American Pie Star Hated The Film And Thought It Would Suck
Shannon Elizabeth played Nadia in American Pie and she hated how the editors changed her character's accent in post-production to the point that she warned friends from seeing the movie.
In the pantheon of great teen movies, one franchise stands head and shoulders above all others, and that’s American Pie, which burst into movie theaters back in 1999 and soon grew into a series of hits. In retrospect, it’s clear that the film would set records and resurrect what was then a dead genre but even the stars of the film had mixed feelings about the finished product. In an interview with Variety, Shannon Elizabeth did not hold back in her view that “this movie’s gonna suck.”
Shannon Elizabeth played Nadia, the foreign exchange student that asks Jim (Jason Biggs) for help studying and winds up in his bedroom undressing in front of a webcam. Unknown to Jim when he rejoins her, the link to the webcam was sent to everyone in school, so all of his classmates are watching when he ejaculate’s prematurely, twice. That scene is one of the most famous from American Pie and a different version took place in the sequel.
The actress had a major problem with the film not because of her famous scene which required ample nudity, but because of how the editors messed with her accent in post-production. Elizabeth explains that after being called in to do ADR work for American Pie, “They were like, ‘We’re gonna play with the accent.’ So I’d say something and then they’d go, ‘Ok, do less of an accent.’ I was like, ‘Why are they messing with this accent so much?’ I had worked really hard with a dialect coach on this.”
Once the editing team got ahold of Shannon Elizabeth’s ADR work, the star ended up warning her friends: “I told all my friends, ‘This movie’s gonna suck’ because they messed with my accent so much!” Part of her prediction was true, as once American Pie was out in theaters, she often heard “A lot of people did say my accent was terrible and I’m like, ‘Yeah, ‘cause they messed with it – they didn’t let me do what I wanted to do.”
While the other part of her prediction turned out not to be true, as American Pie went on to earn over $200 million during its theatrical run, critics hated her performance as Nadia. It worked out alright for Shannon Elizabeth in the end as the general audience loved her performance, partially for the obvious reason, and awarded the Hollywood newcomer the MTV Movie Award for “Breakthrough Female Performance.” The actress even made up with the crew of the film and returned in a cameo for American Pie 2.
American Pie launched a lot of careers, and revived others, as the ensemble cast included Jason Biggs, Seann William Scott, Eddie Kaye Thomas, Alyson Hannigan, Eugene Levy, Jennifer Coolidge, John Cho, Mena Suvari, Tara Reid, and Natasha Lyonne. Most of that cast has gone to star in amazing projects, with both Biggs and Lyonne turning up in Orange is the New Black, Coolidge winning awards in The White Lotus, and Tara Reid starring the Sharknado franchise.
For her part, Shannon Elizabeth became an immediate sex symbol after American Pie and has steadily worked in movies and television for the past 24 years, so while her accent was horrible it did lead into a quietly successful career.
