Michael Cera Got More Than He Bargained For From His Cameo In This Is The End
When we think about movies about the end of the world, our brains probably automatically draw upon movies about the zombie uprising or something directed by Roland Emmerich. In 2013, however, funny guys Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg ("Superbad," "Pineapple Express") tried their hand at tackling the apocalypse with "This is the End." Seth Rogen, Jonah Hill, Jay Baruchel, Danny McBride, Craig Robinson, James Franco (unfortunately), and a slew of other celebrities play fictionalized versions of themselves attending a party at Franco's house, when suddenly the world opens up and they're all faced to deal with "an apocalypse of biblical proportions." With the world turning into a proverbial hellscape, we bear witness to a group of Hollywood actors struggling to survive with hilarious results.
The film is filled with celebrity cameos like Emma Watson, Channing Tatum, and Rihanna, but "Superbad" star Michael Cera provided one of the most memorable. Cera is known for his awkward and soft-spoken characters, so the fictionalized version of himself in "This is the End" is a massive jerkwad with a penchant for snorting cocaine whenever possible. Cera is the first one to die when the world ends, because as Seth Rogen said, "We thought it would be funny to kill someone you don't expect to die, and it needed to be someone who was despicable so when they do die really graphically, you're entertained by it, not wrapped up in the fact that this person you like just died." Rogen said it was the "perfect storm" to have Cera appear as a coke-addled monster, but acknowledged that Cera's own comedic instincts are what brought the performance to another level.
Michael Cera made his cameo his own
Outside of the obsession with coke, like blowing it in "Superbad" co-star Christopher Mintz-Plasse's face, one of the most memorable aspects of his character is the gaudy windbreaker he wears. According to Evan Goldberg, "We wrote this insane character for him, and his only note as an actor, which it's rare to only have one, is 'I want to wear this windbreaker,'" he said. "It's his real-life windbreaker."
Cena made the wardrobe choice thinking it would elevate his coked out body language, giving him something to play with to show how the drugs are impacting his behavior. "Michael was like a hurricane of hilarity," said Goldberg. "All the other actors, he was the one they were looking at like, 'This is, like, magical.'"
In one of his first scenes, comedian and actress Mindy Kaling talks about how badly she wants to f*** Michael Cera, and the camera cuts to him snorting lines and slapping Rihanna's ass without consent before getting slapped upside the head. Obviously, the real Michael Cera knew better than to slap a woman on the booty without asking, so while the script called for the slap, he asked Rihanna for permission to actually swat her behind, rather than perform a stage slap. As Goldberg tells it, Rihanna told Cera he could do it, but said she was going to hit back way harder. "She hit him the first time, the second time, and we were all laughing, and Michael was like, 'Oh, it hurts,'" said Goldberg. "She was laughing and he was laughing, and the third time I think she cupped his ear, and it messed him up."
Rihanna really slapped the crap out of Michael Cera
On the third hit, Cera said, "it was like a flash bomb." Apparently he had a high-pitched ringing in his ear and got discombobulated as to where he was. Cera expressed that he was delirious, and being on a comedy set, everyone originally thought it was all in good fun. Goldberg said the crew was made aware of the severity when Cera informed everyone that he needed help sitting down, because she had smacked him so hard that he lost balance.
"I've genuinely never seen a person get slapped that hard in real life," said Goldberg. To be fair, Rihanna did warn him that she was going to slap him back harder than expected, and she held up her end of the bargain.
"She really slapped the s*** out of him like six times," said Rogen. Cera eventually tapped out and couldn't take it anymore. "It was effective," Cera said. "She didn't hold back."
In the final cut, Cera mimes a practice hit on her butt while Rihanna talks to Jason Segel, and after he makes a contact slap, she winds up with her whole body before clocking him across the face. It's been unconfirmed which take the film ended up using, but Cera was a champ for taking what looks like a sincerely painful smack, and Rihanna showed exactly what should be the consequences for groping strangers.