The Chronicles of Vin

Hunky "Fast and Furious" strongman Vin Diesel was having a very long day. It was 8:00 pm and he'd been talking to the press all day about his huge new sci-fi epic film The Chronicles of Riddick, a sequel to the cult hit Pitch Black. The actor sort of stumbled into our interview room at Beverly Hills' Four Seasons hotel and crashed on the floor for a while, then perked up and was ready to graciously answer all our questions.

Action hero Vin, in a comedy and a musical? He's doing the comedy and would love to do a musical. We learned that the studly actor is a workaholic and started in the biz by writing, directing and starring in a short film and considers "Riddick" a dream project come true whether or not it's successful. He started his own video game company to further the Riddick universe. The chrome-dome actor only wants to act in films that he really believes in, including one in which he plays Hannibal, the ancient adventurer who crossed the Alps on elephants! Let's tune in.....

Vin: (on entering the room) Hi, how are you? Oh my God, I'm shot. I'm shot. (He lies down on the floor, then recovers and joins us).

TeenHollywood: You got your big break writing and directing a short called Multi-Facial.

Vin: Yes, it was shown at Cannes in 1995, Steven Spielberg saw it and wrote a role for me in Saving Private Ryan.

TeenHollywood: How does it feel to journey from then to now?

Vin: I started acting at seven years old.   It took me 20 years to understand that if I was going to make my dreams a reality, I had to take the reigns. I had to learn something about being productive and being self-sufficient, but I had to be productive at all costs and I had to make product. I was going around, telling everyone I was an actor but, unless you were coming to a theatrical play I was in, you would never know.

TeenHollywood: So making that short was a tool?

Vin: The short was an artistic expression. I wanted to make movies. And that was the release of that desire, that drive. So what successful people know and what I learned was if you can't do it all, do what you can. So I wrote a 20-minute short film. I wrote it in five days, and I used the means that I had accessible.

TeenHollywood: Is the guy sitting here different than the man then?

Vin: That's debatable.

TeenHollywood: Here's a blast from your past. Is it true you're really into Dungeons and Dragons?

Vin: For some reason, they thought that I played D&D for 20 years. They thought that I spent years playing Barbarians, Witchunters from the Arcanum. They thought I still played D&D back in the '70s when it's just the basic D&D set. They thought I continued to play D&D when it became Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. They thought I played D&D when there were only three books - the Player's Handbook, the Manual and the DM's Guide. They thought I played D&D as it continued onto the Unearthed Arcanum, Oriental Adventures, Sea Adventures, Wilderness Adventures. They thought I played D&D at the time when Deities and Demigods was the brand new book. They thought I played D&D when I used to get up to a place called The Complete Strategist in New York. (Vin then says very quietly) I'm into D&D a lot.

TeenHollywood: But not now?

Vin: Well, there was some sighting that I was at Wizards on the Coast buying $800 worth of books. It was a training ground for a lot of my adventures.

TeenHollywood: Did you bring that fantasy element to Riddick?

Vin: Where do you think Elementals come from? Air Elementals. Of course the attributes have been augmented a little bit for Dame Judi Dench, but the concept of elementals came from Dungeons and Dragons. The concept of creating a world of neutrality.

TeenHollywood: Why was it important for you to revisit this character from the film Pitch Black?

Vin: 'Cause he's the coolest f***ing character I've ever come across.  He's the quintessential antihero. We all know how much I love antiheroes. It takes 45 minutes in the movie just for Riddick to understand the word heroism. Let alone for anyone to hope that he can be heroic. That's cool. That's real. You can invest in this guy's spiritual growth. He's a guy that embraces that indifference and doesn't care what anybody thinks about it, who wants to be left alone. He's a guy that thinks that anything that happens with the universe has nothing to do with him and he doesn't care. That's kind of cool.

TeenHollywood: Do you relate to him?

Vin: Somewhat. I relate to his defiance. Yeah, you know I had a problem with authority, it's no secret.

TeenHollywood: You passed on doing XXX 2, so how much is at stake for this franchise to take off?

Vin: I don't see it like that. This wasn't like creating a movie. This was like creating a universe. I've already won. The idea that I was able to do this from nothing is- - --I was literally playing Dungeons and Dragons with Judi Dench and Karl Urban at nights after shooting. I will tell you that I was showing her Dungeons and Dragons books and showing her the different properties of elementals. Call me crazy.

TeenHollywood: Did you work with writer/director David Twohy on the script?

Vin: David Twohy is incredibly proficient in the sci-fi world which I don't know that much about. I'm a fantasy guy. So I brought the fantasy element to the picture, he brought the sci-fi and it came together. You see that in every aspect of the film. If you watch the film, the very movements and mannerisms and fighting styles and lurching through the air is right out of a Frank Frazetta (a fantasy artist) book. When you see Riddick flying, it may as well be a Frazetta painting.

TeenHollywood: What is your Riddick workout?

Vin: I was training with a UFC guy, Ultimate Fighting Championship fighter. I got (to the set) two months early and started training in a fighting style called Kali which originated in Spain and then brought to the Philippines by Spanish traders. It's a fighting style that's just now beginning to catch wind. It calls for ambidextrous two handed fighting. And that's what we studied. I went up two months early to learn this fighting style.

TeenHollywood: This is a huge film that's all centered on you. Does that make you nervous?

Vin: Well, for some reason, I was more nervous last night [at the premiere] than I have ever been on any premiere. I was nervous because it was something that I had been working on for five years that has been such a labor of love and that made me anxious for some reason. Having said that, the second I finished my first day of shooting with Judi Dench, I won. I had accomplished a real goal (to work with her). The second the studio green lit this epic that didn't spawn from a book that was in existence for 50 years, that didn't come from a comic book character and was completely an original project, I felt like I was satisfied.

TeenHollywood: You don't usually come to premieres with a date or guest. Why is that?

Vin: Because, if it were up to me, I wouldn't even go- - if it were up to me, no one would even see me before the movie. Because I want you to enjoy the experience and I want you to buy into the character as much as possible. I don't want to bring any of my personal stuff and crowd anyone's mind before they sit down and get into the experience. I feel like it would only cheat. I've tried to stay away from that.

TeenHollywood: Sounds like you are a bit nervous about fame.

Vin: It's a double edged sword. The more successful your film is, the more famous you become.   And we all think of fame as being oh, great, wonderful. The wonderful thing about fame is the bankability that comes with it and the ability to do things like The Chronicles of Riddick. The tricky part is that your private life is that much more threatened.

TeenHollywood: Did you get everything you wanted about your character into the film?

Vin: Well, thank God I created a company called Tigon Studios which created the video game where I was able to add 25 minutes of story, so you see what he's been doing on the snow covered planet for five years. You witness the point in his life where his eyes are transformed and how that happens. There are things that I wanted to see in the film that, thank God for DVD, you can incorporate into the DVD. The theatrical experience is dictated by so many elements. If it were up to me, it'd be a four hour movie.

TeenHollywood: XXX was very successful. Why did you pass on XXX 2?

Vin: I never do sequels in a reactionary way. I don't mean that to be holier than thou. But, when I was done doing the first XXX, at the end of production, when I would brush my teeth at times, I would see these two blue (Riddick) eyes staring back at me in the mirror, which was an indication it was time to revisit The Chronicles of Riddick. I didn't have the rights to the wonderful Tolkien books that inspired us all to play D&D. I didn't have the rights to comic book characters. I wanted to create a modern day futuristic mythology.

TeenHollywood: Are you considering doing Fast and the Furious 3?

Vin: I haven't seen a script and it would be unfair for me to say that I would rule something out without seeing the script.

TeenHollywood: You are doing a comedy. What is The Pacifier about?

Vin: It's a comedy with kids. They made my character direct a stage performance of "Sound of Music", maybe because of my love of musicals. I don't know.

TeenHollywood: So would you do a musical?

Vin: I would love to do "Guys and Dolls".

TeenHollywood: You are wearing a bracelet with elephants on it. Is this for your dream project Hannibal?

Vin: (smiles slyly) I've been riding elephants. David Franzoni handed in an incredible script and you know what Franzoni has written, Gladiator and Amistad. Sylvaine Dupris, who is Ridley Scott's storyboard artist and storyboarded Gladiator has been working with me for the last month. I'm planning to do a multi-lingual version of Hannibal the Conqueror. In the ancient times, they were all speaking Greek and Italian obviously, Roman for the Romans, an ancient version of French for the Gauls, an old ancient Latin for Spain etc. One of Hannibal's greatest attributes was that he was able to amass an army of all these broken people (from different countries) to fight tyranny at the time.

TeenHollywood: Do you feel responsibility to young people in the roles you pick?

Vin: I think that I have to choose quality pieces and I think my responsibility (to everyone) is to dedicate myself wholeheartedly to these pictures, which is not a problem because I'm a workaholic.

TeenHollywood: Okay, people are saying they saw you when you were very young with a weird hairdo in a breakdancing video. True?

Vin: Hey, you know, I used to be a street performer in New York. I swear to you. When Flashdance was out, I was doing it in the streets.

***

Lynn Barker is a Hollywood-based entertainment journalist and produced screenwriter.