Family Switch star Ed Helms talks about a cringy scene in the movie that gave him some hesitancy during production

Jennifer Garner and Ed Helms star in a new body-swapping comedy, Family Switch. This isn’t the first rodeo for Jennifer Garner, but Ed Helms is venturing into the sub-genre and quickly found out about the complexities of such a concept. The fun of comedies such as Freaky Friday, Vice Versa, Like Father, Like Son, The Change-Up and others are the identity crises that the characters faces when trying to fit in each others’ lives without rousing suspicion. It’s a classic comedy trope and every generational gap finds it hard to relate to each other or find a semblance of common ground.

The concept also lends itself to many situations where the characters are forced to act like the person whose body they’re inhabiting. Family Switch‘s plot involves the whole family swapping bodies, which will place the parents in the kids’ bodies and the kids in the parents’. Ed Helms reveals to ComicBook.com that there’s a scene in the movie that nearly made him pass on it. When asked if he was attracted to the project by the off-kilter humor, including a bold gag that could lead to people wincing, Helms says, “I don’t think so. That might have been a scene where I was like, ‘Oh boy, should I do this or not?’ Yeah, there is a lot going on there.”

The scene in question is where he and Garner, who are occupied by the brother and sister in the family, are forced to keep up appearances by giving each other a kiss while posing as a married couple. Helms says, “I think the insanity of that moment is hopefully what makes it so funny. I will say that was really fun to do because I always love playing revulsion in a scene, or being nauseous, and I think that’s kind of what Jen and I both did. Not a romantic kiss, but a fun one.”

Director McG adds his perspective of the project and what he’s trying to convey with it, “[The movie comes at a] moment in the world where we could certainly use a dose of that. We hope that it’s surprising and light and more intelligent than you might think. I mean, my favorite way to make movies is to synthesize highbrow and lowbrow, where a kid could watch it and understand what’s going on, but a parent could watch it and ingest the material on a totally different, more sophisticated level, which is something I think Pixar does better than anybody, and I aspire to do that.”

Family Switch is now available to stream on Netflix.