Drama Queens - BONUS: Lauren Holly

Episode Date: May 8, 2026

In this exclusive Bonus chat, Holly and Sophia Bush unpack the making of their wild new comedy, "Broad Trip," including their chaotic experience with a monster truck and embarrassing Celine Dion moment that they may never live down.Stream "Broad Trip" on Roku now.Learn all about the Holly Family Fund and scholarship here.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Hey, everyone. It's Sophia. Welcome to Work in Progress. Hi, Whips, Marties, welcome back. We are picking up where we left off with the iconic Lauren Holly. We're going to talk all about our new movie Broad Trip, which premieres on Roku this Friday.

I cannot wait for you to learn about the shenanigans we shared up in Canada. I want to give the fans a little bonus on our first. film. I'm so excited. It comes out on Friday. It's on Roku. The movie is called Broad Trip, two broads on a trip. And it just, from the moment it landed in my inbox, I laughed out loud through the entire thing. You know, I just, I read it so fast. Can you, can you tell the people a little bit about what the movie I want to expect? Well, it's a mother-daughter, trip. And the point of the road trip is for the daughter to convince the mom that she should not marry this new guy that's in her life because, you know, the mom is kind of wild and doesn't really

think things through. And it's sweet. And it's just, I mean, we're supported by two great guys, too. We both have sort of love-focused relationships. chips in this movie. They're both great. And it's just, it's fun. It's fun. It's the week of a road trip. Where were we driving from? St. Louis to Buffalo. Yeah. Right? Because my character wanted to get married in Buffalo. Yeah. It's so cute. That, that speech kills me. I won't give that away for our friends at home. But I think one of the things I really loved about it is it's a true rom-com. and the love relationship that needs figuring out is us. Right.

And I love it as a central dynamic. And then it was so sweet that there are these secondary storylines for each of our gals, each of us. That are making us realize things about each other. Yes. And it's like I'm trying to get you to be less in my character's definition, you know, flighty and nuts. Right. And you're trying to get me to loosen up and not be so serious. And be more flighty and.

Yeah, like take a chance, take a risk, kiss a guy, who cares? Yeah. And it's so, I don't know, it's really special, I think, to see a comedy that lets the women be the leads in this way. And I love that it's a mom and daughter, but it's also, in an interesting way, it's an intergenerational friendship. Yes. Because you're trying to teach me from your perspective, and I think I have things to teach you from mine. And it's so damn charming. It's very charming, very fun.

Definitely a laugh. Yeah. The script is very funny. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Not to Chelsea, the writer. She just unbelievable. And I think my favorite day on set when she was visiting was when she actually pulled up photos of her family.

Yeah. And walked us through, you know, what certain nods were in the movie, even your animal print coat. Yes, yes. You have to walk people through a little preview of your wardrobe because to your point from the last segment, the character is so defined by the clothes. And you committed, like, you just went hard in the paint for her. And I, I love it. So how did it happen? We all did, though.

Yeah. That was the thing. That was also, I think, the special sauce about this movie is that it required everybody who came in to, just go for it. You know, Steve Gutenberg did that too. Boyd us, like, he came in late. We were already shooting. We had this whole vibe going, and he just jumped right in both feet and was like, yeah,

I'm going to do this too. And like, that whole thing was just, it was just really good. And for my character, you know, we would have the wardrobe fittings. And it was just kind of like, oh, more, more print, more lace, more flounce, more whatever. More necklaces. Yes. So fun. I mean, you guys, every night at wrap, it was like, okay, you'd have to get your hair off your neck and we would just sit there and unclasp. I mean, what, like 12 to 15 necklaces a night. Oh, of course. All the jewelry, all the, even the amount of hair they put on my head. Oh, that was great. So fun. And it was crazy because you'd get in the chair in the morning looking like you. And then it was like the montage where the person in the hair chair spins around.

And then it was, I Dream of Jeannie, just like a bouffat and curls everywhere. And oh, it was so great. I also, because some people asked me what motivated me in the calendar year, anyway, last year to cut my hair into a Bob. And it was our movie. But it worked so well. Oh, I needed an HR Lady Bob for sure. Yeah.

It was perfect. And the juxtaposition of the two of us, his mother-daughter was like, Oh, it was great. And by the way, I don't particularly prefer myself with short hair. I prefer my long hair. But I was like, this woman has to have, Alice has to have like an uptight little short haircut. Just like perfect little, yeah, you were good. Yeah, we really needed it. Something that, and I hope this comes off as funny as I mean it and not, you know, critically. But, for our listeners, to Lauren's point about how the industry has changed, and I mentioned in our last segment that things get a bit squeezed. You don't have 111 days in four global local local local local locales to shoot a movie anymore. We really had to do a lot of creative work to get this thing done on time. And as she mentioned, this is a road trip movie. A lot of this movie takes

place in a car. And when you film scenes in a car as two actors, it's obviously not safe. She's rolling her eyes. It's obviously not safe to have the actors who are acting, piloting the vehicles with cameras attached to them everywhere. So you get on a thing called a process trailer. It's a single car trailer that's being towed behind, you know, usually it's a big sort of white truck that has seats on the back for the crew. And when we showed up to the first of our two biggest process trailer days, yes. The truck pulling our process trailer was like,

it was the skipper to a Barbie doll of a monster truck from a monster truck rally. Let's be honest, it was a monster truck. It was a monster truck that was like the loudest monster truck in the world. I've never heard a muffler like that. I'm a classic car kid. I have never heard. And I just remember when they fired it up, seeing our sound mixer with his earphones on, getting everything set for us to drive away with mics. And I saw his little head pop up and look at it. Yeah. What's going on? And we had to get towed around by this car and do all of our scenes. We could barely hear each other. We could barely hear each other.

We were lip reading. And all they had in the edit was this like, and so we had to ADR. We had to do dialogue replacement for every single scene. I have never, when I got the call that said that I had like 110 cues, normally I would say maybe 15 cues. 15 to 30. Okay.

I'll give you 30 if there's like crowd scenes or something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or a restaurant or whatever. Many. It was like how is this? And then they wanted me to do it in one day and I was like, how is that even going to be possible? But I did.

It was just so funny. And we knew and that was one of those moments too where I was like, oh, not only do I like acting with you. I like being around you because I know plenty of people. people who would have flipped out and been like, I'm not doing this. I'm not shooting it. It won't be usable. And you and I looked at each other. We were like, here we go, sister. We're just going to get it done. We'll be fixing this later. It was so funny. We were also required to do some singing in this film. Yeah, that didn't go well for me. Me neither. No, no, no. It's not good. They should

never require me to do that ever again. I agree. Here's the thing. I can sing. but not. I cannot sing Celine Dion. No one but Celine Dion can sing Celine Dion. Okay, well, I especially cannot sing Celine Dion because I can't sing like row, row, row, row your boat. So going to Celine Dion is just a whole other thing. Yeah, I was like, this is a dirty trick. Yeah, it's a dirty trick. And by the way, I heard my voice what I was actually doing in production on the day. And it's not good. It's not good.

In our defense, we were screaming over a monster truck, so it's not totally our fault. That's true. I did appreciate that our wonderful director, at least when I was doing ADR, was like, you should intentionally try to sing the soft key. Like, make it be bad. Alice wouldn't know how to do this. Right. And I was like, okay, but really, as a performer, I like to hit my mark and find my light.

And I don't like to not do it well. Like, Sophia can really sing. Oh. Yeah, they're not saying that about Lauren, so don't worry. Well, don't worry. They're not going to say it about me in this movie either. I love it. And now for our sponsors.

Well, I'm so thrilled. Our project is out in the world. I'm so thrilled for everyone at home to get to see it. Also, we want to make as many sequels as our writer is willing to write for us. Yeah, so please watch it. Like, just put it on over. over even if you're not in the room. Oh, I love that. Just start, restart, right? When you get to the end, post about it. I won't do that. I have multiple televisions. I'll put it on all, just trying to

help that. I love that. That's like what I do when my friends have music come out. I just, I stream on every single device in the house. Yeah, it helps, I think. It really does. And it helps, you know, when people, when people share about it. Tag us in all your favorite moments from the movie, please. We can't wait to see. Okay, my love, I have to ask you my favorite. and final question for all my people. I'm curious from the amazing spectrum of, you know, life and work and love and everything in your world right now. What feels like your work in progress?

Probably writing. Writing because I'll never master it. That's kind of the great thing about writing. It's always a work of progress. There's always something you can do better. Yeah, I like that. It's interesting, you know, I've never written, I've not written a script. I've done polishes on things.

I've rewritten scenes, but I've never sat and really written a script. One of the most proud days I ever had was when I got into the Writers Guild for actually selling a script. Like I was very, like, very proud of that. Yeah. That's huge. Yeah. it's one of those things I think I need to confront a little bit of fear there. And I understand, you know, because you're right, you can't really master it.

And I always have a little anxiety, you know, when I'm working on an article or an op-ed or something. I go, is it enough? Have I connected all the dots well enough? Will this really hit for people? Am I making my points as clearly as I want to be? And also with some kind of empathy. Are you the same way as an actor? I can be. If I don't get out of my own way as an actor, I can really make myself a little bit of a basket case.

Because I think I'm way more precious about writing. Like it's so nerve-wracking to me. It's so nerve-wracking to me when people are about to read it. Yeah. I just go through a lot. I feel very vulnerable, much more than acting where I'll like lay my soul bare. and somehow doing that is enough. But with writing, it's the judgment I worry about. Strange. Well, there's also something I wonder for us. As actors, we're so used to trying a spectrum of options until we find just the right balance.

And when you write something, you put it on the page and then it's on the page. There's no second or third take. There's no do a throw away. See what happens. You know, there isn't another option to express. It's just the typeface. And that is hard for me.

See, you even say that it makes me nervous. Yeah, I know. I'm excited. It's horrible. Like, it's too much pressure. I'll read your writing. Finishing something and sending it to someone to read it is just, it takes a certain amount of courage.

for me. Yeah, me too. Mm-hmm. Oh, this is just so fun. I love you. Lovely to see you. You too. Bye, my love. Bye. Friends, make sure you see Broad Trip on Roku this Friday and learn more about the incredible Holly Family Fund at the link in the episode notes for this podcast. This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human.