'Vacation' takes return trip to Walley World

AUSTELL, Ga. — It’s a scene like at any ridiculously popular theme park. Hordes of people mill about, the smell of sunscreen is in the air, signage abounds with cute animal creatures and there's an endless line into the coolest ride in the place.

This locale is special, though, especially to old-school comedy audiences. Walley World and the Griswolds are back on screen in a new Vacation movie (in theaters Wednesday), and there was fun and hijinks to be had on set at the transformed Six Flags Over Georgia.

The revelry at the moment comes at the expense of writer/directors John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein, who are feeling the playful wrath of star Christina Applegate as she flings almonds at them from behind while they’re watching the last few takes.

“Write this: ‘Goldstein says Applegate is being difficult,’ ” Goldstein deadpans, a nut just missing his right ear.

The toughest times are often the most hilarious in this new take on the Griswold family road trip and continuation of the mythology started with 1983’s original Vacation, this time with an adult Rusty Griswold (Ed Helms), wife Debbie (Applegate), bookish older son James (Skyler Gisondo) and Kevin (Steele Stebbins), his absolute terror of a little brother.

“There’s a link to the first film that’s undeniable in premise and concept and some of the family dynamics,” Helms says. “But the actual trip that this family takes is really unique. The stops along the way, the experiences, the jokes, they all come from a really fresh new place.”

Vacation marks the first directorial feature for the Daley/Goldstein duo, who’ve been hired to write a new Spider-Man solo movie for Marvel. The installment needed healthy respect for the original creators and the fandom while also functioning as something that could stand alone.

Daley says they were inspired by the way the 21 Jump Street movie alluded to the original TV show. Yet with this franchise in particular, “if you talk to someone under 23, the likelihood is that they haven’t seen any of the Vacation movies.”

Goldstein, whose comedic sensibility was formed watching the 1983 film (as well as Caddyshack) nonstop as a kid in the ‘80s, adds that “we can’t rely on nostalgia to make this movie work. It has to live on its own.”

When Clark (Chevy Chase) and Ellen Griswold (Beverly D’Angelo) finally make it to Walley World with their family in the first Vacation, the place is shut down. At least this time, it’s open and thriving.

This generation of Griswolds arrives after a disastrous path from Chicago to California involving car crashes, death-defying whitewater rafting, swimming in raw sewage, an embarrassing sexual encounter at Four Corners Monument, and a nasty incident involving a cow and an ATV at the estate of Rusty's sister Audrey (Leslie Mann) and her weatherman husband (Chris Hemsworth). But with that all behind them, they're forced to wait in line for the awesome Velociraptor roller coaster and are now feeling the exhaustion of the journey.

Amid a crowd of extras, Helms wears a big grin to reflect Rusty’s undying optimism, though he looks as perturbed as the rest of his family when a park worker comes to change the wait time for their place in line from one hour to two.

“Even more bored,” Goldstein says, giving direction after the take. “Less cheerful this one.”

Daley suggests a mix of “amused and incredulous” for Helms, and then Goldstein has a perfect line for the littlest Griswold in reaction to the longer wait time: “Give Kevin a ‘What the (expletive)!’ ”

The stuff that comes out of the kid’s foul mouth isn't safe for work or most shipyards. Stebbins, 12, not surprisingly gets a kick out of his vocabulary's vulgarity, and his parents are actually pretty cool with it, he says. “I don’t necessarily repeat it. In my last movie (AHaunted House 2) I did a lot of cursing, too, so they’re kind of used to it by now.”

Stebbins gets most of Vacation’s best lines, usually at the expense of his onscreen bro. Gisondo’s James lives for Jack Kerouac, poetry and dream journals but is also an endless target of emotional and physical bullying from his shorter sibling.

“It’s a lot of him hitting me,” says Gisondo, 19, laughing. “Come like the eighth hour of having a plastic bag over my head, I still tell myself I’m enjoying it and having a good time.”

Though the first Vacation mainly followed Clark’s character arc, everybody gets their own in the new film. That’s a welcome function of what moviegoers want out of their storytelling now, Helms says. “In the ‘80s, it was almost like French New Wave comedy. Things didn’t need to resolve and you could just be crazy and dynamic.”

Applegate was glad to tackle her character, which she based on other modern moms she sees at preschool. The Griswold matriarch has a penchant for foul language in front of the children, engages in some neglectful parenting and is also trying to get past the sordid “Debbie Do Anything” period in her life, a side of her resurrected when the family visits her Memphis alma mater.

Yet they’re all on the same road to making the Griswold family unit tighter, Applegate says. “Everyone comes through with a lesson learned at the end of the journey, which you always do when you go to hell and back.”