Christopher Mintz-Plasse Wants to Kick Ass

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Parent Category: Film and the Arts

Category: Interviews

Published on Saturday, 17 April 2010 11:04

Written by Brad Balfour

Finally, a costumed crime-fighter film that's honest. In Kick-Ass, there's none of this smarmy above-it-all New York Times crit shit -- this is a comic book fan's movie, one for those who used to draw their own stories in grade school.

Q: Were you familiar with writer Mark Millar’s work and comic books in general?

CM-P: I wasn't too familiar. My dad has been a huge comic book fan since the '70s; he's got [more than a] thousand in our garage and by the toilet, something to read when he's going number two, and by his chair.

He's a massive Mark Millar fan, and I know I've read some of his comics back in the day, but I can't quite remember. Once I got the movie, my dad was so excited. He flew to London to hang out with Mark actually for a couple of days. He was very excited for that.

Q: In the comic, your character is quite a bit different. How did you get to be Red Mist?

CM-P: He's tougher, more the bad boy. I think Matthew [Vaughn, the director] wanted to change that because he wanted my [character's] father to be the main bad guy. So he wanted me to be kind of the son that's never the son his father wanted him to be. And he always wants to be in the family business, but then he created Red Mist. He's smarter; he creates it to lure Kick-Ass to him. I think it's very genius.

Q: Given your [real-life] father's [fan-boy] proclivities, did you get John Romita Jr. to do any drawings or artwork for him?

CM-P: Of course. The funny thing is that, 10 years ago, actually more like 12 years ago, my dad ... he can kind of draw, and my brother is a huge Iron Man fan, so he painted a mural of Iron Man on my brother's wall. It was actually Johnny Romita's Iron Man that he copied. So he took a picture of it, printed it out, brought it to the set, Johnny signed it, and then my dad also brought like 50 comics for Mark to sign. I felt really bad. But he was really excited about that.

Q: I heard that someone thought that Red Mist is sort of like Adam Lambert.

CM-P: I was going for the David Bowie look, and then some asshole was like, "Hey you look like Adam Lambert," and I'm like, "You ruined it all for me, man." I don't want that; that's not what I think.

Q: What was your inspiration for playing that character?

CMP: The Chris D'Amico part is very tame and low-key; he's always looking for his father's acceptance. Then when he created Red Mist, he allows his alter ego to come out: freer, smoking weed, blasting music and dancing with Kick-Ass. That more party side to him is what I was going for.

Q: One interesting thing about Kick-Ass is that it's about regular guys or kids. You spend a lot of time in that costume. Did you have some kind of training?

CM-P: I didn't have to do too much training. Chloe did a lot of training for this movie. But I hated that costume. It was awful. The first day it was amazing because I look so cool in it, and then after that you wear it for 12 hours a day and sweat non-stop, so you've got to just keep hydrated. Then the cape was tied very tight around my arms, and it would cut and I would get bruises and weird rashes in places. It was very, very uncomfortable.

Q: Aaron has discussed the jock strap problem of the costumes.

CM-P: Yes. And he had a one-piecer too, so it was very hard for him to go to the bathroom.

Q: Was there just one costume?

CM-P: They had two or three of them. They had one just regular and then they had one dirty one for the warehouse scene, when it burns down and [the uniform] gets all smoky and dirty. And they had two regular ones.

Q: Any regrets that you didn't get to be massively trained by all the wonderful stunt people?

CM-P: There's always that. But then four months into it, I'm just sitting there eating a sandwich and drinking a coke while [Chloe's] stressing out and working so hard. I was just kind of kicking back. But if there is a sequel -- knock on wood -- if there is one, I think I would train for that one and do some pretty cool stuff.

Q: Is it interesting to do an action movie where you might not usually be considered for that kind of role?

CM-P: Yeah, that's why I got excited when they sent me the script. And then I read it and I was like, "Oh, my part doesn't even do any action." But to be a part of something like this is amazing because these are my favorite kinds of movies, very well-done action movies.

Q: Do you ever worry about getting typecast?

CM-P: Not yet. In Superbad  I was kind of a nerdy character, and [in] Role Models [I] was kind of a nerdy character, but polar opposites. The McLovin character was very confident, and in Role Models he just had no friends. In Kick-Ass, he's not really a nerd or anything, so I'm not too worried yet.

Q: Was there any concern that the amount of X-rated language and violence was going to limit the audience?

CM-P: In my opinion, if I heard people complaining about a movie having too much violence, I'd be like, "Fuck, yeah, that's good, I want to go see that movie even more."

Q: But in terms of the ratings...

CM-P: I don't know. I don't listen to that kind of stuff because whoever it is that's complaining, they haven't seen the movie.

Q: In the UK, where it's out, there's been a lot of controversy.

CMP: Really? Who's doing it?

Q: One of the critics was saying...

CM-P: Oh, is it the Daily Mail ? They bash on everything, though. Fuck that [newspaper]. You can quote me on that -- "I don't care, man."

I just have to say, it's a comic book movie, it's all taken from the comic. If you have a problem with the movie, then you have a problem with the comic. There's nothing we can do about it. That's your fault for not enjoying the movie.

Q: Do you worry about kids imitating it?

CM-P: You'd have to be pretty stupid to imitate what happens in this movie. There aren't going to be any 11-year-old girls going out and trying to murder people. I know that. Or maybe there will be.

Q: The swearing wasn't really bothersome; it was more the violence.

CM-P: See that's the thing. People are always like, "Oh, you swear," and I'm like, "What about the violence?" I'm glad you say that, because people are always worried about the swearing; but she murders people.

Q: Was it weird to see her on set doing that stuff?

CM-P: It was awesome. It was so cool to witness it backstage and happening right there. It was very cool, very exciting for her.

Q: But 16-year-old vigilantes... You can see this little girl going after Mafiosos.

CM-P: I guess so. Do it at your own risk. I'm not promoting it. I don't want people to do it, but if they do it there's nothing I can do.

Q: So who do you think is going to see Kick-Ass? You've got the kids' faces everywhere, but it's an R-rated movie.

CM-P: I'm hoping we get the teenagers. Teenage boys are going to love it. My dad loves it; comic book fans are going to love it. We just did a screening in London, an all-girls screening, and they loved it.

Q: How old were they?

CM-P: Different ages; 20 to like 40 or 50. Aaron's a very cute guy, so I'm hoping girls will want to go see him [as well].

Q: Did you actually get to drive the Mistmobile?

CM-P: Yeah. That sucked because it was a stick shift, and I'd never driven a stick shift. So I had to learn on that car and it was like a $200,000 car. And if I wrecked it I'd have to pay for it. I'm getting all nervous and clammy right now just thinking about it.

Q: They didn't have insurance on it?

CM-P:They did. But Matthew [Vaughn] threatened me anyway.

Q: You didn't get to borrow it and take it out on a date?

CM-P: I didn't want to. I didn't want to touch that thing; I didn't want that on my hands.

Q: Were there a lot of pranks played on the set while you were making this movie?

CM-P: There were more pranks on Role Models. There weren't any pranks on the set.

Q: What was the vibe?

CM-P: Very relaxed, very fun. The thing is with Matthew, he has the same crew that he worked with from Stardust and Layer Cake. He always works with the same people, so you come in there and it's already a family. And they just accepted me right away and Chloe and Aaron; it was amazing.

Q: What about working with such a fierce character actor as Mark Strong?

CM-P: He's amazing; he always plays the villain in the movie, but you come in and he's just the sweetest, most down-to-earth guy. He's always got his family on set -- his two little kids and his wife. But actually, not on the violent days; he wouldn't have them be there. He didn't want them to see him beat the shit out of a girl. A very amazing, talented actor. I was excited to work with him.

Q: Did you take any notes from him?

CM-P: You just kind of watch. He's a different actor than I am. It's hard to take what he's doing because he's got his own thing and I've got my own thing. But we improved a little bit off each other, and you just kind of watch his facial expressions and learn from that.

Q: Were you free to improvise?

CM-P: A little bit. It's not like in Superbad and Role Models [where we] improv'd every scene pretty much. This movie was very straight to the script because action movies, you've got to keep them going. You can't improv an action scene; that won't work. But there were scenes when Aaron and I were driving in the Mistmobile and they let us do a little improv in there.

Q: Did you have a favorite gun? Would you want to take one home?

CM-P: I like the Barretta 50-caliber or whatever it's called. It's like a sniper gun. If I could have one of those I would be unstoppable.

Q: Not the bazooka?

CM-P: No, that would blow me away. That would push me back like 15 feet.

Q: I heard your dancing in that one scene was improvised.

CM-P: It was, yeah. There was no choreography; if there was choreography I would have been embarrassed. Matthew just put on 15 minutes of music. Gnarls Barkley... I was actually dating a girl out there that was in a band and he would kind of fuck with me and throw her band on while we were trying to dance, so that was fun. And then a bunch of other music and we just kind of grooved and danced.

Q: So we heard you're going to be a motherfucker?

CM-P: It's way too far in the future to know. I know that Mark is writing Kick-Ass 2 in a couple of weeks and he wants to change Red Mist's name to The Motherfucker, which I think is hilarious.

If they make the movie that will be very uncomfortable because people will be like, "Aren't you that Motherfucker?" I'll be like, "Those are fighting words, man. Don't be doing that." So we'll see what happens.

Q: I heard that the premise for the name change is just so that people can stop calling you McLovin.

CM-P: That's Mark, man; he's a genius like that.

Q: Will you be glad to not be called McLovin?

CM-P: Oh, it doesn't matter to me. For the rest of my life people are going to remember me [for that]... Hopefully they remember me for that character because that was my first movie ever, it put me on the map.

I got to do Kick-Ass and Role Models and all these movies I've worked on, so I'm always forever grateful for that.

Q: What else do you have coming out to balance out your career?

CM-P: I just had an animated movie that was released that did very well -- How to Train Your Dragon — and then I’ve got another voiceover for Marmaduke coming out. After that I have a few scripts that hopefully I'm going to be attached to. We’ll see when I get back to Los Angeles.

Q: What are you doing in Marmaduke?

CM-P: The voice of a little puppy. I love doing voiceover; I've done two of those now. And I love feature films, so whatever. If it's a good project I'm in for it.

Q: What about stage work?

CM-P: I’ve done theater since I was seven or eight, I believe, and I love that. I love the feeling of being in front of a live audience and doing that, so I would always be willing to do that.

Q: Have you ever wanted to do stand-up?

CM-P: I've never done stand-up. I’ve never written anything, and you have to write your own jokes, obviously, so if I do stand-up it will be a ways away.

Q: You could just improv it.

CM-P: That’s hard, man, very hard. I’ll do improve with other people, but stand-up comedy is just too stressful.

Q: Are you more likely to go into something like stand-up or to push into drama faster?

CM-P: Probably drama. To be honest, I probably won't do stand-up. And I'm always up for doing improv because I used to do improv with three of my good friends back in high school, and that’s always a lot of fun. But I want to try some drama.

Q: You're in that series of shorts, Untitled Comedy?

CM-P: Yes. [Put together by] the Farrelly brothers, that’s right.

Q: Do you know when that’s going to come out?

CM-P:There's no due date yet. I think they're still filming a couple, if I remember correctly. But my short is with Chloe, actually, so we got to work again on that.

Q: Can you tell us a little bit about what that’s about?

CM-P: Liz Banks directed [my segment], so it was very exciting to get to work with her again as well [after working together in Role Models] and with Patrick Warburton, Matt Walsh, Jimmy Bennett, and Chloe. It's about Chloe is dating my younger brother, and I'm like the douche-bag 20-year-old brother who's an asshole. Chloe gets her period for the first time, and she’s around three dudes who have no idea what to do [about it].

Q: Does Patrick Warburton play your father?

CM-P: He's my father and he's fucking good in it, man. It's amazing.

Q: Are you going to write and direct in the future?

CM-P:I have no idea. Two of my best friends are really good screenwriters, so when I get back I think I'm going to try to write with them. But that's very hard ahead in the future.

For more by Brad Balfour: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brad-balfour

 

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