Sara Paxton knew way back when that Steve Carell was a superstar.
The actress, 36, worked with Carell in the 2004 teen comedy Sleeping — a year before Carell became a household name with his beloved series, Office. In the film, Paxton, Alexa PenaVega, Kallie Flynn Childress, Brie Larson and Mika Boomer star as 8th graders whose paths cross when a night out turns into a prank-filled scavenger hunt. Carell played Sherman Shiner, the security officer the girls encounter during their night of adventures.
“I remember not having the whole scene with Steve Carell, but there’s a scene where the doorbell rings at Alexa Vega’s house, and we think it’s pizza or they think it’s pizza,” Paxton told PEOPLE during a recent interview. “And I open the door and there he is. He’s like security on a bike. He’s like Paul Blart. And I say to him something like, ‘Oh, whatever.’
Paxton says Carell, now 62, “said and kind of improvised and said really funny things.”
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Even then, as a teenager, Paxton says she knew, “That guy is really good.”
“I thought, ‘That guy goes everywhere,'” she says. “I’m about 14, ‘That guy goes everywhere.’ Yes, he was very, very funny.”
Steve Carell entered Sleeping.
Photo by Moviestore/Shutterstock
Carell, of course, went on to great success, being nominated for an Oscar, multiple Emmys, and winning a Golden Globe.
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Paxton also went on to have a successful acting career. The actress recently starred in the second season of the series Based on a true storyin which she played Paige, a copycat killer seeking revenge for the murder of her sister Chloe. Speaking to PEOPLE about joining the second season of the Peacock’s dark comedy, Paxton called the cast appealing.
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Sara Paxton (front center) and the cast Sleeping.
Dale Robinette/Mgm/Kobal/Shutterstock
“They were so warm and welcoming,” she says. “Everybody on the team. When you go into season 2 … it’s nervous because it’s like starting high school or your sophomore year or something and everybody already knows everybody and you’re like the new kid and just kind of nervous like, ‘Where am I going to sit at lunch?'”
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Paxton continues, “But it all went away once I showed up because everyone was so nice and so warm and welcoming.”
Based on a true story now streaming on Peacock.
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Source: HIS Education