`HEDGE EDGE' STARS OF ANIMATED TALE AREN'T AFRAID TO GO `OVER'BOARD FOR A LAUGH.

Byline: Bob Strauss Film Writer

DreamWorks Animation has made good money with its last couple of digital features, ``Madagascar'' and ``Shark Tale.'' Unlike the studio's blockbuster ``Shrek'' franchise, though, those films had precious little in them to keep viewers over the age of 9 consistently amused.

``Over the Hedge'' should come closer to that elusive, fun-for-all-ages grail. Based on the witty comic strip about a raccoon (RJ) and a turtle (Verne) and their bemused observations about that strange species known as suburban human, the film is rife with lifestyle satire and perspective-based humor.

Much of the voice talent in this woodland-creatures-vs.-encroaching-civilization free-for-all is generally known for adult-oriented material, too. But that didn't prevent the actors from feeling like scared little kids.

``It's always a challenge to be funny,'' notes Bruce Willis, who plays the con artist raccoon like a furball cousin of his breakthrough role, the fast-talking private eye David Addison on TV's ``Moonlighting'' series. ``But this was triply hard because there are jokes in there for kids, there are jokes in there for teenagers and jokes in there for adults. And, actually, jokes in there for critics.

``It was incredibly hard,'' the hero of ``Die Hard'' continues. ``None of the actors ever worked together, as individuals or as a group. No props. You're standing there with a microphone and five people in the sound booth, and that was your audience. It's very anxiety-provoking. It makes you feel vulnerable.''

Garry Shandling, who plays the cautious turtle Verne to Willis' troublemaking RJ, was frightened from the moment he first entered DreamWorks Animation head Jeffrey Katzenberg's office.

``I swear, he put a puppet of a turtle and a puppet of a raccoon on his hands -- I'm not making this up -- and he started describing the story and talking real fast,'' recalls ``The Larry Sanders Show'' creator and star. ``I got scared. I was alone, I didn't have any representation, I had nobody with me. And he was into it! I said, `Give me a second,' and I just put my head in my hands because I knew I was probably going to end up doing it because of his childish enthusiasm.''

Grown-up childishness was one of the hallmarks of ``Over the Hedge's'' production, from script development through some 2 1/2 years' worth of computer animation and off-and-on voice recordings.

``Definitely, the directors and I have a similar sense of humor,'' says producer Bonnie Arnold (``Toy Story''). ``We tried to make the movie appeal to us. We started from, if we laugh at it, then we feel like that's a great first step. We also have people around us in our core crew who are also big kids at heart, and they're always checking us to make sure we don't alienate our core audience.

``We're all very aware of who that is, those kids that come many times to see the movie.

``But you know what? They're smart, too, so you don't want to make anything too soft for them.''

That approach led to a good deal of improvisation in that lonely sound booth. Besides Shandling and Willis, ``Over the Hedge's'' voice cast includes such incorrigible cutups as Steve Carell, Wanda Sykes, Eugene Levy, Catherine O'Hara, William Shatner and Thomas Haden Church.

`I wanted Verne to walk around and say, `I'm really in shape. Look, I have a washboard back,' '' Shandling reports. ``There were other ad-libs. `The shell makes me look 10 pounds heavier than I am.' And there were some incredibly filthy ad-libs that I wouldn't be comfortable saying in mixed company.''

But it wasn't all just giggles. The actors took their roles as seriously as they would in a live-action comedy or drama. And missing that live element was often more difficult than making sure what they said was funny.

``This was the most challenging project I've ever been a part of,'' says stand-up and television comedian Sykes, who voices Stella, a skunk with issues. ``I walk in going, this is a piece of cake, no hair or makeup, I just go in, boom boom, I'm out. But I had to come up with a real character, and a lot of it was just trusting the directors. I've never had to do that before; I usually just trust my instincts. I know what's funny, but I just had to let all that go.''

Asked if she researched the role by watching old Pepe Le Pew cartoons, Sykes takes umbrage.

``No,'' she snaps. ``Y'know, Pepe was a freak. Pepe really should have had charges brought up against him. He was a little pervert.''

As for Willis, a kind of Method approach was in order.

``I never really looked at it like I was playing a raccoon,'' the vulnerable-feeling tough guy says. ``I just did it like I was playing a human being, because it was all human emotions grafted onto a little animated, fuzzy guy. But I never saw any animated stuff until two years in. So I always had to try to tie it to real human emotions, as opposed to, `I wonder how a raccoon would react to this situation.' ''

Made to play a turtle or not? Shandling is typically indecisive about it still.

``It's never been in my dreams to play a turtle,'' he says. ``But y'know, I know I talk slowly. I was at the zoo last week. I was having a bad day, and I was just standing there, talking to an elephant. And the elephant was looking at me like, `I'm a big, fat old elephant with nowhere to go. But if you don't get to the point, I'm gonna kill myself.' The big struggle and challenge for me and the filmmakers involved conversations about who was this character and how to connect him to me,'' Shandling adds in all seriousness. ``There was a constant struggle to get my sense of humor into that turtle's mouth while also playing those emotional arcs. It was all pretty much discovery, because I'm not gonna just come in and do a voice. I don't think I'm good at that.''

Character integrity was one way to keep ``Over the Hedge'' operating at more than just a children's film level. Satiric vision was another.

``What appealed to DreamWorks was this idea of another perspective from creatures that we're all very familiar with,'' says Michael Fry, who writes the comic strip ``Hedge,'' which he created with the strip's artist, T. Lewis.

``We were asked many times for suggestions of what kind of commentary could be put in here or there,'' adds Lewis. ``It certainly works its way into the movie.''

``Early on, T was brought in to provide character designs that our art department ran with,'' notes Karey Kirkpatrick, who wrote ``Over the Hedge's'' screenplay and co-directed the film with Tim Johnson (``Antz''). ``Throughout the production, we would bring them in to watch footage. I would send pages that I would write to Mike Fry, and he would send stuff back, dialogue suggestions and the like. Because the heart of the movie is the comic strip's point of view on consumer society. We always knew that's where a lot of its humor would come from, and who better to go to than the source? And we would just be really remiss and stupid, actually, to not tap into that.''

The filmmakers hope their final product not only provides laughs for all ages, but maybe a little intergenerational food for thought, too.

``We had a motto that was, basically, it's not them in our backyard, it's us in their backyard,'' director Johnson says.

``That's the point of view we wanted to stick to. It's very easy, especially with environmental messages, to sound like you're on a soapbox, so we were incredibly cautious about that. While we didn't want preachy, sloganistic messages in it, I do hope families who see it think a little bit the next time they have a raccoon in their garbage can or see a squirrel on a wire.''

Considering the messengers, though, that might not happen.

``I did it as a personal challenge,'' Shandling says, with all the sarcasm he can muster, about making ``Over the Hedge.'' ``And if that makes the environment better, fantastic!''

Bob Strauss, [phone]

bob.strauss(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

6 photos

Photo:

(1 -- cover -- color) `Over the Hedge' brings on the ...

Animal magnetism 

(2) WILLIS and RJ

(3) SHANDLING and VERNE

(4) SYKES and STELLA

(5) RJ and Hammy -- voiced by Bruce Willis and Steve Carell, respectively -- get a taste of the good life from a trash can in ``Over the Hedge.''

(6) no caption (scene from ``Over the Hedge'')