If you grew up in the ’90s, chances are you watched Blue’s Clues. For me, Steve was my guy and I still stand by the fact that I love detective stories because of my love for this show. So when I was offered the chance to interview the team behind Blue’s Big City Adventure for Paramount+, I was instantly in. And getting to talk to “All three Steves” (well, I spoke to Joshua Dela Cruz and Donovan Patton) and see how much this cast and crew loves being a part of this legacy? It made all those years of singing about the handy dandy notebook worth it.
The movie takes Josh (Joshua Dela Cruz) to New York City with Blue so that he can audition for a Broadway show. But when he forgets to bring the address and leaves his handy dandy notebook at home, he’s stuck trying to figure out where to go on the city for his audition by playing Blue’s Clues! And when Salt and Pepper and the rest of the team from home bring him his notebook, they go find Steve (Steve Burns) to help find Josh.
Josh is the cousin of Steve and Joe (who are brothers) and it’s a movie about everyone trying to be there for Josh and it does remind me of why I loved this show so much as a kid. So getting to talk with everyone? A dream come true!
All three Steves
If you recall, at the Macy’s Day Parade in 2021, there was a viral video of Dela Cruz, Patton, and Burns all standing together on a float with someone screaming “ALL THREE STEVES” and it is something I think about often because when you’re a kid, you know these are different men but it is just the jump reaction to call them all the same name. Still, getting to talk with Joe and Josh was so much fun because while I was a Steve kid, I did watch Joe for a bit.
I told Patton that I was growing out of the show a bit but still kept watching for Joe and that when I saw him in the movie I cried. So I asked what it was like to know that he made a bunch of adults cry (along with Steve Burns) as they watched this kid’s movie?
“Well, yeah, I live to make people cry. That’s my thing. So yeah, anytime I can do that is great,” he joked. “No, it’s really fun. Because this movie is enjoyable for people who were familiar with Blue’s Clues or if you just happen upon this movie, I think you’re gonna stick with it because just watching what Josh is capable of and hearing some of the songs, it’s got a magnetism to it. It’s really, really fun. And it’s not just us, although that is a whole ton of fun.You got BD Wong, Ali Stroker, Alex Winter, Phillipa Soo, Steven Pasquale, my friend Max Darwin, like tons of people in this movie. It was tons of fun to make and yes, you will maybe at some point possibly show up for me and for Steve, but you will stay for Josh. Dude is capable of some real magic. It’s enjoyable.”
And to Patton’s credit, he’s right. Josh Dela Cruz has an energy in this movie that is so exciting to see and having him have a Broadway edge to him was delightful! But I told Dela Cruz that, like Patton and Burns are for me, there is going to be an entire generation who look up to him in the same way. “I feel really honored because I know from experience just like you, I know what it feels like to watch the show as a kid and to watch it with my little sister and then with my cousin,” he said. “And this show is extremely personal to me because, and I imagine for you too, Donovan, because we bring so much of who we are to the role, even though it’s a fictional character, the what we find funny, how we deal with situations, like it’s impossible not to bring yourself into this role. And growing up, I watched Mr. Rogers, that was the person that was my Steve, before Steve and before Joe. And so I’m just really honored that I get to be here to be able to use the skills that I learned to get to Broadway and then to use them in a completely different but very similar capacity to be there for kids and for families.”
Kids are going to know BD Wong as the director
I grew up a Jurassic Park kid so to me, I’ve always known BD Wong from there. Getting to talk with him and Brianna Bryan, I pointed out to Wong that a new generation is going to know him from Blue’s Big City Adventure.
“Yeah,” he laughed. “I don’t think about the people, their experience of me or whatever. But I do love this brand of Blue’s Clues. I love it. I always have, I’ve loved everything that it represents and everything that it’s trying to do. And the longstanding tradition of it, raising our kids in a certain way and the way that it does it and the choices that it makes and the mindfulness that it puts into the collaborations that create this show, they put a lot into it. They’re not kind of halfway about it. They put so much into thought into it and I’ve always loved that about it and I’ve always felt that about it. And so being asked to be in this little movie to celebrate that was really cool for me. I really liked it.”
You can see our whole interview here!
Director Matt Stawski loved the challenge
Getting to talk with director Matt Stawski, I asked about the challenge of making this movie a reunion of Steve, Joe, and now Josh while still making this movie a Josh outing. “It was a big challenge, but I have to say the atmosphere on set, because having these legends there and they’re so professional and they’re so kind and just realize the importance of making a film for kids that resonates with kids,” he said.
“It was a challenge technically, but creatively just easy because, we had this beautiful location. We had to shoot in New York City. We had to go to all these iconic places and have all these fun cameos and Josh, Steve, and Donovan are just like total pros and the funnest people to work with.”
You can see our full interview here:
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You can watch Blue’s Big City Adventure on Paramout+ now!
(featured image: Nickelodeon/PARAMOUNT+)
Published: Nov 23, 2022 03:49 pm