00:00 I mean it's definitely special for my dad because he does the whole father thing.
00:06 he's always proud of anything I do. if I was an accountant, if I worked in the streets,
00:12 it wouldn't matter. he loves me whatever but to do a movie that's basically
00:18 surrounding his career in the military. he flew helicopters so he's gonna be really
00:24 proud of this one. he's gonna really enjoy it. it's his type of movie. I remember when Maverick
00:28 came out because Top Gun, if you had to win a competition and say what is Ricky Whittle's
00:33 favorite movie of all time, it was Top Gun because when I was a kid growing up it was the very first
00:38 movie I ever watched and I watched it in the air force you kind of had these big block parties and
00:43 they throw all the kids into one house, put a movie on and all the adults get drunk and have
00:48 a great time. so they put this movie on Top Gun. I watched it all the way through. the kids were
00:53 messing around, running around, I'm shushing kids like nine years old. I'm like shh you know because
00:58 I want to watch this movie. I'm so in. I ran outside, got my dad to rewind it and watched it
01:03 through again twice in a row and I've been obsessed ever since with Tom Cruise and Top Gun because
01:08 again that was my childhood. I lived on an airbase, I lived next to a runway, jets and
01:13 helicopters flying all over the place. so when Maverick came out I was like oh dad what do you
01:17 think and he was like well planes can't really. I was like I know planes can't do that but
01:21 and he's like no I love the movie. so I know there's gonna be moments in this movie where
01:26 you go well there is this one. I got dad, did you like the movie? and he's gonna love this.
01:31 he's gonna absolutely love it and I'm really proud of this one. it's an epic roller coaster
01:37 of a thriller. it's non-stop. Russell Crowe brings some beautiful warmth and heart to it as well as
01:43 the usual gravitas that he has and I'm excited. I read the script by Devin Frigero.
01:52 it was fantastic. layered characters. the director William Eubank is I feel honestly
02:00 the next visual genius director. he's the next JJ Abrams, the next Michael Bay. he is
02:06 just pure action. he's an incredible director and he elevates this movie so much and then to get to
02:12 play with an old friend in Milo Ventimiglia, to meet the royal family in Luke and Liam Hemsworth
02:17 was just a joy. they took us in, showed us around Australia. Liam and Luke took me home to meet
02:23 mum and dad, the original Hemsworths. so it was just all in all an incredible experience and I
02:30 can't wait for the world to see it. there's two sides of Bishop. for me when I read the character
02:37 that David Frigero wrote, he's this kind of badass tough guy. he's been in the military for years.
02:44 he's got hundreds of missions under his belt and to do one mission is intense enough in a
02:50 life and death situation and this guy has been through it all. so he's not scared of anything.
02:55 he doesn't flinch. he doesn't hesitate but then there's also this sarcasm and humor that he has
03:00 which really drew me to the character which I feel is more like myself being British. we're
03:05 very sarcastic as a people. we love to make fun of people, especially our friends and we always say
03:11 if we don't make fun of you that's when you should be worried because it means we don't care.
03:15 so if we make fun of you it means we love you. so Bishop really starts his character and his
03:21 journey off really clashing with Liam Hemsworth's character, really kind of making fun and poking
03:26 Liam Hemsworth's character which I found really fun because Liam's such a sweet guy.
03:31 but it's more about survival. they're in a life and death situation and Bishop's just trying to
03:38 show this new kid, this new rookie that if you hesitate someone dies and I like to think it's
03:45 really just a love story. it's me and Liam in a beautiful love story. it's almost like the
03:50 notebook. just the guy meets guy, guy hates guy, guy falls in love with guy. it's one for the
03:56 ladies on Valentine's Day weekend. Australia. I loved Australia so much I started house hunting
04:04 while I was there and that's a true story. I started like look I got a realtor. Kath, one of
04:12 our continuity ladies who helps us out throughout the whole script with script continuity and
04:20 things. she had a friend who was a realtor and put me on to a friend because I was that serious
04:25 about like I'm giving up life. I'm just gonna surf with the Hemsworth's in Australia. I'm giving up
04:30 acting. I'm moving to Australia. that is my life from now on. it's wonderful. it's wonderful other
04:35 than the fact that everything there wants to kill you. all the animals want to kill you. the insects
04:40 want to bite you. the snakes, the spiders, the scorpions. it's terrifying. I actually have this
04:45 one story where Milo who plays sugar in the movie, Milo Ventimiglia, saved my life where I was
04:52 literally just chatting away to a director in between takes and you've always got the prop
04:57 departments messing with things, fixing, making sure everything looks right and Milo who's kind
05:01 of like the papa bear of the cast was kind of he's always kind of making sure things were looking
05:05 were good. he comes up behind me and he slaps me on the back and I was like that was a bit tough.
05:10 he comes around with his knife. there's a spider, a white tip spider stuck on the end of his knife
05:16 that he's stabbed in my back on my pack that was crawling up my back and just went saved your life
05:24 bro. a white tip spider if that bites you can leave you with a flesh-eating disease
05:30 and at worst case scenario it can actually kill. so I basically owe my life to Milo Ventimiglia.
05:37 he is a true hero and I couldn't love that man more. I just want to work with good people on
05:44 good projects and this project has enforced that because everyone from top down from you know the
05:52 producers that were there with you know the Avenue and Highland from the director Will Eubank, the
05:59 writer Debra Friggio, the cast, the crew were incredible. everyone was just so positive and
06:05 it just changes your whole day when you enjoy your work, when you enjoy the company of the people
06:11 around you and everyone's working so hard in the same direction it makes life better you know and
06:17 long may it continue you know. I've already kind of attached myself to more projects with the same
06:22 groups just because they know how to put a film on, they know how to make it a positive environment
06:28 and atmosphere you know and it's a no idiot policy and you know it's a beautiful thing to
06:36 see on a set because I've worked with some kind of toxic people in the past and it's nice to see
06:42 that they're being weeded out and people can feel safe on set you know. Landerbad was a safe place
06:47 both physically with all the explosions and the landscape that we had in Australia because
06:52 that you know we had a lot of people keeping us safe and checking the weapons and emptying the
06:57 chambers and things making sure everyone was on top of that but also you know mentally you know
07:02 they wanted to keep everyone you know energized and happy and they did that and so you know you
07:09 want to take that into every project. My friend's got a tattoo that says positivity breeds
07:15 positivity and that's something I live by. I always say that you pay an actor for the preparation
07:21 not the acting. We do the acting for free and so there was a very quick turnaround for this. Normally
07:26 you want to get in shape for this kind of role because it's very physically demanding but I
07:31 remember my rep sent me the script on the Friday night. I met with Will Eubank, the director, on a
07:36 Saturday via Zoom and I was in Australia Monday. There was no turnaround so it's lucky that I always
07:42 kind of stay in shape and ready prepared just in case something like this comes up. So physically
07:48 I was already kind of at a level and then it comes down to the training that the little bit of training
07:54 that we were able to do that the couple of weeks before we started filming with the Australian
07:58 Special Forces and that was kind of just going over making sure you know we were you know good
08:03 with the weapons, with tactics, with technical kind of things you know simple things like
08:08 the go-to when you're holding a rifle is this and then when a Special Forces
08:13 operative says if you put your elbow like that it's going to get shot off you tuck that real
08:19 quick. So Paul Kael who was Australian Special Forces was very quick to kind of train us and to
08:26 take all the bad habits out and to kind of make us a bit more proficient and so yeah that really
08:31 helped with our shooting, with our movements, with our hand signals and understanding you know
08:37 that if we were actually in the field this movie spans two days and our Paul Kael said that
08:45 you probably wouldn't even speak during this whole time but it's Hollywood so
08:51 obviously you have to have dialogue in there but yeah that training really did help
08:55 us feel comfortable you know because once you feel comfortable and you have trust
09:01 then you can feel safe because at the end of the day we are dealing with you know
09:04 controlled explosions but they're still explosions in landscape and stones can be
09:09 you know projected in any direction we're holding guns with blanks but we've seen in the past you
09:16 know you can never be a hundred percent certain you can be but accidents happen you never know
09:22 and so it was always great to kind of have that preparation those professionals all around us
09:27 making sure that we were safe so then you just focus on the acting you know so once you get
09:32 get all that prep, once you start acting, it's a piece of cake.
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