I realize when it’s on set, a lot of people will say it’s the same but when it’s done, is there a different kind of feeling you get after doing a really big movie like How To Train Your Dragon, or you got RoboCop comin’ up, as opposed to something like Goon, where it’s sort of…?
When it wraps, you mean?
Yeah, when it wraps. When you get to show it to people, or when people get to talk about it. What’s that like? Is there a big difference?
No. The differences between the two are usually either fairly cosmetic in that, in an independent film, you have way less fringe benefits and you have way less time, which in itself can be a fringe benefit but like, I’ll tell you, though, I languish when we are only doing a page-and-a-half-a-day. I need to be doing more. So the Goon schedule, which was 35 days, which by Canadian standards is a fucking David Lean epic. Down in the States, nothing is shot for 35 days, except for super-independent movies. We were quite lucky that we got 35 days out of it, but it was a jam-packed, fuckin’ six-pages-a-day, every single day. And you don’t have enough time to second-guess, and you don’t have enough time to sit there and… ‘Cause you can tweet and change at home forever. There lies madness!
At a certain point, at any fucking moment, a singer’s gotta stop singing. Leave one take. A guitarist has gotta stop playin’. The actor has to say, “Okay, that’s as good as I’m gonna be.” The director has to say, “That’s as good as it’s gonna get,” or else it’ll never get there. So anyways, this all to say that when a gig ends, whether it’s a play like the one I just did, or a six-month movie like Tropic Thunder, or a six-week movie like Goon, a five-week rather, I should say, it’s still this, “Whew! Thank fuck!” Nothing feels better. The only thing that feels better than startin’ something, is ending it. And then when it comes out, the showing it off thing, that all depends on the work itself. You know, Goon was something that I was very personally connected to for half a decade, so I have much more of a dog in the fight than I do if I’m just acting in something.
Right. Well, what about for example, and I hate to bring this up again because I know you can’t talk about it too much…
No worries. No worries.
But like, RoboCop is coming out, and you get to be in it, and that movie has such a legacy.
Yeah.
That’s one where, do you have an emotional connection to that beforehand so it’s a bit different? Were you a big fan of RoboCop?
I did. Oh, a really, really massive fan. Number two, in particular.
Really!?
Yeah!
That’s an underrated one, I think.
It is, yeah.
It’s a lot of fun.
It is.
That fight at the end is one of the best fights!
It’s amazing. RoboCop 2, and I think that it’s Frank Miller. I think that he wrote… He was hired to write the first one. It was too dark. They let him do the RoboCop graphic novel for Dark Horse. Then I think they brought… So, I think the plot we see in RoboCop 2 is a version of the plot we were supposed to see in the first one. This is all to say that… No, listen, it’s silly to sort of blanket write off any kind of remake or any thing that… That being said, there are some remakes that I prefer to the original. Cape Fear, for example.
That is a fucking awesome movie.
I think the Scorsese Cape Fear is probably my favorite Scorsese, and I think the first one is an amazing flick. It doesn’t come close to touching the De Niro/Scorsese/Nick Nolte one.
I am in 100% agreement with you on that. I think it’s really underrated.
And I’m not going to say that that’s what RoboCop is going to be, but for me, it’s like, there are a myriad of different factors that can contribute to me taking a gig. It can be where something is, it can be what it is, it can be who’s involved. Ideally, the dream is, all those things together. And RoboCop, believe it or not, was damn close because it was an hour flight away from where I live, with a director who I was a fan of for a few years at that point, because I loved Elite Squad and Elite Squad 2, and then a chance to hang out every day with Michael Keaton and Gary Oldman.
That’s really cool.
So we could have been doing a remake of Death To Smoochy, and I would’ve been happy. Honest to God.
I think it’s time for a remake of Death To Smoochy.
Yeah, that movie could do like… There are some movies that aren’t really good, but there’s a good movie in there.
Yes! The idea is so solid. We only remake good movies! Let’s remake some crap movies that could have been awesome!
I know! No kidding!
Right?
I agree. I think Dead Heat, with Treat Williams and Joe Piscopo could be a remake.
Yeah! Wait… Isn’t that what RIPD is, basically?
Yeah… Well, I don’t think… In RIPD, they’re paranormal. They’re like, spirits or something?
Yeah.
In Dead Heat, Treat Williams is just dead and he’s decomposing the whole time. The slogan is, “You can’t keep a good cop dead.”
William Bibbiani is the editor of CraveOnline’s Film Channel and co-host of The B-Movies Podcast. Follow him on Twitter at @WilliamBibbiani.
