Henry Rollins can talk.
And hes a good talker.
Anyone who has heard any of his radio shows or spoken word records will already know that.
Rollins plays an enigmatic character named Jack, who seems to be fairly bored with life.
Youve been acting for a while now.
So how did they reach out to you about starring inHe Never Died?
Was it just a script that showed up?
She said, Attached is a PDF, its a script, I just read it, its amazing.
Drop what youre doing and read it right now.
Im like, Okay.
So I readHe Never Died, the script.
I would do it this way, that way.
Theres a laugh there.
Violence but thats still funny.
I love it when violence and funny goes together.
I wrote her back, I read it.
Damn, its really good.
She said, The producer and director are in town.
They really want you to do this.
The writer wrote that with you in mind.
But she said, Theyd like to meet you.
The next day I met them across the street from Joes Pub at the Starbucks at Astor Plaza.
Really nice guys, just really cool people and they said, What do you think?
What do you say?
And I said, Im in.
They said, We use your name to get financing.
I said, Youre screwed.
Youre going to get a dollar fifty and Ill help you out with that.
Youre not going to get dime one.
And Zach (Hagen, the producer) said, No, you watch.
Were going to make this happen.
We looked for this goal, we met it, were moving forward.
This is going to happen.
I just dont believe anything good will ever happen.
I just didnt believe it, yet every weekend I would read the script over and over again.
I really didnt believe the movie would get made because nothing that good ever happens to me.
However, I wanted to be ready if it did, and I liked it so much.
A few months in, it became clear that this is going to happen.
They had gone over the threshold of the money they needed.
They are kind of the 55-yard line.
They are getting it together.
I was in disbelief.
Then the autumn of 2013 comes around and guess what?
Were casting and get ready, were going to be shooting in a month.
Suddenly, were all in Toronto together… Because I assume youre fairly booked up at any given time for months in advance.
This is going to happen, so keep your schedule clear.
Dont get me wrong.
Keep the schedule open.
I dont like having an open schedule; I like a densely-packed schedule that ruins me.
So I said, I think hes going to get it done.
She said, Youre going to do this movie.
And then Jason and I, we worked through all the stunt stuff.
I wanted Jack to fight in a certain way.
I said to the stunt peopleand they were already a mile ahead of meHes really efficient.
Hes been killing people and fighting for hundreds of years so theres no bad punches.
Its just (makes punching sound effects)he just needs it over.
They said, Were all on the same page.
and they had to teach it to me 80 times.
What history is informing this line?
and he would give me this weird backstory.
800 years ago Jack did this and thats why hes saying that so Im writing it all down.
Jack is about 99% awful.
I have to right that wrong.
I cant let her twist in the wind.
(Karas) a woman who got screwed by life, out of her restaurant, shes a waitress.
I can help her.
Take my money, help me save my kid.
The two women basically save Jack, for now.
The next day Jack goes right back to ripping peoples throats out.
Theres that one scene in the apartment where I chase my daughter out and she doesnt understand why.
Thats the 99% awful part.
I guess one of them was onDegrassi Junior High?
Both of them do very well.
So shes a beloved TV personality in Canada.
We were very lucky.
They were not busy at the time.
They had a month and they were cast and off we went.
And all of our bad guys were great.
It was an all Canadian crew except for our principal camera man and our directoreveryone else is a Canuck.
The reason is not that hes a mellow guy.
Youve dealt with New Yorkerstheyll drive you nuts after a while.
You live here for a period and youre like, Okay Im going to murder everyone.
What if you had 2,000 years of that?
Where like, Oh, another war?
Oh, youre building more prisons.
Youd be so done with people, because were so one note.
Human history, we havent changed that much.
Oh, we stole from that guy and a war started.
Gee, that never happened before.
Thats why we repeat history because we have no idea how much we repeat history.
Well never learn from history, theres nothing to learn from.
If I have to take it from you, Ill go there.
Thats why he likes bingo because theyre all pensioners.
And he keeps it in the lettuce crisper in the bottom.
We built in a backstory.
Probably leaves $100 like, Here, Ive got drawers of these, take it.
Im related to someone.
Shes on my easy chair.
And shes the typical daughter.
What are we doing today, Dad?
To me, thats funny, so I played the tired dad thing because hes not into it.
Thats why I lunged at it.
I read the script backstage at Joes and laughed out loud.
It doesnt have to beA Streetcar Named Desirebecause Im not Brando.
Im fine with being in a movie about Here come the bugs!
Put a plastic bug on me, Ill act.
Im not too cool.
I just like doing stuff.
But its a really dark humor…
Yeah and its dry.
Damn, this is great!
The most fun thing about this filmbecause I never watch anything I do, Im just done with it.
They didnt know I was there, I was at the back, different film festivals.
To watch audiences watch it where they laugh… You got it!
Not like one or two people, the theater laughs, and something thats funny violent, everyone cheers.
They seem to get it the way we intended it.
Theres something different, like youre taking the genre and giving it a different thing.
This film fits very comfortably in the horror genre.
Fortunately, all of those actors seemed to be on the same wavelength.
Theres just these moments where that is funny.
And my daughter sees him.
Okay, you must have something of mine.
You are my daughter.
If you see the guy and no one else can, what else can you do?
Are you immortal like me?
Did you get this hell passed onto you?
Maybe thats for part two of this thing.
Its set-up in a way that Jack is a character who could theoretically show up again.
Youre reading it and Can we shoot this now?
Can we just do this?
Theyre looking to make that happen.
Hopefully theyll take me along with them, but Ive read two episodes and its brilliant.
Cause Im not an actor.
Hey, you want to be in a band?
Yeah, what else am I going to do?
Well, dont let that stop you, heres a microphone.
Youll never hear me tell you Im good at anything except procrastinating and sleeping late.
If you hired me and Im not good than its more your fault than mine.
I showed you what I could do.
I auditioned and you still hired me, so maybe it’s crucial that you assess your job.
So when people ask me, Why do you go for the horror genre?
And the horror genre seems to like me, which is fun.
I like working, if its drama or its horror.
Im just kind of a utilitarian work dude.
What was that like to do that?
Obviously, Jack opens the bag incorrectly.
Its his last bag of blood.
Hes squandered his last resource, hes not a happy guy.
He needs to take advantage of that blood because its going to go bad.
It will not be useful.
So I said to Jason that Jack really needs to hoover up a lot of that blood.
Jacks gotta do this.
We gotta get this shot.
It was brutal and I ended up drinking about that much syrup which sat in my stomach.
They said, How are you doing?
Jack is screwed in that moment.
No, thats all scripted.
I memorized all of that, every single thing: silversmith, tinsmith, wreck diver, horse trainer.
When its time to rehearse it, I had it.
I had been rehearsing it for weeks, cause that was one of the last scenes we shot.
We shot it in the freezing cold in Toronto at night.
Yeah, Toronto in November and December is not the best time to shoot outdoors…
Especially because were in clothes that dont reflect the cold necessarily.
Your face would freeze.
That was a cold winter, I remember.
And so many of our scenes were at night in the dark.
They had to wet my hair, which really hurt because it did start freezing.
It was a long night and we did it, we suffered through.
What else are you up to?
Still doing the spoken word stuff?
What Im doing now is shamelessly promoting this until Friday.
Monday through Friday I was doingHe Never Diedin Toronto.
Actors from the film come out and do their scenes live as the screen behind them is them.
Its kind of overwhelming.
I said, Im not a screenwriter, and he said, But you are a writer.
I own a publishing company.
I sleep with the owner every night.
He said, Would you try?
and Im like, Yeah.
Weekly, Im writing forRolling Stone Australia.
I gotta lot of hats.
All spoken word, no band.
So next year is kind of flat out busy between the film and the talking tour.
I narrate two radio shows, that takes an amazing amount of time.
Can you do that while on the road?
On the road and at home.
I have shows finished through mid-January.
I started working on the winter shows in June, knowing I need shows through mid-February.
Do the spoken word shows translate well to these other non-English countries?
Believe it or not, my audience in Germany speaks perfect English.
He Never Diedwill open in select cities, on iTunes and On Demand on Friday, December 18.
