Kurt Russell in Death Proof
People may be surprised to hear Kurt Russell talk about acting with such detail. When he does low budget horror and mid-budget action movies, it seems pretty straightforward. But he usually has good reasoning, like how he separated himself from the kids in Miracle because he was supposed to be a coach, not a buddy. When he played the psycho stuntman killer in Quentin Tarantino's Death Proof, he brought his A game.
Kurt Russell Talks Death Proof and Grindhouse
"There’s a lot of stuff that’s not there," said Russell. "When you read a script, you kind of get your own ideas right away, but the great thing about working with Quentin is he’s mapped this guy out with what he does, but he hasn’t really mapped out how to play him. When I rehearsed, for one of the few times ever, every time you read a character you kind of get a general idea what you’re going to do. We did a read-through and I realized in the read-through I still don’t have any idea here. But I knew in his mind he’d hired Snake Plissken and he’d hired Macready from The Thing. I knew what he had in his head. And when I looked at it, I said, he’s Stuntman Mike, he’s not those guys. And what was great was the two people that worked together, him and me, we really meshed well together and sort of said we’re going to find this as we go. And he never stopped me from trying to find it."
Several standout moments in the film came from Russell's own suggestions, such as when he goes into a John Wayne voice in a pick-up scene. "One day I’m talking to Vanessa [Ferlito] and it’s the straightest scene in the movie, and it’s Quentin so I’m feeling really good and free, and so I go let’s talk to [her] like John Wayne. You can just feel the whole room [go quiet], and I just wouldn’t stop and I was having fun. I was thinking he’s going to say cut, okay, that was crazy, that was fun. And just about that time he goes, 'Wait, wait, wait, wait, keep it rolling, okay go back to this part of the speech. Do John Wayne, all of the way. Yeah. Let’s go. John Wayne.' I’m thinking I’m going to really go John Wayne on him, and I do this thing, and then he goes, 'Pkay, Brando! Brando!' I realized, this guy loves to play as much as I do. He just wants to have fun, and who knows? Who knows? It’s film. Start a fire with it! Who cares? Go find out and maybe it’s in there, maybe it’s not, but who knows?"
By the end of the film, Russell totally betrays his tough guy image. "I just took one word and ran with it: coward. This is a guy who kills women. He’s a coward. I don’t think I’ve ever seen one of these guys in these movies finish up in fact true to form, and it’s one of those things where when you hammer your finger, you have an idea what that will feel like, but when you do it it’s like waaayy worse than you thought. He and I were laughing as we talked about it, and I said I want to do that. He said, "Okay, let’s do that, let’s try it." And we just went down that road and we didn’t stop and finally, he never did ever say anything to me directing-wise ever until the last scene in the car, when I’m hanging out of the car. He goes, 'Okay, you’re in bad shape.' I said, 'Okay, here we go, but how bad?' He said, 'As bad as you want to be.'"
At this point, Russell did a take so outrageous that even Tarantino called his bluff. "I just did this thing and all of a sudden he comes over and he’s confused. He’s walking around and everybody’s kind of like, 'Is he actually going to say something?' They kind of back off, and I said, 'What?' He says, 'Uh, maybe less?' and I jumped out of the car and I said, 'I did it! I got him to say too much!' So he comes marching up to me months later, we’re going to do the looping and he comes marching up and he plops down and I just watched the end. It was that take. I could never go too far for Quentin, so they ended up using that take."
Grindhouse opens to theatres on April 6th.
For the trailers, clips, posters, stills, interviews and more movie info, go to the Grindhouse
Movie Page.
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