Sitting Down with Acting Royalty Michael Douglas aka Hank Pym #AntManEvent

Earlier this week I shared exclusive Ant-Man interviews with Paul Rudd and Evangeline Lilly. Coverage continues today with an interview with Michael Douglas. Paul Rudd described him as acting royalty, and I have to agree. It was incredibly surreal to have his undivided attention to chat life, acting, and Ant-Man.

Michael Douglas Interview:

We open the interview by asking Michael Douglas about his research for the role, and if he was a comic book fan growing up. Michael shared that along with the script he received a leather bound book with a full backstory on the characters in the Ant-Man comics. He mentioned his character, Hank Pym, had love loss and rocky relationship with his daughter, and there was a whole story to play once learning about it.

I was invited to cover this press event. All opinions are mine alone.

Q: With the technology in this movie, how is it different from anything you’ve ever done?

Michael: “Well, I mean, one of the exciting things for me about doing this picture is I have never done a special effects movie before.” He mentioned being fascinated by the multi unit process of actors, stunts, special effects, and the macro unit. He adds, “but to see how they put four units together using the story boards was inspirational.  I mean, how often too do you get to do a movie where you see yourself 30 years younger. It was wild.”

Q: What was your favorite scene to shoot?

Michael begins by joking that he knows what scenes he liked the least. Sharing that the heavy exposition scenes where he’s carrying a lot of the plot took a little momentum, but that his favorite scenes included Pym Technologies.

Q: Who was the greatest joy to work with? Who did you have the most fun with?

Michael shares that although he got hired in a movie as an actor, he is also a producer, and looks at the whole picture. He adds that seeing Kevin Feige, Peyton Reed, and the great production team they had made him really happy. Additionally, Michael shares, ” I think the biggest surprise was Corey. Corey was a great heavy. He was a great, great villain and the scenes I had with him, he brought much more strength and, dynamo than I ever had anticipated. Paul, I knew from the beginning and he’s just as easy and wonderful as could be. He’s lovely. And then Evangeline I did not know her range, and so you go wow. There’s no weak spots here. Everybody’s solid.”

We asked Michael now that he was playing a superhero if he was hoping to wear a suit, and he joked, “who’s to say I wasn’t in a few of those,” adding, “hard to tell with the helmets down.” We all laughed at that. He did share that there was a stunt double for all the scenes, and he was happy for a role with limited action.

Q: Paul Rudd’s a funny guy. How was it working with him on set? Was it all laughs?

Michael: “He’s a lovely guy. Obviously, he did some rewriting on the script and was very helpful. Sometimes I would get frustrated where I’d have one of these five minute long monologues explaining everything, and of course, he would have a one-line punch line.” He also mentioned his heart went out to Paul for putting a full day in, including maintaining a work out regimen. “Paul now looks to me like Robert (Downey) did before the first Iron Man. And I’m sure this is going to be great for Paul.”

Q: Not really having been much into comics and things, what really was your motivation for joining the Marvel universe?

Michael told us he just wanted to do something different, and was curious about special effects. Adding that two of his best buddies are Jack Nicholson and Danny DeVito, and each of them had a great time as Joker and the Penguin in Batman. He also shared that his 14 year old son (with actress Catherine Zeta-Jones) was excited for him, mentioning that he told him, “this is a whole new audience for you.” We all had a good laugh.

We had such a great time chatting with Michael Douglas. He was kind, open, as you can see from the conversation above, a lot of laughs. I truly feel blessed to have been in the presence of acting royalty, and for him to take time out of his day to speak with us privately.

Watch a sneak peek of the film with this latest TV spot release:

Are you excited for Ant-Man? Don’t forget it opens in theaters July 17th!

 

Photo credit: Disney & Marvel Studios + Louise Bishop / MomStart.com