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Quotes
Cole
Hauser and my co-producer bought me a didgeridoo for my birthday when we
were there. And I did learn to play. I was lucky because the aborigines
treat it as a very sacred instrument, and one of them took the time out
to actually teach me how to do it.
Every single character that I've ever played has some
similarities. I did telemarketing, so I did it for a living. It's the
same thing as selling stocks, but instead of stocks you're selling
inadequate tools. The whole reason why I did this film was to redeem
myself for a shameless job.
I am flattered that they think that many people would
enjoy my work. I don't approach any genre a different way than I may
approach another one. I treat every role I do like a role worthy of
applying whatever kind of tactic, process and talent I have.
I don't know if I could ever get Hannibal greenlit if
I didn't have the box office response that we hope that we'll get from
XXX and that I've gotten from The Fast and the Furious.
I haven't had that many weird encounters with fans,
thank God.
I hope the fact that I do films like Knockaround Guys
ensures that I won't get pigeonholed. It's not the worst thing in the
world, you know.
I love anti-heroes and I've explored anti-heroes and
I have played anti-heroes. Maybe I don't necessarily know if I
understand what an anti-hero is. This is a guy who lives by his own
code. There is no changing point for Dominic. He is the same guy in the
beginning as he is in the end.
I pulled from all that harbored anger we all have and
lock away in a vault and keep it there locked so we can function.
I try to do as much of my own stunts and then my
stunt performers come in and emasculate me and do the impossible. What's
funny as hell is the only time I really work out is when I'm not
working. So, if I look big, I'm unemployed.
I was a bouncer for nine years, and when you're a
bouncer everything you say has to be reinforced with an unspoken threat
that the situation can be handled in a physical manner-if I can quote
the great Stone Cold Steve Austin!
I was walking around with the babies so much that
when I got to the Sidney Lumet picture, I would be on set in between
takes and I'd be rocking back and forth. Just standing like this rocking
back and forth, and Sidney would say, Why are you walking like that in
between takes?
I'm flattered because the whole action-hero term is
such a new term. Steve McQueen and Sidney Poitier and Kirk Douglas, they
weren't considered action.
I'm not really afraid of the dark, except if I'm
walking. The thing that scares me the most is the possibility of walking
into a wall and busting my lip.
I'm not that car-oriented, like I couldn't build an
engine. I grew up in New York City, so I guess I am more familiar with
subways.
If you had asked me back in grade school what I
wanted to be when I grew up, I would have said my first choice was an
actor, but if I couldn't be that, I'd want to be a superhero.
If you take my performance or my understanding of the
role and my appreciation for story and then dress it in CGI, that I
guess becomes an action film.
If you're the type of person who has to fulfill your
dreams, you've gotta be resourceful to make sure you can do it. I came
out to California when I was 21, thinking my New York credentials would
take me all the way. I came back home a year later all dejected and a
failure.
It was interesting to do a completely fictional
piece. You know, Saving Private Ryan was not a fictional piece! So the
challenge was: How do you incorporate real emotions? How do you
incorporate aspects that people are going to be able to identify with?
It would be flattering to call it a modern Dirty
Harry, but I think this film deals more with the loss of his wife than
the traditional revenge vigilante films.
It's really cool to go back to Riddick when the
studio's excited about doing it, making a trilogy out of that character.
That's a really gratifyingly cool experience.
Jordana Brewster and I had to kind of synchronize
being brother and sister and to do it right. We had to kind of
synchronize our personalities and our understandings. She actually
reminds me very much of my sister.
My mother gave me this book called Feature Films at
Used Car Prices by a guy named Rick Schmidt. I gotta credit the guy, cuz
he gave me the most practical advice. It empowers you.
The more you know about the Dungeons and Dragons, the
more you'll see the thought process that went into the Chronicles of
Riddick mythology.
The thing that stood out above and beyond all the
experiences was this relationship with the nine-month-old baby. On
weekends, I'd be thinking about going back to set on Monday just to see
the baby.
The video game culture was an important thing to keep
alive in the film because we're in a new era right now. The idea that
kids can play video games like Grand Theft Auto or any video game is
amazing. The video games are one step before a whole other virtual
universe.
The whole year I was in LA I got into telemarketing
and learned how to make money. Five years later that skill helped me
make my first film.
There's going to be a time in the next 18 months when
I go to shoot this Hannibal character, and I'm going to do my best to
channel the character, not even play the part, but literally channel it,
this general, this third century B.C. Carthaginian general. I'm going to
be channeling a lot of anger.
We all deal with being unfairly judged.
What was the toughest stunt in XXX? All the stunts
were difficult for their own reasons. What I found particularly
difficult was, I was standing up on Ahab, in the river in Prague. That
was very, very difficult because if I would've slipped off, I would have
died of hypothermia in 10 minutes.
When I was about 7, there was a blackout in
Manhattan, and I grew up in this huge building with around 365
apartments, and it had long, long halls. We were playing tag in this
building, and I'm running around on the ninth floor, and I ran straight
into a wall and busted my lip.
You can walk on set and walk by Vin Diesel and that
nine-month-old co-star having a conversation that you couldn't
understand. Lotta goo goo ga gas.
You get a little excited walking on a set and this
nine-month-old baby knows you're there. Not thinking Vin Diesel, just
thinks of the big guy who's always taking care of him. It had a dramatic
effect on me.
You know when something feels so good but you're
afraid to feel good about it? So you kinda hold back? Everyone says,
Congratulations, you must be so happy. And you say something stupid
like, I'm just doing what little I can with what little I have.
You live these three months in this reality, in this
dark reality. You don't want to do those films every year because
they're taxing. I started smoking a lot of cigarettes.
Well, I've worked out for
years. For a long time it was my only sense of gratification.
I would get into fights
with other bouncers when a guy was already on the floor and the other
guys thought it was alright to jump up in the air and land on the guy's
head.
I was being offered three
franchises at the same time - Pitch Black, XXX, and The Fast and the
Furious - and I had to choose. I couldn't do all three. - on why he
didn't do the Fast and the Furious sequel
This isn't a poster. This
is a declaration of war! -Re: the XXX poster and what it means for his
career
I am definitely a person
of color. - regarding his mysterious ethnicity
On the planned Chronicles
of Riddick trilogy: We gave the script to the studio, I bought three
leather binders. One said C1, one said C2 and one said C3. They all had
locks on them and we only gave the key to C1 to the studio.
In the next film, Riddick
is going to go to the underverse. Riddick will act with new elementals.
Not air elementals [as Judi Dench's character is] but fire and water.
It'll come full circle in C3 when he must return to Furia".
On the Chronicles of
Riddick: The concept behind switching genres was to create a film that
you could continue exploring. In the ending of this movie, it's not just
something that says we're opening it up so we can tell another story,
it's very specific. A very daring ending because it's left open-ended.
From the very very
beginning, when everyone thought it was crazy, I was thinking of The
Chronicles of Riddick as a trilogy. That would start with the movie you
saw, and Pitch Black would act as a prequel that introduced you to the
character. So in simple terms, in Chronicles 2 we venture to the
Underverse. We knew we could get away with a PG-13 on the first one, but
once you go to the Underverse it's rated R, because it's a place where
war is the norm and there is constant, constant battling. Then on
Chronicles 3 we will see Riddick return to Furia, to deal with the
homeland.
I was a bouncer for nine
years - it was all I knew how to do - and my training was not to talk
loosely...That's still my thought process: Shut your mouth, watch your
back and keep working till your ass falls off.
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