Sweet, Dude! Talkin' grand pianos and gross returns with Hollywood's hottest, uh, couple by Elizabeth Snead

Omigod, they've capitalized on South Park! (Those bastards!)

Until now, Stan, Kyle, Cartman and Kenny have been a whole lot more famous than their creators, Trey Parker and Matt Stone.

And that's likely to change with the release of BASEketball, a wild, tasteless spoof of big-time athletics directed by David Zucker (Airplane), starring Parker and Stone and featuring Yasmine Bleeth and Jenny McCarthy.

But that's just a warmup for the 28-year-old Parker (he's the blonde one) and the 27-year-old Stone (he's the one with curly hair), who met at college in Colorado and quickly became acting/filmmaking pals.

This fall, they'll launch a new season with those construction-paper cutups from South Park on Comedy Central. Expect some familiar feces, er, faces, as well as the usual assortment of shocks and surprises.

Then in October, Parker's comic porn parable, Orgazmo, makes it way into theaters. There's also a South Park movie in the works--which will be rated R, in case you're wondering--for next spring. And if that's not enough, their old college project, Cannibal! The Musical, has become a hit on the midnight-screening cult circuit.

Not bad for a coupla guys who put together their first South Park short just to earn some spare cash and make their friends laugh. Well, Parker and Stone are laughing--all the way to the bank.

So, anything exciting happening, besides BASEketball, Orgazmo, the South Park movie and the new TV season?

Trey: I have to go to my 10-year high school reunion next week. [Doing a British accent, smoking an imaginary cigarette.] Hi, everybody. What a ghastly little town! It's really funny, because Access Hollywood wants to cover it, and I'm, like, "No way, dude,

Trey: Holding out on Yasmine Bleeth that's so uncool to come to your high school reunion with the press."

Do you see those old classmates much?

Trey: The ones I care to see. Some of them work on the show. But there's gonna be a lot of weird ones to see.

Guys who beat you up?

Trey: No one beat me up. I was a pretty big kid in high school.

Matt: You should rent a huge ballroom and have your own party. Or rent a helicopter, fly in and stay for, like, 10 minutes and then go, "Bye everybody, I'm back to Europe!" Just for effect.

Trey: No, here's the sweet thing: Go there and set up a booth and sell South Park T-shirts for $20, then for another $10 I'll sign them.

Sounds like a good way to make some fast cash

.Matt: You know Brandon Cruz? From The Courtship of Eddie's Father. He works as an assistant editor at South Park. A pretty cool guy. He's, like 35, a surfer punk. And every once in a while, he gets invited to these celebrity autograph conventions, and he sits there and signs pictures of himself as a little kid. And, like, Bob Denver is there. And Don Knotts. And Adam West. Adam West is, like, $20 an autograph. You just walk up and hand him a $20 bill, and he's, like, "Thanks," and signs a picture and gives it to you. Don Knotts makes, like, $30,000 a weekend.

I'm guessing you guys have made some bucks off of South Park. Had time to spend any of it?

Trey: Well, we got our houses.

Matt: Is South Park for kids? You bet!

Matt: Yeah, we spent a lot of money on our houses.

Here in Los Angeles?

Trey: Yeah. I got one in [a very expensive, exclusive, elevated area of L.A.] and Matt got one in [a very expensive, exclusive area of L.A. but closer to the ocean].

Matt: It's so great. Whenever I go home, I just feel like I'm on vacation.

Trey: And I bought a Steinway grand piano. I've wanted one since I was, like, 14.

So, you play?

Trey: Yeah, that's, like, my main thing.

Matt: People always ask that: "So, you play?"

Trey: Yeah, like I bought a $100,000 piano for decoration.

Matt: But there are people who would do that--buy a $100,000 piano, and it sits there and they put drinks on it.

What about new cars?

Trey: Still got our same cars. I keep thinking I should buy a Mercedes, but I don't wanna look like a fag.

Tell me about BASEketball. It's very funny, and when I saw it, the audience was just cracking up.

Trey: Really? It's all so light, and it goes so fast. For some reason, you feel like you're at a party.

I can't believe you just got up there and acted in a major studio movie. Weren't you nervous?

Trey: We had a lot of experience in front of the camera. From Cannibal! The Musical. We were in all of that. And Orgazmo. We were in all of that, too.

Matt: Even with a big studio film, it's not that different. Just more people watching you. It's not that different than if you just get your friends and a camera, go out and dress up.

The film poster reads "Starring the creators of South Park," but they cast you guys in this film long before South Park was on the air?

Trey: Yeah.

So, you were destined for stardom. You didn't need Cartman and Stan!

Matt: Yeah, fuck those guys!

Trey: Last July, David Zucker called and wanted me to direct BASEketball. And I said I can't, we're doing this TV show...

And he went, "Well, when that falls apart"?

Matt: Yeah, they said, "We'll get you out of doing that show so you can come work for us." We were like, "Why would we want to get out of this? It's the coolest thing!"

Trey: Then he called back and said, "How about if you guys act in it?" I said, "I don't know if we have time to do that, either." He said, "We're not shooting until February." We were like, Fuck, South Park will be done by then. No way it's gonna still be on the air in February.

How did you find time to do both the show and the film?

Trey: We didn't make the time, that was the problem.

Matt: It was the hardest time of our lives.

Didn't they give you a van on the set to work on South Park?

Trey: That didn't work. Basically, we'd get picked up at 5 a.m., driven to the set and shoot for 14 hours a day. At 7 p.m. we'd be done, get out of makeup, get back in the car and they'd drive us to work. We'd get there at 8 p.m. and work until, like, 2 a.m. For 10 weeks!

Matt: Weekends were spent hard-core on South Park because we had to catch up. It was like having a 60-hour-a-week job and then adding another 60-hour-a-week job. It was really stupid.

Did you guys have to rehearse BASEketball's kissing scene?

Trey: Nooooo...

Matt: It was, like, two takes.

Was that scene in the script?

Trey: No, it was our idea. At first, they didn't want us to do it. We had to talk them into it.

What's coming up on the new season?

Trey: Mr. Hankie is coming back. We're working on him now. We have a Mr. Hankie Fantasia scene, and he's got this sorcerer's apprentice hat on and he's waving the wand and summoning shit in different directions and it's turning into tubas.

With the Fantasia music?

Trey: Yeah, the sorcerer's apprentice song.

Great! Any celebs to be made mock of this year?

Trey: A lot. Robert Redford, for one.

No way!

Trey: Yeah, we're ripping on the whole Sundance thing.

And then there's the South Park movie.

Matt: Yup. It's coming out in March. And its R-rated.

Matt: Yeah. As much as I love Beavis and Butt-head, we felt that movie was too tame. But they had a level to go to because the episodes were only seven minutes long. So, the point of doing a movie for Beavis and Butt-head made sense, 'cause it was neat to see it in a longer format. For South Park, it needed a reason to become a movie, and if it was rated PG-13, it would be more tame than an episode. I think our episodes are more R-rated than anything.

Will you keep doing the TV show?

Trey: We owe 52 episodes. That's two years.

What do your parents think of South Park?

Matt: They like it!

Do they ever go, "Oh, son, no..."

Matt: I think they will about BASEketball's kissing scene.

Trey: Yeah, my grandparents are coming out for this.

You could cause a coronary!

Matt: Aarrrrruuuhhh [imitating a heart attack], I knew you were a fag! [In Kyle's voice] Grandma!

Has anyone ever shown you South Park tattoos?

Matt: No, but they have South Park bongs. I've signed a couple of them. That's pretty sweet.

How many people are working on the show now?

Trey: Like 70. It's doubled.

Matt: Then there's the movie. That's another 70 people.

Will you do special effects for the movie

. Trey: Yeah, we're gonna do some CG stuff. We already have the capability

. Matt: It's gonna be rad.

Do you guys get negative reaction from religious groups or gay and lesbian groups?

Trey: Mostly the religious groups.There's the Christian Family Network, which just sent out a pamphlet about us. It's hilarious.

Matt: Hey, we should take that with us on The Tonight Show.

Speaking about angry religious groups, what's the story behind Orgazmo?

Trey: It's the story of a Mormon doing his mission work in L.A., and he happens on to this porno shoot and gets offered a lot of money to play this part where he doesn't even have to have sex or anything. He takes it, and the movie becomes huge, and so he is...Orgazmo. [Laughs.]

It's due out in September. How long ago was it filmed?

Matt: It was only a year and a half ago, but we look, like, 10 years younger! [Both laugh.]

Are you recognized now? Do people come up to you and say, "Omigod, they killed Kenny!"?

Trey: Yeah.

Matt: It's a pain in the butt. We're gonna shave our heads.

Trey: Yeah, like that'll help.