00:00The way I describe Nobody is if I saw a trailer and it starred Brad Pitt, I'd be like,
00:04oh yeah, I'm gonna go see that movie, but because it stars Bob Winkirk, I'm like, fuck yeah, I'm gonna see that movie.
00:15Derek Holstead wrote Nobody.
00:18I picked up the idea of me being in an action film.
00:22That was my idea.
00:23We met and we just started geeking out about what we could do in that space, you know?
00:28And we came up with a pitch first.
00:31We pitched it to, we collected probably 31 no's, you know?
00:35A lot of people love the idea, but they're like, Bob, we'll shift you to EP.
00:38And we were like, no, no, you're gonna need a star.
00:41And ultimately, it was just perfect timing.
00:43We found ourselves landing it at Universal and it became real.
00:47So that was like two years into, three years into Better Call Saul that Derek and I met.
00:52And, yeah, and then Ben, we met for Normal, for this film.
01:00Yeah, and that was, it took a long time for us all to meet because of the world of Zoom.
01:05So the days of flying, thankfully for the rainforest, the days of flying out to Hollywood and flying back for meetings have gone.
01:12So it's all, all done digitally.
01:15So, yeah, I met them all in Winnipeg.
01:18We cooked the idea of Normal up while we were shooting nobody.
01:22And then when the script came together, we sent it to Ben Wheatley.
01:27It was Derek's idea, this story, about a town where something's off and this guy is the temporary sheriff.
01:37He's meant to fill in, but he's meant to leave shortly.
01:41But he sort of senses that something is awry or weird.
01:46And Derek cooks up tons of action films, plots, and stories.
01:52He shared three of them with me, I believe, that day.
01:56And I read this one and I said, that one's intriguing and funny because a small town where there's something crazy going on.
02:07Yeah, I just like, I'm from Naperville, Illinois.
02:10I grew up in Illinois.
02:12I went to college at Carbondale.
02:13I'm just, I know small towns and I have a great affection for them, but I also find them to be oddball places often times.
02:24When you had the idea to be in an action movie, had that been long simmering?
02:31No.
02:31Did it come to you one day?
02:32It was a total brain fart that came when I was riding my bike around Albuquerque.
02:39I was shooting Better Call Saul and I would ride my bike for hours on a Saturday to kind of decompress.
02:46And my brother-in-law had sent me a photo still of a Better Call Saul ad on a television set in China.
02:53And I thought, well, they're watching me in China.
02:55What kind of film could I make that plays around the world, action plays around the world?
03:00And then I started doing the math on the character I played, how they knew me.
03:03And I thought, all you've got to do is add the fighting to that guy.
03:07And I called Mark from my bike.
03:11I stopped, called him.
03:13I have an idea.
03:14I played this character and they're watching me in China and you think we could do an action movie?
03:19Totally ready for him to laugh at me.
03:21I was in front of the Dairy Queen in Albuquerque and I was going to get a Dairy Queen.
03:27And he goes, I see what you mean.
03:32I see what you mean.
03:33I couldn't believe he didn't tell me to get back on my bike and fucking ride.
03:38I think it wasn't so much the action side of it.
03:41It was more just Bob Odenkirk.
03:44And then it was Derek Coldestad.
03:45And I was like, oh, yeah, oh, and yeah.
03:47And that was it.
03:49And also it was, you know, I love cinema and I love doing lots of different genres and stuff.
03:54And so when I, and I'd always had a cowboy movie in my mind, a western.
03:59And this was like, oh, it's kind of a western.
04:02It's a neo-western.
04:03And it's got, you know, it's like an inverted high noon, effectively.
04:07So that was why I really enjoyed it.
04:09Ben, you mentioned another film that I saw, Bad Day at Black Rock.
04:14Yeah, yeah.
04:14And I, because I had never seen it.
04:16Oh, you're not?
04:16Oh, yeah.
04:17Yeah.
04:17But it's got DNA.
04:19That vibe to that, hasn't it?
04:21Bad Day at Black Rock, which is a Spencer Tracy film, western.
04:26It definitely has DNA with that classic film.
04:30Have you regretted, even for a flash, putting yourself in the role of action star?
04:36You know, waving guns around is always a tricky question in the modern world.
04:43But I think you always, it is a film and you want it to be exciting.
04:48And I love watching action on film.
04:52So that always becomes a question of who's the bad guy?
04:56Why are we doing the, you know, why is this happening?
04:58What's the conceptual level of violence?
05:02You know, so that's the thing where I ask questions about.
05:05Is there some thematic value to this story and even to the fight itself?
05:12And Derek's great about thinking about those questions and trying to, you know, offer a story that has a validity and value beyond just the fun of it.
05:24Yeah.
05:24That's all of our time.
05:25Okay, cool.
05:26I appreciate you guys.
05:27I appreciate you guys.
05:28I appreciate you guys.
05:29I appreciate you guys.
05:30I appreciate you guys.
05:31I appreciate you guys.
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05:33I appreciate you guys.
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05:35I appreciate you guys.
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05:40I appreciate you guys.
05:41I appreciate you guys.
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05:52I appreciate you guys.
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