Jason Statham Calls Out Acting in Marvel Movies: “My Grandma Could Do That”
Thirteen years ago, Jason Statham was selling cheap jewelry to tourists on the street corners of London to pay his bills. Then Guy Ritchie – an up-and-coming filmmaker about three years away from becoming Madonna’s husband – spotted him on the street. Ritchie, who was casting his 1998 gangster movie “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels,” took a meeting with Statham. “I told him my history as a small-time con man,” says the actor. “He wanted to put me in the movie.
In the 2002 classic movie, “The Transporter,” Jason Statham plays an ex-Special Forces guy who is acting as a courier. Statham battles two ax-wielding villains in a tight hallway, coats his body in oil during a fight in a bus depot, and flings himself through the windshield of a moving truck. “I did every fight, punch and kick that you see,” Statham told NY Daily News. “I think it is very important to do every bit of your own stuff.
Jason Statham’s name was involved in several Marvel-related casting rumors this week to play Bullseye in Season 2 of ‘Daredevil’. But, don’t hold your breath. Instead of playing into the casting rumors, Jason Statham took shots at the state of cinema in 2015 and the lack of effort in “superhero movies”.
Via the A.V. Club:
“I could take my grandma and put her in a cape, and they’ll put her on a green screen and they’ll have stunt doubles come in and do all the action. Anybody can do it,” he said. “They’re relying on stunt doubles, and green screen, and $200 million budgets, it’s all CGI created. To me, it’s not authentic.”
Statham is probably right. Jason Statham started his acting career by performing his own stunts. He is such a big advocate of stunt men and women that he has personally advocated for performers to be given their own category at the Oscars.
Discuss this story with fellow Project Casting fans on Facebook. On Twitter, follow us at @projectcasting.
