So these interviews really aren't "lost" unless you count being hid in some sub-sub-sub-file on my computer lost. However I did have a chance to sit down with the cast of Iron Man at last year's San Diego Comic-Con where I participated in roundtables. Though a year later, some of this information has yet to hit the web; so I thought I'd share with you some of the questions I decided to ask the crew. Roundtables are a funny creature, because you have the ‘talent’ stuck between you and seven or so other people. I usually just spoke up first, hit them with a question, and sat back. Here are three questions I shot at Terrence Howard, Jon Favreau, and Robert Downey, Jr..
Terrence Howard, as most PULSE readers know, plays James Rhodey in the film. Longtime Iron Man fans know Rhodey also assumed the mantle Iron Man then, later, War Machine in the comic books. I asked Howard, not counting Blade, because he's not really a "superhero," how it felt to possibly become the first black male superhero on film.
Howard replied, "I feel like Sidney Poitier and Jackie Robinson right here. I got to do what they pushed the envelope on for so many years. I'm held responsible at the same time for how [Rhodey] is conducted, because, perhaps in the future, [Marvel Studios] will green-light other characters of other ethnicities. But I never thought about it like that. I never recognized it like that."
Glad to know I could humble the man’s thoughts as he could possibly be the first black male superhero on-screen from any of the Big Two comic companies.
When it came time for Robert Downey, Jr. there's already been tons of comparisons to how his own lifestyle somewhat mirrored that of his character, Tony Stark. What I wanted to know from him if there was anything that Downey felt he got to bring to the character?
"I can say that we are similar," Downey, Jr. said. "[Tony Stark's] in better shape, he's smarter, and he's probably a lot more quintessentially manly at the end of the day than I am. I don't know how you play that. It's not like I use a different voice or something. I'm an American guy and a citizen of the world, and there's plenty of role models for that stuff. I'm a film lover - and I can Steve McQueen in The Great Escape or [Clint] Eastwood in Kelly's Heroes - any of that stuff, and the motivation comes on."
I asked director Jon Favreau his thoughts on acting in a comic book film [Daredevil] versus directing Iron Man and which he preferred. Favreau said that directing was simply the way to go. "[As director] I can always stick myself in the movie as you saw." Those of you who saw the film know that Favreau played Tony Stark's driver Happy Hogan in the film. "And I was very happy to be in the movie," he noted.
Iron Man remained the #1 movie in the country this past weekend, for the second week in a row. However, will he remain invincible when the anticipated sequel to The Chronicles of Narnia and the long-awaited final chapter in the Indiana Jones saga hits? Upcoming weeks will tell.
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