Katie and Kellie Cockrell – Star Trek Into Darkness
Tommy2: How’s it going, it’s Tommy2 and calling in today we’ve got twins. It’s Katie and Kellie Cockrell from the upcoming film, Star Trek Into Darkness. So how are you two doing today?
We’re good. How are you Tommy?
Tommy2: Great! It’s real exciting time of the year, we’ve got summer and a bunch of big movie releases just around the corner. Now since you two are twins, why don’t tell us about the best practical ‘twin’ joke you’ve every played on someone.
Kellie Cockrell: So we’ve switched spots on people before and one time in high school we switched spots on our boyfriends.
Katie Cockrell: Yeah, and it was hilarious. So Kellie and I were dating these two boys who were friends and we decided they better know which one of us is which. So we went into the bathroom and completely switched clothes and then kind of went up to the opposite ones and were like “oh hey” and they had no idea and were just… they didn’t think it was funny but we thought it was hilarious.
Tommy2: You’re definitely following that reputation twins have for playing tricks on other people.
Kellie Cockrell: Yeah!
Katie Cockrell: Yeah we do that all the time and we’ll be talking to someone and the kind of just switch the phone over mid conversation and just to like see if they can tell. I mean we’re always kind of testing.
Kellie Cockrell: Yeah, it’s super fun.
Tommy2: And speaking of that, what’s your favorite movie that focuses on twins?
Katie Cockrell: Kellie and I saw “The Parent Trap” when we were five.
Kellie Cockrell: With Lindsay Lohan.
Katie Cockrell: We fell in love with it. I think the next day we had planned out this plan to switch spots in kindergarten.
Tommy2: I think the starring roll in that movie was the good Lindsay Lohan and the bad one right?
Katie Cockrell: Yes, it was!
Tommy2: Now before we get into your involvement with Star Trek Into Darkness, tell us how you both got into entertainment?
Katie Cockrell: So, Kellie and I started dancing when we were really young. We started when we were four and we kind of just loved it immediately and we kind of got into the entertainment industry through dance. We grew up kind of training in all styles of dance – jazz, lyrical, hip-hop, contemporary and in high school we were on the dance team in high school, and we were the dance captains and kind of… we were just at this photo shoot one day and the photographer was like you guys should get into modeling. And we kind of didn’t really think anything of it. We were like “oh yeah, sure.” But he gave us the name of a local talent agency in Utah and we ended up meeting with them and they signed us. But they said, your too short to do modeling, I mean you could do catalog’s but we think you should do acting
and because we were involved in dance we thought “hey, that’s kind of more of an area that is of interest to us.” And so we so we started going out on auditions in Utah, and Utah has it’s own little film industry their where they film a lot of Disney movies and we kind of got our start their. We got, our first major role was a really big role in a Disney Channel Movie (“Return To Halloweentown”) that they were filming out there. So that’s kind of how we got started.
Tommy2: Your start with Disney was like in 2006 and between then and 2010 you had the opportunity to be in some big releases including – “High School Musical 3.” In that film you two were cheerleaders and of course did a lot of dancing. What was it like being part of that franchise at it’s peak?
Katie Cockrell: It was just fantastic. I mean it was filming in Utah and it was such a big deal in Utah. I mean, it was in the newspapers and it was on TV and everyone knew that it was filming there. So it was really exciting to be part of it. And then we worked with Kenny Ortega, it was phenomenal – he’s amazing. And then I worked with Bonnie Story and Chucky Klapow the choreographers and they won Emmy’s for their choreography, you know. So it was just so cool to be around it and we… I met Vanessa (Hudgens) and Zac (Efron) and we were friends on set and it was just a really cool opportunity.
Tommy2: Do you two have any special memories from that film?
Katie Cockrell: You know one of the ones that really stands out was the Prom scene. It was probably like a six minute dance number, which for a dance number – that’s really long, and all the dancers were in these high heel salsa shoes just busting out the choreography. We probably shot that scene thirty times in a row and it was really challenging, but it was such a bonding experience and everyone loved the movie so much that they were really putting everything that they had into the dancing because everyone wanted this thing to be good. And I remember Kenny was just in awe of how great everyone was doing it and how much passion everyone had for it. So I think that really stood out, just out as a bonding moment that this is something that we’re all going to remember for the rest of our lives.
Tommy2: Definitely. Now moving on, we’ve got these Star Trek Into Darkness billboards popping up all over the place and the commercials are in high rotation on TV. How excited are you guys for the release?
Kellie Cockrell: We’re really excited. It’s just amazing to be part of this franchise that’s so epic, you know. We feel just honored to be part of it, we’re really excited to see how it turned out and nervous. We just want to make sure we did a good job and we’re just… yeah, we’re excited.
Katie Cockrell: We cannot believe that we are part of this. Like, it’s real. It’s so epic, we’re just completely honored, completely flattered that even get to have a part in it.
Tommy2: So now how did you land your roles in the film?
Kellie Cockrell: So we went in as a normal audition, although it was really secretive. Our agent told us it was for a big thing, but they couldn’t say anything else and we didn’t really know what it was for, so we went in and honestly, we had a good shot cause we didn’t fit the specs exactly right. And so we were just like “oh whatever,” we went in and we auditioned really well. I remember being like “oh, that went really well.” April Webster was the casting director and she had us do it a couple times. And then it was about two months before we knew we got the part because we had to do a photo shoot together, and that was sort of like a callback to see if they liked our look, so that was nerve wracking. And then, it was another month before they had us do a meet and greet with J.J. Abram and at that point we didn’t even know if we had the part so, we went to meet with him on-set, which was just ridiculous, it was so unbelievable, we just met him in front of the Star Trek Enterprise. We had a quick conversation and then he was like “so, you guys ready to be on set?” And we’re like “oh, I guess… we got it.”
Katie Cockrell: So J.J. told us that we got it. The whole time we were like kind of okay, we’re still auditioning, we don’t know what’s going to happen. You know, are they gonna throw us off the set. We just had to be prepared and J.J. was like “okay, see you guys… you’re ready to be on set.”
Kellie Cockrell: “See ya next week” and we were like okay?
Katie Cockrell: We called our manager and were like, “well this is was J.J. said” so I think we have it. But, we didn’t want to get our hopes up though.
Tommy2: Sounds like your typical Hollywood story – hurry up, wait, cross your fingers and then just be patient. Right?
Katie Cockrell: Exactly!
Kellie Cockrell: Yeah, it was a long process but we were just crossing our fingers the entire time.
Tommy2: I read, you went through 10 days in make-up testing. What was that all about?
Kellie Cockrell: We did! We went through ten days because J.J. wanted us to look exactly like how imagined. And that’s just a testament to what a great filmmaker he is that we would pay that much attention, that much focus on our characters who were smaller characters in the movie and so, we had completely different looks every time. The makeup artists were amazing, they were so cool and they did prosthetics, they did full on different looks every time and then we’d go show J.J., they would light it, they would do it on camera and he would critique it and they we would do it again the next day.
Katie Cockrell: We became so close with the special effects team because we were working with them 10 to 12 days on set for like 14 hours at a time you know testing out different things and trying to get the characters right. So, we really became close friends with the special effects team too.
Tommy2: Can you tell us a little bit about your characters?
Katie Cockrell: Well, you know the characters are very secretive as you know, Star Trek is something that we can’t really talk a ton about. But we have a scene with Chris Pine and it kind of shows Chris Pine’s character as Captain Kirk, his playful fun character and I mean all we can say that a lot of girls will be jealous of our scene with him.
Both: (Laughter)
Tommy2: And that’s all that matters right?
Kellie Cockrell: I mean Chris Pine is really good looking on-screen but when you meet him in person he is very very attractive. So we’ll take one for the team and do the scene.
Tommy2: So what you’re saying is he’s got the charisma that when you get around him you just feel it.
Katie Cockrell: Yes, without a doubt. Besides the fact that he’s incredibly talented as an actor. He’s also just very good looking.
Kellie Cockrell: And really nice. It was fun. It was definitely fun.
Tommy2: Katie and Kellie thanks so much for checking in with us today to talk about your careers and your latest project, Star Trek Into Darkness. Take care now.
Kellie Cockrell: Thank you so much.
Katie Cockrell: You too!
