Interview with Will Arnett, host of LEGO Masters
Posted by MeganL,
The new LEGO Masters reality TV show, scheduled to start airing next month here in the U.S., has generated much anticipation and excitement in the AFOL community. Last month, Brickset and other fan media were invited to visit the LEGO Masters set.
I, along with Dave from our friends at The Brothers Brick, had the opportunity to sit down for a few minutes with Will Arnett, the host of LEGO Masters.
"Do you like my shirt?", Will asked when we met. The shirt read "Will" in the LEGO logo font. "I designed it myself!".
Learn Will's favourite LEGO themes, what has impressed him the most about the LEGO Masters contestants, and what he's learned being host of his first reality show after the break.
This is your first time hosting a reality show. How have you interacted with the LEGO Masters teams?
My role is to be a cheerleader for the teams. I’m the grease that keeps the wheels going on the show. It’s a role that I've never done before, but it's pretty fun! We try to encourage them to bring as much of their personality into the builds as they can. The Brickmasters (judges Jamie Berard and Amy Corbett) and I are always trying to encourage the contestants to use as much color as possible and let their own personalities come out in the builds. Sometimes it's successful, and sometimes it's not. Of course, it’s a competition, so they want to do well and they’re incentivized that way. But the more relaxed they get and the more fun they have seems to be a pretty good way of getting them to dig deep creatively.
How have the teams interacted with each other? Has it been more collaborative or competitive?
It's really incomparable in a lot of ways. One of the great things about the LEGO community is that it is quite collaborative and supportive. People are fans of each other’s work, and certainly that's the case with the contestants. Each team wants to win for sure. But there's not really gamesmanship, so they're not really playing against each other in that way. You don't see a lot of psychological games going on. The teams get quite attached to each other. When teams are eliminated, when they've been building alongside each other for a couple months, they really feel it when somebody has to go home.
You’ve been involved with LEGO for a long time – most of our readers know you as LEGO Batman. What’s your impression of what the teams are accomplishing here at LEGO Masters?
I’m amazed and constantly impressed at how good some of the builds are – not just the creativity, but the engineering. We had incredible builds with the bridge challenge, where the teams had to build a six foot span bridge. You see that they’re using real engineering techniques out of LEGO bricks. The ways that they constructed these creations, not only were they structurally sound, they were also architecturally impressive.
Do you build any LEGO yourself? What are your favourite LEGO themes?
I like to build what my kids like to build. Most of my building revolves around what my kids do. Of course, I'm always trying to push them toward LEGO Movie, LEGO Movie 2, LEGO and Batman sets. My sons have been getting into Architecture, and we did the NASA Saturn V rocket most recently. That’s where they've started to go now maybe because they're getting older.
Has hosting the show inspired you to build any of your own creations? Could we see you as a contestant?
(laughs) I don't think anyone could see me as a contestant! The quality of talent out there is so high, it would take me a while to get to that level. Just being in the LEGO-verse starting with the first LEGO Movie reignited my passion for LEGO. Really for the last 9-10 years I've been quite into it.
Have you learned anything from hosting LEGO Masters?
Certainly my appreciation for how great these builders has increased from doing the show – I now recognize how hard it really is. Not only that, the one thing that separates this show from building at home is that these guys are doing it under a time constraint. We have some snap builds that they have to do. Sometimes they have to build things so they can be smashed, so the builds have to look good when they're built and they also have to look good when they're getting demolished, whether it's by baseball bat or dropping them or even if we put explosives in them. That's a really narrow target to hit and watching them do that has been super impressive.
If you were offered the opportunity, would you host LEGO Masters Season 2?
Generally, I don't answer hypothetical questions but – let me put it this way, I've had a really fun time doing the show. It's been super satisfying. What's been really cool is how many people have wanted to come over and hang out at the set. My kids have wanted to be here at all times – as soon as they get out of school they're always like "can we just come straight to the set?” which has been rad. A lot of people have had their families around so that's been really cool, and we’ve had some great guests on. Jason Bateman showed up one day with his daughter because he's been building with her a lot right now, so in that way it's been really cool. I like being around it.
Thank you for spending time with us!
Over the coming several days we will have more coverage of LEGO Masters, including a tour of the set, interviews with judges Jamie Berard and Amy Corbett, interviews with the LEGO Masters contestants and more!
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35 comments on this article
Should've asked him to do a magic trick.
Who is he?
@jdm said:
"Who is he?"
*GASPS!*
He's LEGO Batman in the movies. He's now hosting this new building show in the USA.
I imagined him talking in his Batman voice.
^^different voice in France. ;-)
@jdm: I never thought of that...
@jdm said:
"^^different voice in France. ;-)"
Ohh good point. I have watched a bunch of Hollywood movies that were in Mexico, everything is the same (it's even still in English) except the font on the screen is oddly in Spanish. So I never thought about just changing the voice actors.
But find a clip of the USA version, he has a great Batman voice.
Never heard of him either. People in English-speaking countries seem to forget that films are dubbed in many other countries. I do make a habit of listening to many films in their original version (at least with languages I am fluent enough in), but especially with movies like TLM, which we watched as a family, we watch in the German dubbed version because neither my wife nor my kids would be able to follow the film otherwise.
I was more disturbed by the thought of the contestants having to build MOCs to be destryoed on-screen. WTF?
There are enough idiots on YouTube doing that already. What good does it do to give such a bad example on a show licenced by LEGO themselves?
In the German version of the show there was no such thing, thank god. Never is it setting a good example destroying stuff on purpose. Vandalism in the public space is a perfect example. Showing wilfull destruction of stuff on TV gives the impression to kids that such a thing is not only acceptable but actually good. They should have rather had a challenge to build something that gets donated to charity.
But I guess that's the U.S. showbiz mentality for you.
"Do you like my shirt?", Will asked when we met. The shirt read "Will" in the LEGO logo font. "I designed it myself!".
I literally googled how to get a shirt like this when I read the interview on Brother's Brick. Now I'm gonna have to go out and get the font and order one on zazzle.
They're not builds, Michael, they're engineering feats; builds are something kids do for money...or candy.
Thanks for the words.
He was also famous for Arrested Development but he is most famous now for his legendary voice work in many roles in the US. A huge fan of his.
Great interview, Megan. There's something very satisfying hearing about his dedication to his kids and them enjoying LEGO together. Will seems like a really good dude. And voicework and production work in Bojack Horseman is some of the best, most poignant character work ever on TV.
@jdm said:
"Who is he?"
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=X8LxBEm4DO4
English language cast with side-by-side clips.
Interesting that Jason Bateman (his old Arrested Development co-star) stopped by as he is the narrator for a Lego documentary I've seen.
Can't wait!
@AustinPowers
When he said "explosives" I was shook.
Wow I did not expect this collaboration! Love it!
Will's going to be hilarious for this!! Can't wait.
I think this show is part of why Lego bought Bricklink. They're anticipating that it'll spark new people to want to create MOCs, so they bought the place those people were most likely to use to do it
It looks like it will be a carbon copy of the Australian version from last year. That’s not a bad thing as it was some of the best television of the decade. While a reality show, it was positive, encouraging and fun. The fact the teams were insanely talented didn’t hurt either.
@i_amtrunks said:
"It looks like it will be a carbon copy of the Australian version from last year."
Which in itself was a copy of the UK version. Although to be fair, even though the UK does TV better than us, I think I enjoyed our version more.
@chrisaw
I totally agree. Can’t wait for season 2!!!!!
I also enjoyed the Aussie version. Best things about it were that it was short - nine episodes over three weeks - and it had none of the nasty focus on upsets and conflict you see on other "reality" TV. The contestants were positive about their builds and encouraged each other.
@AddictedToStyrene said:
"I also enjoyed the Aussie version. Best things about it were that it was short - nine episodes over three weeks - and it had none of the nasty focus on upsets and conflict you see on other "reality" TV. The contestants were positive about their builds and encouraged each other. "
All these points you made were key to its success. Also that Hamish and Ryan were able to fill in the dead spaces effectively, give good feedback, leaving the contestants to focus on their builds and not worry about being entertaining
Can't wait for more posts on this topic!
They had a pretty nice line up of celebrities and guest stars in the trailer. It's really nice to see just how far LEGO spreads.
Suprised only one person here has mentioned he's the voice of BoJack Horseman to answer people's questions. Of course every AFOL knows him as LEGO Batman, but he's done a decent amount of other stuff.
I hope that they build a frozen banana stand filled with the 1x2 tiles with the money print!
O.o baseball bats....explosives....what am I about to watch?
I am so excited for this show. I don’t do any real time intensive MOC’s so it’ll be nice seeing the process.
@AustinPowers said:
In the German version of the show there was no such thing, thank god. Never is it setting a good example destroying stuff on purpose.
>> What german version of the show? When/where was this (or is still)? I'm sure my kids (not speaking about me :-) ) would love to watch that, cause they are deep into LEGO these days...
@GSR_MataNui said:
"Surprised only one person here has mentioned he's the voice of BoJack Horseman to answer people's questions."
Who?
@raist7 said:
">> What german version of the show? When/where was this (or is still)? I'm sure my kids (not speaking about me :-) ) would love to watch that, cause they are deep into LEGO these days..."
It was on RTL in late 2018:
https://www.rtl.de/cms/sendungen/show/lego-master.html
Tbh, it wasn't the most exciting show to watch. Coupled with the fact that quite a few of the contestants were not all that talented. Probably different in the UK, Australia, US, ...
"Who is he?"
And still getting 5 likes.........
@ChrisBricks81 said:
""Who is he?"
And still getting 5 likes........."
Who’s who?
Fantastic interview! Can’t wait for the show!