James Franco and David Ellison: Flyboys

We're locking eyes with two guys who look totally opposite but are equally adorable. Not too shabby. Hot James Franco of Spider-Man, Annapolis Tristan and Isolde fame, is dark and handsome. David Ellison, is the epitome of cute blonde, blue-eyed California surfer boy... only he's one of the top aerobatic pilots around and, at only 23, is one of Hollywood's youngest film producers. Oh, and he acts as well.

At the Santa Monica airport, press gathered in a hangar to talk with the stars and filmmakers of the new romantic action/adventure film Flyboys, a tale of the very first amazingly brave (and hot-looking) fighter pilots in the world; the World War I elite unit, the Lafayette Escadrille. We're talking good date movie here.

See, in 1916, there was a war in Europe against Germany and, before the U.S. got involved, some very young guys, looking for action and willing to fight for democracy, joined the French military, learned to fly tiny, very scary, very fragile bi-planes and the first "dogfights" in the air were born. Both Franco and Ellison are pilots. David has been flying since he was a kid and James learned for the film and now has his pilot's license. We had a fun chat with the duo about danger in the air while shooting, fun on the ground, tricks on horseback, working with lions and flying with The Blue Angels and Thunderbirds.

Picture this chat in an open airplane hangar housing stunt planes. There is a helicopter on the pad a few feet away and we watch take-offs of expensive private jets (we were told that Angelina Jolie was taking off with a crazed fan in pursuit). Lets talk with our two Flyboys....

TeenHollywood: David, you had two dreams converging in this film; being a pilot and acting. You also co-produced the movie.

David: It really was a dream come true the way this whole thing came together combining my two passions which was really great. I got involved as a producer before I got involved as an actor on the film. I went to film school at USC for three and a half years.

James: Just one more quarter, a semester [to go].

TeenHollywood: But, acting in Flyboys, how did that come about?

David: Tony (Bill, the director) approached me, after most of the other stuff was all sealed and finished, about being involved as an actor on it. And he was really adamant about having a real pilot in the movie, and I was a little apprehensive. At first, I said 'no' because I didn't want to ruin the film [he's very good in it] but I trusted that he and Dean (Devlin, Producer) knew what they were doing. I consider myself really lucky. I was involved with every stage. I went through editing, I went through composing. When we first got the script, the rewrites. It really becomes like your kid and you watch it as it evolves through all these different stages. That's one of the most rewarding things for me and I just hope to be able to continue to do that.

TeenHollywood: James, did you learn to fly for this film or after?

James: Well, [as a rule] I become kind of obsessive about research. I think part of it's just filling time. I signed onto this at least four months in advance, and Tony is a big pilot and he had some of his friends take me up in a Steerman out in this great little airport called Santa Paula, which I guess was a World War II base. They have these great old planes and I went up in this open cockpit plane, and did all the loops and everything, and it was a blast. So I thought, 'Well, I have the time, I might as well get my license', so I went every day and I got it.

TeenHollywood: Did you think about any other war movies or classic actors when you were preparing for the role?

James: One of my favorite actors is Steve McQueen, and he did a number of war films, and one in particular The War Lover he plays a pilot, and you just watch him in and around the plane, and it's so natural and detailed, because he was a real pilot, and so I hoped to try to come close to something like that, and it felt like maybe the only way was to just do it.

TeenHollywood: You've worn a uniform on a couple of occasions in different films about battle. What made you decide to do another one? What's the attraction? Of course the sky blue uniforms in this film look really hot.

James: [grinning] Yeah. My favorite is the light blue. In a war film it's like everything's on the line. The stakes are so high because of the situation, so, just off the bat, it is a place of great drama. But the guys I play, they are people that have volunteered to be there, and what they're volunteering is themselves, they're putting their lives on the line. And I can't say that I've ever done anything like that in my life. So, I have such great respect for them. I consider them heroes. They're volunteering for something they believe to be the right thing and they're willing to risk everything for that. I think that's really what this movie is about.

TeenHollywood: I know some of the flying sequences are computer-generated but a lot of the planes are real. How were those scenes shot? Did you have to really go up?

James: They had real pilots, these guys that make replicas of World War I planes, and I think everything's accurate except the instrumentation is a little bit more modern, and we'd go up with them in two-seaters. I'd been flying every day, and I'd done some aerobatics and all they want is the most exciting bits, so whenever you go up, you know you're going to be doing loops and everything else, When the weather is nice you're going to go up and do as much as possible, as quickly as possible, and so it got a little difficult after awhile. I never got sick, but that's when flying was a little less than pleasurable for me.

TeenHollywood: But were you ever in danger up there?

James: If you think flying is dangerous, I'm sure Dave has no fear about that kind of thing.

David: Well, when we were up there we weren't [in danger] but these planes roll 420 degrees a second. You flick your wrist and it responds. These airplanes are really rustic, and aviation had only been around for 10 years, so I know when the winds got picked up there were a couple of times where the pilots were a little worried, but never with an actor in the airplane.

James: Well. I did two days in this helicopter rig [Ellison and Franco both laugh at the memory]. They had a helicopter and they made this little seat that was attached outside so I was not in the helicopter. It looked like I was just sitting in the cockpit of a plane. The camera would be in the helicopter and I would be totally outside. And they went up and they fly me around. They're flying me right over the trees and I was like 'all right. I'm at their mercy and I guess if anything happens, it happens'.

TeenHollywood: Sounds frightening!

James: Then they wanted some clouds and there were no clouds except at six thousand feet or something. So, they're like 'let's go up'. We went up so quickly, I didn't realize how cold it actually was but it was the most piercing cold I've ever experienced. It got in my bones and it lasted all night. Then they shot me on one side and wanted the other side of my face so they moved the rig to the other side and [laughs] the French helicopter team, they were great, really excellent, but they started arguing in French and making gestures like the chair was going to fall off. 'He's not going up!' 'No, it's fine!' 'No. I'm not taking him up'. Eventually I guess they got it right but it was pretty intense.

TeenHollywood: This is a different experience than doing Spider-Man I guess.

David: That set would look pretty good after hanging off the side of a helicopter.

Franco: Yeah. In Spider-Man, nobody has to really swing from buildings.

TeenHollywood: David, your character has trouble shooting straight. Do you?

David: [laughs] I've never gotten the opportunity to shoot out of an airplane before except for in the movies, so I'm not sure to be honest.

TeenHollywood: What about researching the real guys, the real members of this elite flying unit?

David: I knew a decent amount about the time period when I read the script but there were a lot of details that I didn't know about. I got a book that actually had a 10-15 page biography on all the real people in the Lafayette Escadrille. One of the most interesting, rewarding parts for me was seeing how close to reality the film is. The one thing I swore was fake was the lion in the movie. I'd never thought that would be real. Then, on page three of the book I bought, there is a picture of two Lafayette Escadrille members holding two baby lion cubs.

James: There were actually two – there was Whiskey, and then they got another one called Soda.

TeenHollywood: Appropriate. How did you feel about filming with the lion, James?

James: There's one scene where I had to say goodbye to the lion and they wanted me to pet its head and everything, so it was the process of throwing it a piece of meat so its mouth was occupied, and I reached in there as quickly as possible but looked like it was a casual thing petting its head.[He laughs] It's de-clawed, but the teeth are still real. I think there was actually a time when I got in there [with it] but it was pretty friendly, and the producer, Dean Devlin, kind of fell in love with it, and actually got in the cage with it.

TeenHollywood: James, did you also read about the real fliers?

James: Yeah, one of the other great things about having Tony as a director, not only does he know his aviation, but he is one of the biggest book collectors, and he was such a great resource. The book David's talking about I think was put together by [Charles] Nordhoff and [James Norman] Hall who wrote 'Mutiny on the Bounty', and it's these two thick volumes just biographies of all these pilots, you couldn't ask for anything more. [noise from a plane taking off that sounds like shots!]

TeenHollywood: We're being straffed! [everyone kind of semi-ducks but James keeps talking]

James: The other thing about the movie, there hasn't really been a World War I aviation movie in a long time. I think the last one was The Blue Max [A George Peppard movie made in 1966].

TeenHollywood: These young pilots were either crazy or super-brave. Do we still have that kind of all out bravery today to go fly when you know you may only have a three week life expectancy? Do young guys still have that?

David: I think they absolutely do. I've got a couple of friends that actually fly over Iraq right now, flying off of the ships. Those guys believe a hundred percent that they are doing the right thing. They put heart monitors on the guys when they flew during the Vietnam war. The heart rates of the pilots were higher when landing at night on the carrier deck than when they were actually getting shot at. You don't have air combat over there but these guys are putting their lives on the line every day for something they believe in. You have people like that. I think the bravado and heroism is still right there.

TeenHollywood: James, are you still flying now?

James: Yeah. I have my license. I trained on a Cessna and, only later did I realize that I could train on a faster plane. Dave, what did you learn on? An Extra 300 L?

Ellison: Yeah. I still have that airplane that's behind you right there. It's an Extra 300 L. (a very cute, fast-looking red plane that is parked in the hangar behind us).

Franco: So, I feel a little ripped off. Tony (Bill) has a Marquetti which is a much faster single-prop plane. Then, recently Dave and I went up with The Blue Angels and The Thunderbirds and I hadn't been flying for a while and it was a whole different kind of flying. It made me want to go back.

TeenHollywood: (To David) Would you go up with him?

David : Yeah. We went up. We've been doing a lot of aviation promotional stuff so we had the airplane painted up and are doing formation flights with The Blue Angels and The Thunderbirds and we got to fly with them.

TeenHollywood: While they were doing their wild stunts?

David: Oh yeah. We went through everything.

TeenHollywood: (We're freaked. Let's change the subject) James, the cute 'getting to know you' scenes between you and love interest Jennifer Decker were great but do you really not speak French and she doesn't speak English?

James: At the time, she really didn't speak much English and I took a year and a half of French at UCLA but I'd lost a lot of it. So, those scenes are really her and I trying to communicate. I think it added a new level of reality. They were kind of scripted but, Tony was like 'just try to communicate'. So, some of it was kind of improvised and those are some of my favorite scenes in the movie just because of how real they feel to me.

TeenHollywood: You filmed in England. Did you have any time to cut loose after the shoot and visit the pubs? (The guys both grin)

James: It was a tight shooting schedule but, on the weekends, everybody went out and had a good time but it was a lot of work.

TeenHollywood: What are you doing now or next?

James: I just finished a movie called Camille with Sienna Miller. It's kind of a quirky love story about these two kind of crazy Kentucky kids, kind of a road trip.

TeenHollywood: So, no military uniforms?

James: No, but I wore the same tuxedo for the whole movie.

TeenHollywood: What about your horseback riding in this film?

James: Well, I did Tristan and Isolde and for that movie I had about eight months in advance so I rode every day and, after you do it that long you kind of want to make it exciting so I learned how to do some tricks. I do a couple in this movie but I have more in my repertoire but it just didn't really fit in the movie.

TeenHollywood: Horseback riding, flying. What's next?

James: I'm thinking about shark fishing.

TeenHollywood: Do you guys ever talk to Travolta or Harrison Ford.. those actors with pilots' licenses?

Ellison: I saw Harrison. Ford's a really big part of Young Eagles [which teaches] young kids how to fly. They've flown a million kids by 2001. They are on to one million three hundred thousand by now. Kurt Russell actually helped me get a hangar here [at the Santa Monica airport]. But those guys are really nice. Of course, whenever you get around the airport with a bunch of pilots, there's really only one thing you talk about, just flying.

TeenHollywood: James, clear up a rumor. On the new Spider-Man, was there a lot of stuff to re-shoot?

James: Oh, there was some quote that was much ado about nothing about some test screenings that never took place and that there wasn't enough action. That was a lot of baloney. I think I was asked 'what are you going to be re-shooting?' and I just said 'some action scenes that were already in it that we're just filling out a bit'. I haven't gone back yet.

TeenHollywood: Do you have a super villain name in this one? There was speculation online that you are Green Goblin 2 or Hobgoblin or a goblin of some sort.

James: [grinning] I can't really say.

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