- Hello friends! This week on Heat Vision Breakdown
we are joined by a very special guest,
the star of The Dark Knight.
You've seen him in Blade Runner 2049.
Pretty much everything that everyone loves,
David Dastmalchian. Thank you so much for joining us.
- Thanks man, good to be here, thank you.
(upbeat rock music)
- All right, let's start off with your current project,
which you wrote and are also starring in.
It's called All Creatures Here Below.
This film has a little bit of mystery going on in it.
What's sort of the premise of this film?
- So All Creatures Here Below, it's a story of
these two people who are very much in love.
They care very deeply for each other, but life
has been incredibly cruel to them and
they're just living a hare's breath away from
abject poverty in Los Angeles.
And the day that my character, Jensen, loses his job,
the partner in this couple, Ruby, played by
the great Karen Gillan, she kind of strikes out to take
the thing that she feels like has always been denied them,
which is a child.
And my character, Jensen, takes the thing that he
always feels has been denied them, which is some
financial security. And they just both happen to make
these really bad decisions at the same time on
the same night and so they have to run.
And they go back to this place that they've been
hiding from for a long time, which turns out to be
where they're from, which is Kansas.
- Where you're from.
- Which is also where I'm from!
So if he can get back there, he can confront his demon,
the monster that's been haunting him for so long
that he feels like they could start a new life together,
you know? These people, that's all they want.
They just want a new life together and they'll
sacrifice everything to get it.
- One of the first introductions that the wider
audience had to you was in Christopher Nolan's,
The Dark Knight in 2008.
What was it like auditioning for Christopher Nolan,
especially as an aspiring actor?
- Just like, being asked that question,
I get nervous again, like-
- I saw you tense up.
- It was insane! I mean, you know, I've been reading
comic books my whole life and I've always thought that
like the joker was one of the coolest characters
in literature, in mythology, and our modern mythology,
and the comics meet those.
It was like everything I could have wanted.
And here I was, you know, a struggling actor in Chicago.
I was doing awesome theater work and barely enough
money to pay the rent. And, but I had never been on a
film set before and I'd never gotten to do anything
like that and all of a sudden I was in this packed
room of actors trying to audition for one of the bank
robbers at the beginning of The Dark Knight. And, so that
was my initial audition, was for a character, I think
his name was Grumpy.
- Were you under a mask at that-
- No, no, no, I just read for the casting director,
just in, you know, I wore like thuggish clothes or whatever.
But he said to me, I want to bring you back tomorrow,
I want you to meet somebody. It's really interesting
what you're doing with this character.
'Cause, as this comic lover that I am and as someone
that wanted to be a part of this so much, I had really
thought out, like who this little character was
and he was like, "I really like what you're doing,
but I just want you to do it with your eyes and not
with your body or your voice so much."
And that note, it just made perfect sense to me.
And he said Christopher Nolan really loves to see
the story that people could tell with their eyes.
So think about that when you come back
and meet him tomorrow.
And sure enough, the next day, I was sitting almost
as close as I am to you to him in a little room,
and he had a little handheld camcorder, and he was
having me do this scene of dialogue,
which is fake dialogue, it wasn't really part of a script.
And we worked for five or ten minutes together
and I was dismissed, I shook his hand, I thanked him,
and I went back to doing Othello at Writers Theater
in Glencoe, Illinois.
And four months later-
- Wow.
- I got the call that I was going to be in the Dark Knight.
- Well, it worked out!
- It did.
- And it is a very, very memorable performance-
- Thank you.
- Even though, it's not a huge part of the film,
but everyone remembers that little scene that you're in.
How do you make the most of your small amount of screen time
when you have a smaller role like that?
- You know, I'm so grateful that I got so much time
entrenched in the world of theater and collaborative
ensemble acting when I was in Chicago.
The other thing that has always propelled me,
is playing characters who are propelling
the person who I'm doing a scene with.
So, I don't know how to describe it other than
I get this incredible charge, this kick out of
being in a scene with somebody where my character's
behavior, or the thing that I do is like a slingshot
for whoever I'm in a scene with.
And so, when I was doing that scene with Harvey Dent,
I was thinking, like, this is everything,
'cause I knew, I mean, I knew the inspiration material.
There was a lot of Long Halloween in there,
there was a lot of Harvey's, like, trajectory
from the comics that I was familiar with and I felt like,
what an important moment, to really try and tip this guy
over the edge.
So that's kind of what I was thinking about.
And I knew that me, David, the presence that I am,
I'm not very strong and muscly, and I'm not,
I mean I might be intimidating, like, to my kids
when I furrow my brow, but I'm just not the most
intimidating guy,
and so the idea that in the script, it's like, Harvey
gets in this ambulance and he's asking me,
"tell me what you know, I want to know about the joker."
And it's this, you know, my character's intimidatingly,
you know, kind of smirks at him or something.
And I was like, that's not going to work, I need something
that's going to- what would really terrify this guy.
And I was like, what if I just can't do anything but giggle,
what would that do to like somebody,
if I was asking you right now, like, "you have to tell me,
how are we going to save all the people in this building,
what's the answer?"
And all you were doing was just looking at me,
with like, a little giggle, like-
And then, it's a nice twist, 'cause I didn't even know
there was going to be this other scene where you find out
that my character had mental illness
and that the character was like- I hadn't gotten to
see a script, I didn't know that was going to play out.
And so that worked beautifully because I felt like once
Batman saved- Batman saved me!
Think about that, that's crazy!
But when Batman comes in to save me,
He gives the breakdown of this character that I played,
and I thought, that's kind of wonderful, 'cause what if
all along, I was actually trying to tell Harvey the truth,
but my mental illness was such that all that was coming out
was just laughter.
- It is unsettling, and it is intimidating,
so I think you nailed that.
- Thanks.
- Well now you get to be a villain. You are going to to be
in the Suicide Squad with James Gunn and you are playing
a character called The Polka Dot Man,
which I've never heard of.
Are you familiar with The Polka Dot Man? Be honest.
- To be completely honest, I was not.
- No?
- No, that was a very exciting morning this morning
to know that that is really happening.
- What do you know about the character at this point?
Is there anything you can share with us about it?
- That he has gone up against the caped crusader,
I know that, and I know that he has a really rad name.
Uh, The Polka Dot Man, I mean, come on!
- How do you beat that?
- Ask for anything better than that?
Mr. Polka Dot, I think sounds pretty cool.
But that's, that's about all I think I know or can say,
I guess, I don't know.
- All right, playing it close to the vest,
- Yes.
- your polka dotted vest.
- Yes, yes.
- But, you also get to work with another fantastic director,
'cause you've worked with, I mean the list is insane
of the people you've worked with.
You've worked with Christopher Nolan,
you've worked with Villeneuve, uh, Villeneuve.
Uh, so sorry, I'm so bad with names.
I messed up your name too, by the way.
- It's okay-
- In a past video and I feel horrible about it.
- No, no, no
- David Mouse-chechin, Das-, Dastmalchian, whew!
- The trick is this small chin, so Dastmalchian,
that's all you've got to remember.
- That is amazing!
- Yeah, Dastmalchian, Dastmalchian!
- Got it, now everybody knows.
- Yeah!
- Uh, but now you're working with James Gunn and
James Gunn did Guardians of the Galaxy, and now you're
going to be in a James Gunn movie and you're one of the
leads in a James Gunn movie!
Is it surreal for you to have worked with all of these
amazing directors?
- That's massively surreal, I have been so lucky.
You know, when I moved to Los Angeles in 2010, I had
three major career life goals that I always would put
at the top of my, you know, obviously I wanted to keep
working in the comic spectrum and I wanted to work
in the realm of, you know, film adaptations of
my favorite stories.
But, I put down, work with The Muppets, Bond villain,
and work with David Lynch.
Those were the three things that I have always-
and I got to work with David Lynch a few years ago
on his incredible return to Twin Peaks.
And when that happened, when that moment transpired
and I then sat back and thought about some of the greatest
directors working in film today, I've gotten the opportunity
to be on set with.
And I was
covetous
of the idea
of getting to be on a set with James Gunn.
I think that that man understands so much
about what makes these modern myths
so effective
and powerful, and what makes them work, the gears that turn.
I mean, his imagination is an incredible place.
I love the films that he has made.
- We just need a Muppet-Bond crossover and for you
to play the villain in that movie, and then-
- That's like-
- Check, check, check
- This is the Hollywood Reporter, right?
Hello, Hollywood, like, report! Yeah!
- Uh, another huge project that you're in right now is
Villeneuve's Dune. Remake, reboot, re-imagining?
- It is, yes, I would say all of the above.
- Okay.
- The, uh, I love David Lynch, but it's not the 1984 film,
no, this is Denis' interpretation of the Frank Herbert
novel, Dune, which is an incredible book.
I mean, the thing about Dune that makes it so-
it's brilliant sci-fi.
I mean, character development, the twists, the plot turns,
and the themes in it, and some of the big ideas that
are at work in Dune are really fascinating to me
as a reader, as an audience member,
but one of the things that always blew my mind about
the book Dune, was that Herbert writes his characters
in every kind of situation, every interaction between
the characters, from not just one or two levels
of perspective.
I feel like there's three, sometimes four levels
of perspective. He really turns every interaction
inside out and every character has so many levels to it.
There's no hundred percent good-guy,
hundred percent bad-guy.
It's a muddy world, and it's a philosophically
challenging world, and it's all wrapped up in this
incredible space adventure.
And the fact that Denis has invited me to be a part of
his film. And I'm playing Piter De Vries, who is this
sadistic,
human computer, who is so driven by an intention
that is quite different than any other character
I've ever gotten to play before.
It's crazy, man! It's like, yeah, and Denis a-
he's a genius, I feel like he's
our generation's Stanley Kubrick, if you will.
I feel like, 'cause he works in so many different genres,
and they're all masterpieces. I've never- I've yet
to see a Denis Villeneuve film that didn't bowl me over.
And working with him as an actor, I've gotten the honor
of doing it twice now, is a really safe place to create.
He lets you and encourages you to just go wherever
you want to go and he helps shape you and guide you
and he's like from another world.
I don't know what I did right to be so lucky
that I get to do this.
- Well you are a very nice man, so I feel like that helps
a little bit.
- Well... Did ya hear that, mom? Thank you, mom.
- David Dastmalchian is the star
of pretty much every project that anyone is excited about
coming forward. But All Creatures Here Below,
your latest project, is coming out on May 17th,
so check that out and just thank you so much, David,
for coming by.
- Thank you, it was wonderful, thanks.
(upbeat rock music)