that she was actually a monster. I mean, she was adorable. But she was still a monster.”
The team ultimately changed Anxiety’s portrayal because the monster visualization “just didn't feel right.”
4. Anxiety wasn’t a villain, but she was Joy’s antagonist.
“Well, all villains believe they're the heroes of the movies,” LeFauve said. “When you write, you have to know that.”
“We just decided that that wasn't our authentic experience of anxiety,” she said. “That anxiety, again, is trying to protect you. So she has a good goal, which is to protect Riley. She just has a really bad plan how to do it.”
But, LeFauve continued, “She is Joy's antagonist, because they have such different ideas about Riley and what Riley needs. The truth is that neither of them are right, and both of them have good intentions.”
5. Emotions like anxiety and envy aren’t necessarily negative.
In fact, LeFauvre said, many of the emotions that are often considered negative, like anger and sadness, can be productive.
“I was asked once, ‘Why all these negative emotions?’ And I was like, ‘Well, that's a judgment.’ I don't think they're negative necessarily. Anger helps you understand where your boundaries are. Envy is super important, especially for girls. Jealousy tells you what you want. And you need to listen to what you want. Girls aren't generally taught to do that.”
“And then you can look at what you're jealous of,” LeFauve said, “And that’ll start to indicate to you, ‘Oh, there's something in there.’”
Where to watch Inside Out 2 in Westchester, Rockland, on streaming
Inside Out 2 is still playing in theaters, with showings available in Westchester at the Apple Cinemas in White Plains, Alamo Drafthouse in Yonkers, Look Cinemas in Dobbs Ferry, AMC Port Chester and Mamaroneck Cinemas to name a few. In Rockland, catch Inside Out 2 at AMC Palisades Center 21 in West Nyack or the Regal Nanuet RPX.
If you'd rather watch at home, Inside Out 2 will stream exclusively on the Disney+ platform. While no official streaming release date has emerged, the movie is expected to land on Disney+ sometime in late September.
Samantha Antrumis the community news and outreach reporter for The Journal News/lohud. She reports on cultural and social justice issues and events.You can reach her at santrum@lohud.com.
