I’ve
been a huge fan of Jeff Bridges since I was a kid.
This is partly due to the classic film THE LAST PICTURE SHOW
alongside an all-star cast. What
I’ve always respected about him was his honest approach to film
without really finding superstardom. His
work in such films as FEARLESS, STARMAN and THE FISHER KING have all
been terrific, Oscar worthy performances (Nominated for 2 but 0
wins). But Mr. Bridges has
become more than just a really great actor since his work in THE BIG
LEBOWSKI, a cult classic that leaves you wanting to hang out with
“The Dude”. Now, he takes
‘the dude’ to a new level by adding a touch of that iconic
character to a penguin named “Big Z” in the upcoming SURF’S UP.
A Sony Pictures animated feature with surfing (not singing,
or marching) penguins.
As
for his co-star, Shia LaBeouf… if you haven’t heard the name,
you will soon. He will soon be
seen in TRANSFORMERS and DISTURBIA. Possibly
even INDIANA JONES 4, a rumor he denied at this function.
He also appeared in such films as HOLES and with Keanu Reeves
in CONSTANTINE. Here, he takes
on the role of Cody Maverick, a penguin who loves to surf and finds
his way into a surfing contest with a bunch of other penguins… and
a chicken (voiced by Jon Heder). Yes,
I did say chicken.
Both
Jeff and Shia took some time to talk with us courtesy of an all out
Luau that Sony Pictures set up in support of the film.
It was an interesting time and it seemed that Mr. Bridges
definitely has a little ‘dude’ in him.
He was bald and wearing a Fedora (all about the Iron Man).
He was laid back and seemed to be enjoying the night.
He also talked a little about his upcoming IRON MAN and one
of his acting heroes by the name of Robert Ryan.
Shia, also chimed in with hero talk and also about some
upcoming features, including the much anticipated TRANSFORMERS.
Mr. LaBeouf has a whole lotta excitement about his career and
he also talked to a few of us afterwards, further denying the rumor
that is INDIANA JONES. So read
on about surfing penguins that don’t sing and dance and what not
to anticipate in the coming weeks.
Jeff Bridges / Shia LaBoeuf
Was
that something for “Iron Man” [regarding Jeff’s shaved head]?
JB:
Yes.
So
they tell us that you came in first with a different pitched voice
and they’re like “no, no, no… we want your voice”.
Were you kind of surprised that they wanted ‘Jeff
Bridges’?
JB:
[Speaking in a high pitch voice] Actually, this is my real
voice. [Laughing] No, I
don’t know, I never heard that story.
I don’t know. Different
pitched voice? I went in
thinking it would just be normal.
I didn’t know that. I
just thought, play it as real. You
know, one of the things that was appealing about the whole project
was this documentary quality, the “Spinal Tap” kind of take on
it all. Playing it
pretty serious you know and find the humor in that.
For
you Shia, how did you get involved?
Shia
LaBeouf: Um, I started
hearing some of the cast news that they were throwing around, Jeff
was always first choice and I’ve always wanted to work with him
and so that was a huge appeal. And
then you meet Chris and Ash and they start lettin’ you loose and
realize how much free, flow thought you can put into it and it’s
always fun to have that much control, you know.
Plus it was a new concept.
You know, it was this hybrid version of animation that had
never been done before, it’s good to be a part of new things and
it’s stretching the art form a bit so you wanna be part of those
type of things.
How
free were you to just go off of the script…?
JB:
Oh, yeah they always encouraged that.
You’d have a script that kind of gave you the bones of the
scene but they were always calling on you to use your imagination
and bring whatever you had to do.
That’s always the most fun… Like on a regular movie when
you’re called upon… you’re going to have to rise to the
occasion. Sometimes,
they don’t have any scenes and you’re really going to have to do
it…
SL:
F*ck up.
JB:
Yeah.
Shia,
in the acting world, who was your ‘Big Z’?
SL:
Dustin Hoffman. Then
I found Gary Oldman. There’s
a lot of them.
What
about you Jeff?
JB:
My ‘Big Z’… [after a moment] Robert Ryan.
I got to work with him. You
know who Robert Ryan is?
SL:
No.
JB:
He was really an interesting actor, he always kind of stood
alone for me, didn’t really seem like an actor.
I think he got into acting quite late, like maybe in his late
thirties or forties.
SL:
In westerns?
JB:
He did some westerns. I
did “The Iceman Cometh” with him.
I had most of my scenes were with him…
What
did you admire about him, especially?
JB:
Well, I remember one time we were at a table and we were
sitting there, getting ready for one of our long scenes and he had
his hands like this on the table and they guy said, “we’re ready
now Bob” and [he moved his] hands and I saw these two big pools of
sweat. And I said,
“Bob, you’re frightened after all these years…?” and he
said, “I’d really be scared if I wasn’t scared.”
[Laughing]
That’s
cool.
JB:
You know that fear thing is something that is always with you
and you’re gonna have to befriend that, that’s your buddy.
So that calmed me down quite a bit.
That’s
really cool that you could work together in a booth too, that’s
very unusual.
JB:
“Billy Budd” was another great movie. You remember that movie?
Terrance Stamp. Check that out.
Were
you surprised you were able to overlap? I know with voice-overs
usually you are told you can’t talk when someone else is talking.
JB:
Oh no.
SB:
They encouraged it. That’s part of that different style. The
cadence is different in this animation as opposed to something like
– any other animation you’ve ever seen.
Did
either of you get a little worried when you heard about “Happy
Feet” – the penguin movie coming around?
SL:
This is was 4 years of fruition to get here. You’re worried but
then you see how successful it is. It’s uplifting. You go oh, ok.
It was happenstance that all these movies of conversion happened all
at once. It wasn’t like we were copycatting. It’s impossible in
animation because it takes so long to make these things and bring
them to where they are. I don’t know if there’s fear.
JB:
Not exactly fear, but you’re like “awe” because there is an
element of horse races, making the movies and you want your horse to
do as well as it can. And as Shia was saying, maybe it’s good news
for us, maybe it’s bad news, I don’t know.
You know you’re rooting for your guy.
Very
funny line that he had, “I don’t sing and dance.”
SL:
We added that after.
It’s
like you have an established superstar going for you already with
the penguin.
SL:
Sort of, yeah.
JB:
Oh that’s good, yeah.
Shia,
you’ve been staying really busy for the last few years. What makes
you choose one project over another?
You’re not a struggling actor.
SL:
Thank God.
You
can pick what you want. What makes you pick “Transformers” or…
?
SL:
They’re things that turn my clock. And excite me and make you want
to show up. It’s a lot
of work to make these movies. It’s not just show up and put some
pretty make up on, let’s have good time always. Sometimes it’s a
struggle. Movies like “Transformers” and “Iron Man” are not
easy movies to make, they’re really difficult.
How
did Indiana Jones come up?
SL:
That’s just a rumor. I know when I have a job I sign contracts and
I talk to directors, and I haven’t had any of that happen. Until
that happens, I’m out of work. I’m looking into a whole bunch of
different things. If that happens, of course, I’m on board. It’s
a dream job. But it’s a rumor right now and a dream.
Shia,
you were about Jeff’s age when he got started in acting. I wonder
if you got any advice or if he gave any advice during filming about
becoming a young actor and what you went through.
SL:
I think I was too nervous to ever ask. It’s a tough thing to be
like, “Hey we’re equals. Why don’t you tell me how you did
it?” It just doesn’t feel that way – ever. To ask to for advice
in a situation, I don’t feel like I’m going through the same
thing. We didn’t have those talks. We talked about his ukulele. We
talked about Montana. And we talked about penguins. We come up with
little things to say about …
JB:
Music.
SL:
We talked about a lot about music.
JB:
I related to Shia just the way he approached the work.
It’s kind of very much the way my father taught us how to
approached it. He works with a lot of joy, has a lot of fun. And
that’s kind of contagious as it gets back and forth and created
that kind of cool friction to make the fire. And that’s how I like
to work. It’s
interesting that you work with so many approaches to it. With actor
who don’t go that way at all. Who want to get called by their
characters’ name, Shia reminded me of how I liked to do it.
Jeff,
so you’re not going to do a picture book for this movie? You’re
not going to take any photos in the booth?
JB:
I’ve kind of phased out of that a little bit. I’m doing
something on “Iron Man”, maybe I’ll consider that.
Do
you consider your character as kind of like “the Dude” of
penguins?
JB:
Yeah, you could say that possibly. They both surf. They’re kind of
laid back guys. Penguins
are into clams. The Dude does weed.
What
attracted you to “Iron Man”?
JB:
It’s the group was a big draw. The fact that there is Robert
Downey, Jr., Gwenyth Paltrow, Terrence Howard, and our leader is
John Favreau. I’m big fan of “Swingers” which he wrote, and
it’s always great to have a director who is a writer so in the
tough spots he can get you out.
The story of “Iron Man” is interesting; it’s not your
typical superhero where he’s got some kind of power necessarily.
John wants to ground it in reality as much as possible.
It’s about dealing with weapons manufacturers and the
politics of the world and so forth. It’s kind of interesting so I
got hooked. I do my best not to engage in a movie, as Shia said
it’s hard to do and once you commit to it, all these other doors
close. You can’t do all these other things. You don’t even know
what these other things are yet – they could be great. It’s an
interesting group of people to work with, and that’s a big
draw.
What
do you play in it?
JB:
I play Robert Downey, Jr.’s mentor.
What’s
the character’s name?
JB:
Obadiah Stane
.
And
what is going to surprise us on “Transformers”?
SL:
I’ll just tell you this … we went to get our MPAA rating. And
it’s a movie for the masses. They show the movie and we get a
rated “R” rating because of intensity, not because of curse
words or nudity but because of sheer intensity you know, its
aneurism inducing. And
[they] fought the good fight and were back at a PG-13 but just the
fact that they put us there, it’s so intense man and there are not
a lot of breathers, it’s just ‘wwoooshhh’ and you’ve never
seen any animation like this. ILM,
the people that talk to ILM say that this is the most intense
graphics that they have ever done in the history of their company
and ILM have done some pretty magical, wild things.
I mean, just Megatron’s arm has fifteen-thousand moving
pieces that all converge like a rubik’s cube.
It’s Michael Bay with these chase scenes, you know, just
the chase scenes alone are insane.
Then you have two forty foot tall machines on the 405 Freeway
boxing. Its nuts… The
biggest surprises will be visual because it’s never been done like
that and it’ll be fun to see what happens.
Lorenzo
[di Bonaventura] said they’re gonna start moving forward with
“Constantine 2”, have you heard that yet?
SL:
Are they?
That’s
what Lorenzo said.
SL:
Wow. Did he?
Really?
Yeah.
SL:
Wow, I didn’t think Keanu [Reeves] would wanna jump back on
but…
Yeah,
he said he wanted to.
SL:
Keanu went through a lot of shit on that movie.
I would never… Wow, I mean, yeah, sure I’m game if they
do it. But I haven’t
heard anything so maybe not.
You
may be also very busy with something else… [Regarding “Indiana
Jones Part 4”]
SL:
Or not.
Well,
if it did happen, when would we hear something?
The next two weeks?
SL:
You mean, if what would happen?
The
one with the hat and the whip…
SL:
Look, when I hear something I’ll tell everybody.
I can’t keep secrets very well.
I mean, literally it’s an internet rumor that’s turned
into this insane thing. It’s
fun to watch everyone talk about it but again, I don’t have a part
or a deal or anything set so… sure, I’ll tell you when I hear.
Let
me know what you think. Send
questions and comments to jimmyo@joblo.com.