Kennedy is a comedian at heart

By Tara Dempsey

Jamie Kennedy, known by most as "Randy" from the popular Scream trilogy, is featured in the new Ben Younger film, Boiler Room.

In a phone interview packed with the words "totally," "like" and "you know," the laid-back actor spoke about his roles, his influences and scary movies.

In Boiler Room he plays Adam, an extremely ambitious stockbroker for the illicit firm JT Marlin. Adam is one of the characters who introduces Seth (Giovanni Ribisi) into the corrupt world of the firm. Kennedy relished his role as one of the bad guys.

"I loved it," Kennedy said. "I wish I could play more. It's fun to do that 'cause you get to exercise a part of yourself that normally you don't get to exercise É The role was awesome."

Kennedy had a lot of freedom in his role as Adam, who he describes as manic.

"[Adam is] kinda just crazy," he said. "I just kinda went off and did whatever I wanted. He's kinda nuts, kinda just a guy who does drugs."

Kennedy enjoyed working with the cast, which included Ben Affleck, Nicky Katt and Scott Caan, and bonding with his Boiler Room co-stars off camera.

"[It was a] total boys club. [We] total[ly] hung out, did everything together. We still do. These guys became my really good friends."

Aside from Boiler Room, Kennedy had a cameo in the recently released Scream 3, and explained how he was able to briefly restore his role of Randy.

"Well, I was really bummed that I got killed in Scream 2. So I was talking to Wes [Craven] one night and he was like, you know we gotta think of a way to bring you back and I'm like, yeah - what about like a videotape? I'm like I can narrate and try to keep them alive. He said that's not a bad idea and then he had an idea how to bring me back for real...But that got nixed [because] the people wondered if it would have been believable. So we just opted with the videotape, but it was just one scene."

In many of his roles, Kennedy likes to goof off and do impressions and he says his directors encourage his improvisation.

"Every time I do something like that, it's just me," he said. "I improv. I was talking to Wes [Craven] during takes one day [in a British accent] and he's like, 'that's good! That's good! Use that in the scene!' So I did it, and I ended up having this weird British accent in that one scene [in Scream 2]. And then like the Jerry Lewis in the first Scream I was [imitating Lewis] and he was like, 'do that.' [The directors] love it. That's the side, really, that's who I am. I mean, people don't know that but I'm like a comedian. Sometimes I'm like totally low key and other times I'm like totally manic and [I] do like voices and characters and impressions."

Kennedy, who cites Eddie Murphy as being his biggest comedic influence, was a huge fan of "Saturday Night Live" when he was growing up.

"I love 'Saturday Night Live,'" he said. "I wanted to get on the show and I auditioned, like, five years ago. Then I was thinking about auditioning again but I don't know, it might be weird because I'm in movies now but it depends - if I don't get a chance to do what I want to do then I might audition for it again."

Of all the characters Kennedy has played, his role in the Scream movies has been his favorite because he has so much in common with the character.

"I think Randy [is my favorite character]," Kennedy said. "I really love Randy. I'm a lot like Randy, that's like me so it wasn't really me acting, it was just kinda me being."

Kennedy's role in the Scream movies has prompted the question of what his favorite scary movie is.

"Probably The Exorcist," Kennedy said. "It's just awesome. It's so frightening."