| 
Compiled by: Jack Foley
Vin [Introducing himself and Alexa): Otherwise known
as Humphry Bogart and Lauren Bacall!
Q. Alexa, what was the most nerve-wracking aspect for
you: doing an action film or acting opposite Vin Diesel?
AD: Actually, if it wasn’t for Vin, I probably
wouldn’t have survived, so I have to say the action stuff.
Q, And what about the preparation for that? It’s
not really for a young lady, putting yourself through all that…
AD: Eh, a few months of training and lots of blood sweat
and tears, but lots of fun.
Q. Vin, it occurred to me while watching this movie that
Riddick is your Conan movie, because Riddick is thief, warrior,
king…
[nods in agreement]
Did you see it that way? Because you’ve made Riddick this
iconic figure haven’t you?
A. Well, the idea of fusing fantasy into this science
fiction was one of the things that was so attractive about visiting
this character.
Conan – I’m glad you actually … when I hear
someone say that, that’s a good thing. In the training,
and this is how crazy and meticulous I was about trying to get
the right anatomy. A year before shooting I bought a trampoline
and put it in my back yard.
And the reason that I did that is because I wanted to create this
body anatomy that kind of resembled a Frank Frezetta illustration.
I don’t know if you guys know who Frank Frazetta is, or
his illustrations of Conan and Tarzan, but the body anatomy was
always very savage.
So, instead of being on a wire and just flying through the air,
I tried to create this body anatomy. So the fact that you say
Conan is, I guess, pretty dead on, but more so for the illustrations
of Frank Frazetta.
Q. Vin, where did you practice pulling that scary face
you’ve got in this and Pitch Black and what are your favourite
scenes?
VD: The scary face? I’ve had a lot of years to
perfect that in my years of bouncing, when I wasn’t able
to get an acting role. So, many, many, many years and many, many,
many nights of standing at the front door, you can kind of perfect
that face that says ‘I’ll kill you,. Especially in
New York City.
Q. And best scene?
A. Well, of course my scenes with Alexa were unbelievable
and fun and beautiful and sexy, hot, strong… But I think
my favourite scene in the movie was petting the Hell-hound, because
it took me back to petting my own dog.
I have a connie corso, this 165lb connie corso. So, actually,
I remember working out that scene and deciding how we, Riddick,
would pet this huge hell-hound, and I had just got through elephant
training, and one of the things that the elephant trainers said
to me stuck in my mind.
These big animals don’t like it if you just softly caress
them. They wanna know that you’re there. They want you to
hit ‘em hard, so when I saw the special effect all come
together, and I’m petting this giant hell-hound, I went,
[squeels] ‘yeah’.
Q. Vin, David Twohy said you angled for Dame Judi Dench.
If she angled for you for a part in a stage play would you do
it, and if so what part would you want?
A: Wow! As long as it wasn’t Caliban, I would jump
at it.
Q. What was it like working with Dame Judi?
A: Unbelievable. Going from Pitch
Black, going from this very contained story that lived in
the sci-fi horror world, and going into an epic sci-fi mythology,
we needed a character that very quickly could explain the mythology.
Who more credible than Judi Dench? She was, in my mind in casting,
the most important component.
Of course, as an actor, I can tell you that anyone in the world
is gonna want to work in a film that Judi Dench is in. So once
we cast Judi Dench, as Aereon, there was an international call
for actors and everybody wanted to work on the film. We could
have gotten Laurence Olivier at that point [long pause as he considers
what he’s just said] … provided…
Q. … he hadn’t been dead for years?
A. Yeah, thank you. Minor technicalities. But she was
so amazing. So wonderful. For years, people had asked me who I
wanted to work with. They’d expect me to say an A-list actor,
or an A-list director, and I’d say Judi Dench. And they’d
say, what would you guys do together? [She was] magical. At the
end of the first day, the first scene that we shot together, the
still photographer came into my trailer with an 8x10 and I immediately
sent it off to my mother and said: "If nothing else, my dream
has already come true. I did it, I did a scene with Judi Dench."
Q. Alexa, are you, or were you, a fan of science fiction
and had you seen Pitch Black?
AD: I had not seen it prior to this coming up, and once
the audition came up, I immediately came and watched it. It was
about how much research can I do before my 48 hours of audition
time is up.
Q. How excited will you be to come back and do more films?
Would you come back and do more film?
A: [in bad Brit accent] I’m not. I’m having
a long vacation.
AD: I would start tomorrow.
VD: Ahhhh, that’s adorable.
AD: I would, I think it’s not a story that
can be told in one film and I would love to come back and do another
one and be a part of it.
VD: Of course, I would want to [starts heavy
breathing] continue on with this thing that I have worked on so
hard. [speaking normally] Yes. The concept behind switching genres
was to create a film that you could continue exploring. Even in
the ending of the movie, it’s not just us opening it up
so we can tell another story; it’s a very specific ending.
A very daring ending, because it’s left open-ended. But
you know, or maybe you don’t know, that in the next film
Riddick is going to go to the Underverse. I would love to. This
is what we do it for.
|
 |
Q. Is this only the beginning
then?
VD: Yeah. There are a lot of elements in my mind; there
is already a story, a place. In C2 – I’ll tell you
this: when we went to the studio, I bought these leather binders.
I got three leather binders and one of them said C1, one said
C2 and one said C3 and they all had locks on them. And we only
gave the key to C1 to the studio. So C2 we will go to the Underverse.
C2 will be rated R, in C2 Riddick will interact with new Elementals.
Not air Elementals – with fire, water. And then come full
circle with C3, when he must return to Furion, and you will hopefully
have Sophie Marceau saying to Judi Dench: "We did not save
him to rescue your world." Sorry…
Q. You’re getting carried away! Vin, at one point
you were juggling three franchises [Fast
and the Furious, xXx] can you talk
us through why you decided on this one and let the others go?
VD: This was a cult classic. When we shot Pitch Black,
we shot Pitch Black in Coober Pedy [in southern Australia] with
the studio called Polygram, that ultimately fell out and we didn’t
have a distribution company for a while.
The other films were huge blockbusters. I never was too keen on
doing a sequel in a reactionary way, just because the movie was
a financial hit, as opposed to Pitch Black, which was a cult film.
Not a whole lot of people saw it in the theatre. I guess I just
gravitated to the Riddick character, and the possibilities of
the Universe, more so than just revisiting a franchise because
it was successful.
Q. And there were no pangs when you saw 2
Fast 2 Furious – indeed have you seen it?
VD: Nah. I think my producing partner just saw it for
the first time last night in the hotel.
Q. Your doing your bit for its profits then?
VD: Yeah, I chip in whenever I can.
Q. Can you give us any clues about Hannibal and is it
going to be physically more arduous in a realistic sense?
VD: Hannibal the Conqueror. I started elephant training
two years ago. It’s true! It’s a living. Believe it
or not. So I started riding elephants two years ago. Timbo is
his name. The largest African elephant in north America. David
Franzoni, who wrote Gladiator,
has written Hannibal.
A man named Ross Leckie, who is from Scotland, wrote a book called
Hannibal. The book we optioned two years ago. I’m going
to Malta to location scout because there are Venetian temples
that still exist there, that were there during the Carthaginian
rule.
Yes, the film I’m most passionate about is Hannibal the
Conqueror. It’s a story about this 3rd Century BC Carthaginian
general who proved that by uniting people of no common language,
culture or religion could defeat tyranny – it’s a
very interesting story to me, very multi-cultural.
Of course, if you don’t know, he was a Carthaginian general,
200-years before the birth of Christ. Ultimately, his city, Carthage,
which was the London of antiquity in ancient history, was destroyed
in the first documented account of genocide, raised to the ground.
I could go on for ever, so just stop me…
Q. Mountains…
VD: The march across the Alps? Absolutely. It’s
an integral part of the second act. Hannibal crossed the snow-covered
Alps from Spain, into Italy, when it was an unthinkable task,
on elephants. Yorick [van Wageningen], will be playing Versim
Gedderacks, who was a leader of the Galles, who is, at first,
a rival of Hannibal’s, and then becomes an ally, as he proves
himself to the world.
Q. Riddick is rough and tough, but has humour bubbling
beneath the surface. Was that carried off set too?
VD: No, it was very deep, very heavy. I think that humour
comes out of Riddick in spite of himself.
Q. Vin, Pitch Black wasn’t that long ago, but you
seemed very determined to make it in Hollywood. Since then your
career has witnessed a quantum leap. Has it exceeded your expectations
when you were a relative unknown?
VD: I guess the therapy I subscribe to is thinking about
what I’m going to do next. I don’t know if it’s
a fault or an asset, but I don’t think about where I’m
at, I always think about what I’d like to do.
There’s always an outstanding dream, so in this case, Hannibal
the Conqueror. For five years, it was Chronicles of Riddick. So
when I was on Pitch Plack, in Cooper Pedy, in the outback of Australia,
I was thinking, wow, wouldn’t it be cool if we were able
to follow Riddick off of this planet and, through his eyes, be
introduced to a world and a mythology that governs that universe.
And now that I’ve been able to satisfy that for the past
couple of years I’ve been thinking: ‘I can’t
wait to tell this Hannibal story.’ So I think that’s
my answer. I think that’s more of what I’ve done,
enjoyed the creativeness.
Q. Vin, when Pierce Brosnan got the part of Bond, he
said the most intimidating thing was working with Dame Judi. Was
it like that for you, or was it a love match?
VD: A love match. It was like my fairy godmother. Nothing
could go wrong. I was in the safest of hands. Nothing was more
magical. This is going to sound crazy, but my mother is an Astrologist
and [Dame Judi] is a Libra, and a Libra is and air-elemental sign,
so you draw the conclusions.
Q. Elephant training: Did you have a battle of wills
with Timbo, because I’ve been on an elephant and they pretty
much did the driving.
A. Elephants have killed more trainers than any
other animal. I think I got lucky. I just kind of chilled with
the elephant. I looked at the elephant and said, ‘you know,
I’ve been doing this for years’.
|
