TONY: Yeah. Like, what if the sequel sucked?
Matthew Broderick: Exactly. And the movie really is about a day; it’s a self-contained thing. As soon as you say, “Well, is he going to do the same thing again but be in college?,” or, “Is he going to be a young businessman who takes a day off from his job?”—that doesn’t sound very interesting.

TONY: After all these years, you must be pretty tired of “Bueller?… Bueller?…”
Matthew Broderick: Yeah. That is used often as a taunt. People say that to be mean to me. They think it’s hilarious. Or they’ll say, “Is this your day off?”

TONY: In Diminished Capacity, you play a guy experiencing memory loss. Any roles you’d like to forget?
Matthew Broderick: Well, I’m so afraid of hurting anyone’s feelings that that’s a scary question. There are parts of many movies that I’d like to forget. But I can’t forget them, because they keep showing them on TV!

TONY: What about Project X?
Matthew Broderick: Project X was okay. You know, it’s very easy to look back and wag your finger, but it was the people who did WarGames, which was a big success. And my costar was Helen Hunt, who became my special friend after that. So it was all worth it. And I really loved those monkeys.

TONY: It’s weird that I brought that one up—I actually liked that movie. I just can’t think of any Broderick films that were total tankers. Ladyhawke?
Matthew Broderick: Ladyhawke was not a tanker. I liked Ladyhawke. No regrets about that. But don’t get me wrong: I have been in tankers.

TONY: Like what?
Matthew Broderick: Who wants to do this? But you know, The Road to Wellville. An absolute stinker. I think I can say that without anyone being too mad at me.

TONY: Not a tanker? WarGames. To celebrate its 25th anniversary, shall we play a game?
Matthew Broderick: Okay.

TONY: I can’t muster Global Thermonuclear War, but how about word association? I’m going to give you a name: Joshua.
Matthew Broderick: Well, that was the WOPR [machine]. But I’m also getting an image of a Joshua tree.

TONY: Game over. The only winning move is not to play. A thousand dollars says my next question is about The Lion King!
Matthew Broderick: That’s not a fair bet, because you can change what you do based on the bet. I’ve learned not to take those. I was once in a pool hall and a guy said, “I bet I can get this ball to go around there and hit that ball and knock another ball in.” I said, “Nobody can do that!” And he did it, and I thought to myself, Of course he can do it. He wouldn’t make the bet if he couldn’t do it. What was I thinking? Big lesson.

TONY: You would have won! I never had any intention of asking about The Lion King.
Matthew Broderick: If I’d made the thousand-dollar bet you would have.

TONY: True. Anyway, I think we both win because we don’t have to talk about The Lion King.
Matthew Broderick: Good point.

Finding Amanda opens Fri 27;
Diminished Capacity opens July 4.