Of zombies and Twinkies

They both look slightly zombified themselves by a promo blitz that made a stop in Austin, Texas, one night and, the next, found them here at a local college fest’s costumed “zombie crawl’’ for a screening at the Boston Common.

As they admitted in a banter-filled conversation with the Globe, they initially had similar reactions when their people sent them a script called, well, “Zombieland.’’

Q. Some zombie movies have abstractly veiled titles: “I Am Legend’’ or “28 Days Later.’’ Not this one.

Harrelson: Yeah, I had the script for a while before I read it; you know, put that in the “stupid’’ pile. But I read it and just loved it.

Eisenberg: Same here. But my agents don’t vet things in the same way. I get tons of stupid scripts, because I’m not famous, so they’ll send me whatever comes in for my category.

Harrelson: [chuckling at him, needling]: This guy. “My category.’’

Eisenberg: [deadpan]: Look, Woody, we’re all products. This is a business; it’s called show business.

Harrelson: Now that’s the level of cynicism I’ve been striving for.

Eisenberg: The only reason we get to stay at this fancy hotel is because the movie is a product. Woody, if you want to act, you can go do community theater, go be in “Guys and Dolls’’ in Any High School, U.S.A. This is a business. Anyway, reading the script, I thought it was great right off the bat. Actually, no - the first thing it said was, “We hear the voice of a witty, anxiety-ridden Everyman. Think Seth Green.’’ I wondered, “So why did they send me this?’’ So I didn’t like that first page.

Q. Do you get sent much high-concept material? It’s surprising to see you in something so far removed from, say, “Adventureland.’’

Eisenberg: Oh, yeah, they send me everything. And I audition for some real awful [expletive], and I just don’t get [the part]. I’ve been lucky not to get into stuff that’s been embarrassing, but that’s not for lack of trying.

Q. One of this movie’s distinguishing touches is the way it lays out Columbus’s “rules for surviving Zombieland,’’ and then even turns them into onscreen graphics. Was that there on the page?

Harrelson: It was, but the director [newcomer Ruben Fleischer] did a lot of commercials and music videos, so he knew a company that’s really good with that kind of thing specifically. I think it really adds a lot, because you’ve already had a few good chuckles before you even meet Jesse’s character.

Eisenberg: I was a little offended. I wanted the first laugh of the movie.

Q. Was a particular survival rule your favorite? Even one that didn’t make the final cut?

Eisenberg: I came up with “double-knot your shoes.’’

Harrelson: Yeah, you don’t want to trip running from zombies ’cause you’re not double-knotted.

Eisenberg: And there was one that didn’t make it called “Ziploc bags.’’ The rules are cutely mundane; the practical nature of them makes them funny.

Q. Bill Murray’s cameo in the movie is getting some buzz. Woody, were you calling in a favor from working with him on “Kingpin’’?

Harrelson: It was connected, yeah. But it wasn’t in the script that way. It was always supposed to be some superstar; one version that was pretty funny had Sylvester Stallone in it. But at the last minute, someone fell out, and they were really scrambling. In the end, most of that stuff was improvised.

Eisenberg: Before they got Bill, I had the idea that we’d meet Woody Harrelson. You weren’t there shooting on the day I suggested it, so you couldn’t object, and they were really considering it. I thought it would be sooo funny.

Harrelson: I don’t know. . .

Eisenberg: And now I realize it would be sooo stupid.

Q. Woody, speaking of your past credits, there’s a new 15th anniversary DVD of “Natural Born Killers’’ that’s got us thinking about that one again. Did “Zombieland’’ give you any acting flashbacks to the whole gonzo killing spree thing?

Harrelson: The memories do come in the form of flashbacks with that particular movie. [laughs]

Q. Tallahassee is on a quest to find at least one good Twinkie still left on Earth. Did you end up eating Twinkies take after take, to the point that you don’t ever want to see one again?

Harrelson: I’m not really a Twinkie lover anyway, so no big loss there. But I’ve worked on a bunch of things where they’ll have people who make up one kind of food to look like another - something that looks like a hamburger, say, but isn’t. And there was a woman on this [shoot] who made Twinkies, which was quite a task, because that’s a very specific look, you know? But she actually did it: a vegan, healthy Twinkie.

Q. Pretty good trick.

Harrelson: I think the day’s coming when we’re gonna get a Twinkie revolution. We’ve gotta get this thing out and on the shelves. The downside is just that these won’t last 222 years. I think the last thing there’ll be on this planet when it all hits the fan will probably be Twinkies and cockroaches.

Eisenberg: And Cher.