When families fight, often the biggest victims are the children. But in The War With Grandpa, which will be out in theaters on October 9, it is the child who will become an instigator. Oakes Fegley plays Peter, the young boy who will not give his bedroom up to his grandfather regardless of the cost.
Meanwhile, Laura Marano plays his older sister Mia, who must deal with the fallout of the family chaos when all she wants is to hang out with her boyfriend. The two young actors chatted with Screen Rant about the conflicts their characters deal with and what they learned from the Hollywood legends on set.
Can you guys talk to me a little bit about your characters and who you play?
Oakes Fegley: I would say Peter is the counterpart to his grandfather. They’re both kind of antagonist-protagonist, all mixed into one, and they’re kind of butting heads super hard because they’re really similar as people. Overall, that carries through the entire movie, and that energy is what keeps it going.
Laura Marano: Mia, who I play, is sassy. She is definitely has a bit of a rebellious streak. She’s a teenager, and I think she just has a strong sense of justice. “Hello, I just want to hang out with my boyfriend. Come on, everyone calm down.”
She’s a little self-involved. She has no idea there’s a war going on between her grandfather and her brother.
Oakes, one of the most fun scenes in this movie has to be that dodgeball scene? was it as fun to shoot as it looked on screen?
Oakes Fegley: Yeah. And being around a lot of younger actors at the time – it was probably three and a half years ago – we were all really good friends off set as well. So, it was definitely fun to be in that sort of environment with a younger energy. And it brought a lot of fun to it, yeah, for sure.
Mia doesn’t know much about the war that’s going on, but how does she eventually fit into all these shenanigans?
Laura Marano: She’s… Not part of the biggest one, but without giving too much away, she is revealed to be doing something that her parents aren’t approving of in the biggest prank.
But I do want to take a moment to say: it’s pretty unfair that Mia gets the same treatment and the same amount of trouble as Peter, who has been doing all these things, when she’s just wants to hang out with the guy she likes. Just putting it on the table.
You guys are surrounded by Hollywood legends in this film. Can you talk to me about any fun experiences or bits of advice that some of these legends were able to bestow upon you?
Oakes Fegley: I don’t think there’s really any distinct pieces of advice or anything that anybody gave me. But I think my favorite thing about working in general is working with different people, and seeing how they work off different actors and how you can work off of them; how different directors direct. I think all of that was true here as well. Working with all these different people, seeing how everybody worked – especially Bob, I think it was really nice to to see all that energy come out. And there were so many people on set; there was always somebody cool on set to be talking to.
Laura Marano: Yeah, I think overall, everyone just had the best attitude. Obviously, looking at the list of actors, I was quite intimidated. But it wasn’t like they took themselves very seriously – they took the work seriously, but not themselves. So, it wasn’t them going out and being like, “Laura, you really should do this in this scene.” I think they were really trusting and respectful and kind, and it was so surreal.
Key Release Dates
The War With Grandpa
Release Date:2020-10-09
