Question: Do you know how they're going to bring the other characters over?

Ben Stiller: Basically they closed down the museum of Natural History, the exhibits there because they're upgrading and so they put the old exhibits into storage and they send them to the Federal Archives in Washington. It's some sort of magical logic for that movie that needs to happen.

Question: You filmed a mockumentary during 'Tropic Thunder' while you were filming the movie. Can you talk about that too?

Ben Stiller: Well, just in keeping in the vein with the movies that we were sort of in the genre of and paying homage to, and I don't like to say satirizing because it's not really satire, it's not parody – it's like whatever the movie is within itself. All the elements are in the other films and this movie exists because of those other movies were made. In 'Apocalypse Now' [Francis Ford] Coppola's wife did 'Hearts of Darkness' and so we thought that might be fun to do, a documentary about the making of the movie within the reality of the movie and Justin Theroux who wrote the script with me and Etan Cohen, he took control of this thing and wrote this fake documentary about the director who, as you saw what happened to him in that scene last night, basically went crazy. He took these actors out into the jungle and never returned. It's like, 'What happened and what's the story there?' So we filmed that sort of concurrently and Justin directed that and wrote it and did interviews with the actors while we were shooting. I'm not sure what we're going to do with it. I think it's going to come out a little bit before the movie comes out, maybe online in segments. It'll definitely be on the DVD. It might be on a fake sort of History Channel show or something like that, but it was basically having fun with that. It was actually really cool because we were able to use elements of that for the movie also in terms of like footage that he shot and the interviews. Steve Coogan is like a huge part of that.

Question: When you're working with so many comedians do think ahead of time about what you'll have for the DVD?

Ben Stiller: For sure, and especially I think on this movie. First of all, the first cut of the movie was like three and a half hours and I walked away going, 'Wow, I know there's like twenty minutes that I can cut –' when I first saw it 'But I don't know after that.' The first time I put up then in front of people I was like, 'Oh, my God, I can take that out and that out and that out.' But there was really a lot of stuff that we couldn't use and so I feel like in terms of some sort of director's cut or even like alternate scenes or something there's a lot of stuff there that I'm excited for people to see and there's a lot of stuff that even in the mockumentary, stuff we couldn't use even within that, where like Downey – he's just off the charts in this movie, in my opinion. He just does an incredible job. I feel like he's sort of breaking new ground in terms of comedic acting and the reality level and also just how funny he is. He went off and did a whole thing in the mockumentary about his character that was sort of like a sub-story about what happens to his characters and going crazy while playing the part. It's just insane. It was too insane even for the mockumentary so I don't know what's going to happen with it. It definitely needs to come out after people have seen the movie because otherwise people will be like, 'What the hell is this?' So we have a lot of material there in terms of that stuff. The war sequences we had to cut down and there was a lot of stuff there. Oh, and the trailers too. We did these fake trailers before the movie that sort of setup the characters. The character that I play in the movie has done this really bad movie called 'Simple Jack' where he played a mentally retarded man who talks to animals. My character did think he was going to win an Oscar and it's then panned across the board and is a huge disaster for him. So he's coming off of that movie going into 'Tropic Thunder' and needs to sort of regain his place in the world. We did a trailer for 'Simple Jack' and you see part of it in the movie, but there's a full trailer for that Justin is actually in too and my wife is in it and Mickey Rooney is in it. It's awesome. So that'll be probably a part of the DVD too.

Question: When you're on the set of a movie that has a movie within it, what's it take to keep track of everything and keep it all separate?

Ben Stiller: There were definitely times when it was a little bit silly because in that opening scene when we break the fourth wall of the movie my hands are blown off and I'm doing this emotional scene and the director is yelling cut. So you're doing this scene where you're filming the director and this crew of like a hundred people filming our scene and my hands are strapped behind my back and I have fake arms. I realized when my hands were strapped behind my back how much you use your hands when you're directing. You need them to say, 'Do this and do that.' It just becomes a part of it and so when you have to direct with your hands behind your back and you're trying to tell them to cut, because also the director is saying, 'No, no, keep it rolling –' because the scene is about keeping it rolling, it all became just silly. I would have to say, 'No, no, no. Stop filming for real. This is Ben talking.'

Question: There were some secrets about the film that got out like Tom Cruises cameo in the film. Were you disappointed that that was leaked out because it could've been a really great surprise?

Ben Stiller: I guess so, but I don't know how you keep that stuff today under wraps if people are coming after it. With Tom, people are watching him so much and I think that happened because people are always just following him around. I don't personally care though because I feel like what he does in the movie is so insanely funny and is just so great. I think that people are going to be in for a great surprise. I think the fact that he's in the movie is going to be a great surprise and even if it's not a surprise for people what he does is very, very entertaining and I think that people are going to enjoy seeing him have a little fun.

Question: Has De Niro called you about 'Meet the Little Focker' yet?

Ben Stiller: Nobody. I've never heard anything about that except from journalists. If he does call though I'm in trouble.

Question: What is the running time on this movie and are you going to do anything after 'Night At The Museum II'?

Ben Stiller: I don't know. I have something that I might be doing, but I don't yet, but I think that I'm going to take a little bit of time off. I think the running time, it's not locked yet, but it's going to be somewhere like an hour forty five.

Question: Is 'Hardy Men' something on the horizon?

Ben Stiller: It's on the horizon, but not a reality yet.