On Sunday, Super Troopers 2—which was produced by Denver-based Andy Juett and Kayvan Khalatbari (who, by the way, are also co founders of Sexpot Comedy)—premiered at the Sie FilmCenter. We connected with cast members Kevin Heffernan (Farva), Steve Lemme (Mac), and Paul Soter (Carl; also a 1987 graduate of Arapahoe High School) to chat about their long road to the sequel. Meow.

5280: So, are the mustaches film props or a lifestyle?

Soter: I’m still not convinced Kevin’s is natural. I think he went to Sweden and got some sort of transplant.
Lemme: He’s got a postiche.
Lemme: We were all eating dinner while you were watching the movie and there was edamame at the table and I can still smell the edamame in my mustache. I still don’t know if I like that or not.

In the first film Kevin has to do full frontal nudity, and in the sequel, it’s Steve’s turn. Paul: are you next in line for SuperTroopers 3?

Soter: Basically, we shot Steve at every possible angle in this one. I don’t know where else there is to go with nudity.
Lemme: Have no fear, SuperTroopers 3 will be in 3D.

How has the writing process changed from writing the original to writing the sequel?

Soter: Well, it was a lot easier when we were all living together and spending all of our time together when we wrote the original script. Writing the sequel was a lot more effort, because we had to schedule the time to write together now that we have all moved away.
Lemme: When we’re writing, if it makes all five of us laugh, then it’s going in the script.

Was there a scene in the film that you didn’t anticipate to be as funny as it ended up?

Lemme: The scene where the Canadian mounties are watching hockey and discussing Danny DeVito was entirely improvised. When we test-screened the film, it kept making audiences laugh and so it stayed in the film.

In the original Super Troopers, you filmed with a fake bear but you chose to use a real bear in the sequel. What was that like?

Heffernan: The couple days that we had the bear on set, everything was about the bear. We had to make sure the bear was happy at all times and to ensure that this 1,700-pound creature named Whopper wasn’t going to try and eat someone.
Lemme: We thought about using a second bear for the scene where Rabbit (Erik Stolhanske) has shaving cream on his crotch and having the bear swipe away the shaving cream. I remember the bear handler telling me, ‘You try that if you want. The bear is talented but not necessarily talented enough to swipe a few inches above a man’s crotch.’

Is it as fun for you to make these movies as it looks on screen?

Soter: You know, we had a lot of challenges making this movie. The first phase of financing for this project we crowdfunded on Indiegogo. We could not have made this film without all the support of our fans who helped us through the Indiegogo campaign. We actually had to start and stop production several times because of financing and it was stressful. When I watch the movie I am reminded how much fun we had actually making it.

What was it like working with Rob Lowe?

Lemme: Rob was absolutely great to work with. He is so damn good-looking that you get distracted by his appearance.
Soter: Sometimes you would just be staring at him and forget your line.
Lemme: We made the film in Western Massachusetts and because of some of the financing challenges that Paul mentioned, Rob flew back and forth between California and Massachusetts four different times to shoot his scenes. He really got behind the project. The part about the Halifax explosion in the film was totally improvised by Rob and it worked so we left it in the film. When we screened the film in Toronto, the crowd fell silent through that scene. They still haven’t gotten over the Halifax tragedy.

Did you use any kind of dialect coaching for the Canadian accents?

Lemme: We didn’t use any dialect coaching for the film. Will Sasso, who plays one of the mounties, is Canadian and was onboard with taking a piece out of Canada. The accent for his character is based on some unknown Canadian Prime Minister. During the credits you see all the outtakes with Will, but that is only a small portion of them. He had us laughing so much that we broke character nearly every take.

What’s next for you?

Heffernan: It is all about what happens this weekend. If people go and see the film this weekend it will unlock the possibilities to make more movies—and if they don’t then it will take another 10 to 15 years to make another movie.

Super Troopers 2 opens in theaters nationwide on Friday, April 20.