海角大神

"There's the Mooch," says Ben Falcone brightly as his wife,聽Melissa聽McCarthy, enters the room.

It's a term of endearment, a long-used nickname between the two who have been paired in love and comedy since they were aspiring performers at the Groundlings, the Los Angeles improv school. Their long partnership reached a professional crescendo on July 2 with the release of "Tammy," a road trip comedy they wrote together that聽McCarthy聽stars in and Falcone directs.

McCarthy聽and Falcone, who married in 2005 and have two daughters, are incredibly sweet together 鈥� riffing easily and warmly complimenting each other 鈥� but you wouldn't know their marital harmony from their movies. Their on-screen relationship is far more combustible.

Falcone was the undercover air marshal in聽McCarthy's聽breakout, "Bridesmaids," and he played聽McCarthy's聽clingy former lover in "The Heat." In "Tammy," she hurls put-downs and ketchup packets at him after Falcone, playing her boss, fires her from a fast food joint.

"Tammy" was born when Falcone woke up one morning, groggy from a dream envisioning聽McCarthy聽and her alcoholic grandmother (played by Susan Sarandon) embarking on a journey away from their small Illinois town. After six years of working on it (and buoyed by聽McCarthy's聽now-considerable box office clout), their personal little comedy (both are from Illinois) opened in the heart of summer blockbuster season.

AP:聽Melissa, you went to college in Ben's hometown, Carbondale, Illinois. Did you ever meet there?

Falcone: I knew who she was. She went through a Goth phase.

McCarthy: I didn't know it but he said we were at the same parties together 鈥� which I just find the most bizarre thing. It wasn't until 10 years later that we met.

Falcone: After a year of being friends, we started putting it together. She had blue hair and clown makeup.

McCarthy: I prefer to say kabuki white. "Clown" has sort of a negative connotation.

AP: Did you have similar upbringings?

Falcone: She was probably more popular than me.

McCarthy: I don't know about that.

Falcone: I definitely think so. I wasn't, like, unpopular. (McCarthy聽starts cackling. Ben shifts into character.) "Listen! Listen! I was super popular!" I storm out of the interview and jump through the glass windows.

AP: So you actually met later in Los Angeles?

McCarthy: We met at a Groundlings class. We immediately were improvising with each other and immediately gravitating toward each other, writing-wise. The first day, everybody's doing their biggest, probably most unrealistic, poorly done characters. And Ben got up there and did this very strange inmate that sat on a chair quietly. I just thought it was the funniest thing. I thought: I like that creepy guy.

AP: Ben, do you remember the first time you saw聽Melissa聽perform?

Falcone: It was in that class. ... Her character kept going to the same Kinko's and talking to a guy name Todd. She said the name about forty hundred billion times, like, "Hey Todd. How you doin' Todd? Anyway, Todd, I just need a couple more copies." And it was obvious she was not there for copies at all. She was just there to talk to Todd. It was a super-funny and great character 鈥� fun.

AP: Were you crafting volatile characters from the start?

McCarthy: I love to have a character with a firm belief in their point of view, no matter what it is. It doesn't always have to be aggressive. It can be a really shy person who really wants a cul-de-sac on the end of her block.

Falcone: She steals from everybody. Bits and pieces and then she puts them inside herself. People that she grew up with or relatives.

McCarthy: The fun is, if you can justify it, then it can make sense. I always think in real life, people do so many strange things.

AP: In "Tammy," you throw ketchup packets at your real-life husband.

Falcone: Her suggestion.

McCarthy: You were screaming, "My eyes!" because of those corners, which may have kind of fueled my fire. Which is terrible because in real life, I would never do that. If anything hurt, I would be like, "Oh my god."

Falcone: I would hope that you'd never be throwing ketchup packets at me in the first place.

AP: Given your success together, these must be good times.

McCarthy: We've been doing it for 20 years for free, with cheaper wigs. We would have kept doing it. If the opportunities that we have now wouldn't have come up, I still think we'd be at the Groundlings doing the same thing: building crazy costumes and crazy sets that do or don't work.