Interview: The great Liam Neeson on Absolution, The Naked Gun, fight scenes and more!

I’ve been lucky in my job at JoBlo to interview a lot of the legends I grew up watching on the silver screen, but until recently I never had the chance to chat with one of the all-timers, Liam Neeson. I was a monster fan of his from way back, even before he reinvented his career thanks to the breakout success of Taken. I grew up watching him in movies like Darkman, Rob Roy, Schindler’s List, and many others. 

But, the thing is – when you interview a legend, there’s always that worry that they might let you down. Suffice it to say that was NOT the case with Neeson, who proved to be an affable, friendly, and down-to-earth fellow. I had a very nice conversation with him about his latest movie, Absolution, in which he plays an aging thug trying to atone for past misdeeds. While our internet connection wasn’t the best (status quo in this era of Zoom interviews), Neeson seemed happy to discuss this earthier character, with him explaining the research he did into CTE (Chronic traumatic encephalopathy), which is the affliction his character is suffering from in the movie, which our critic Alex Maidy really enjoyed (read his review HERE).

I also got Neeson to tease his upcoming reboot of The Naked Gun, where he channels Leslie Nielsen as Frank Drebin. His deadpan, and hilarious answer has me convinced that the movie is going to be something special, with him going out of his way to praise his co-stars, Pamela Anderson and Danny Huston.

Absolution is now playing!