On Sunday, Mumford & Sons released a super funny music video for their song “Hopeless Wanderer,†starring Ed Helms, Jason Bateman, Jason Sudeikis, and Will Forte; and today, The LA Times caught up with the video’s director, Sam Jones (I Am Trying to Break Your Heart) for a look behind the scenes. Here are some bullet point facts about it:
The video was shot in one day in April on a Southern California movie ranch called Golden Oak Ranch.
The actors offered to work for free, but they had to be paid hundreds of dollars because of Screen Actors Guild minimums.
Director Sam Jones pitched the video idea to the record label but after they approved it, he says, “I was like, ‘Oh God,’ because I didn’t have any actors that I’d actually talked to.†He called Jason Sudeikis, who he’d worked with on a photo shoot, who called his Horrible Bosses costar Jason Bateman. Will Forte and Ed Helms came on board after that.
The band wanted input over which comedians were in the video, but Jones refused.
Sudeikis sang at the top of his lungs the whole day, despite the fact that he was lip syncing.
Helms wanted to play the band’s banjo player because he really plays the banjo, but Jones cast him as the pianist because he looks more like him.
“The band loved it — they didn’t want to change a thing,†said Jones. “I’m obviously so excited that everybody is watching it. It was one of those rare experiences where the record company and the band really let me do what I wanted to do.â€
