Public Servant Lifestyle

There’s double trouble for Chris Rock and Anthony Hopkins in Joel Schumacher’s latest take on the international spy genre.

Bad Company

In Bad Company, Academy Award-winner Anthony Hopkins portrays Gaylord Oakes, a veteran CIA agent who must transform sarcastic, street-wise punk Jake Hayes (Chris Rock) into a spy, to replace his murdered identical twin brother, Kevin Pope (also played by Rock). Oakes only has nine days to accomplish this 'mission: improbable,' before having to negotiate a sensitive nuclear weapons deal.

The Concept

The seed for the concept of Bad Company originated more than a decade ago during the late 1980s. For producer Jerry Bruckheimer, the most difficult task in bringing a motion picture to the screen has always been in shaping the script. “It’s truly the hardest thing to do,” he says. “We’ve looked at countless ‘great ideas’ throughout the years, but moulding that idea into a workable, interesting script takes time and attention to detail, even with a comedy, especially with a comedy. Once the script works, we start attacking the question of who is going to be in the movie; who is going to bring the script to life and hopefully add to what’s already on paper.”

“I really think it was brilliant on Jerry Bruckheimer’s part to cast Anthony Hopkins and Chris Rock together, and the idea of working with the two of them, along with Jerry, was irresistible,” says director Joel Schumacher.

Film

“Jerry Bruckheimer and I have been friends since I directed The Lost Boys,” continues Schumacher. “He called me because he liked the film and we have talked about working together many times since. This film was a perfect opportunity to work with Jerry, and along with Anthony and Chris, it was a fantastic combination.”

“This is a project that has been waiting for special elements like Anthony, Chris and Joel,” explains producer Jerry Bruckheimer, whose films include Top Gun, Armageddon, Con Air, The Rock, and the recent blockbuster, Pearl Harbor and Black Hawk Down. In addition, he launched the career of Eddie Murphy with the box office giant, Beverly Hills Cop, and enjoyed similar success with Will Smith and Martin Lawrence in Bad Boys.

“I believe that we have successfully combined the distinctive comedy of Chris Rock and the Academy Award-winning acting skills of Anthony Hopkins to create a unique motion picture,” Bruckheimer continues. “Joel Schumacher has already proven that his talent as a director is boundless.

“Joel is always on the leading edge of what’s happening in pop culture,” explains Bruckheimer. “He’s very contemporary and has the ability to reinvent an accepted film genre. Joel’s not only a director; he’s a writer, a designer and a brilliant visualist with a great sense of humor. I love throwing talented directors who are known for a certain style into a new genre. If they’re as creative as Joel, they’ll give it a different look and make it their own.”

“Bad Company is definitely an exciting action film,” Schumacher says. “I wouldn’t say that it’s a buddy movie in the traditional sense because these characters are not at all sweet to each other. The casting of Anthony and Chris makes it apparent that there is an odd couple element in this spy film setting. However, I think what we’ve brought to this mix surpasses any single genre description, and we’ve created a very unique experience, something that is new and fresh and that feels like our time now.”

Undercover

Agent Oakes and Kevin Pope are partners and very high-level CIA agents who have been working a long time to stop a nuclear device fitted into a suitcase from falling into the wrong hands. The only way they can do this is to pretend to be buyers. Kevin Pope has been working under the name of Michael Turner, posing as an antiques dealer in Prague, gaining the confidence of a Russian black market seller, Adrik Vas, played by Peter Stormare. Pope introduces Vas to Oakes who is pretending to be an extraordinarily rich buyer.

Kevin Pope is extraordinarily polished and very young to be such a top agent. He was adopted by a loving family and was raised in a noble, elitist way by these lovely people. He is brilliant and was well educated at private schools, an Ivy League college, and then was recruited by the CIA out of Naval Academy. He and Oakes have a very close relationship. Oakes admires him and has a deep affection for Kevin, who is really at the top of his game when he is tragically killed.

Oakes is a top senior member of the CIA operatives. He no longer has a wife and feels that he is married to his job. Although he has a hard exterior and is obviously somebody who would sacrifice his life for our country, he is also a compassionate man. Kevin is killed only nine days before the arranged purchase of the nuclear device and the only person that Adrik Vas trusts is Kevin. The CIA’s plan is to find Kevin’s twin brother, Jake, from whom he was separated at birth, and for Oakes to see if he can pass off Jake as Kevin to complete the mission.

Jake is also sharp and very brilliant, only on a whole different level – on a street level. Unlike his twin Kevin, Jake was shipped from the orphanage to many different foster homes. A much cannier and wiser person than Oakes at first realises, Jake lives in New York and is very industrious, hustling chess in Washington Square Park, scalping tickets to sports events, and working as a DJ at a club at night. He’s in love with his girlfriend, Julie, played by Kerry Washington, but they haven’t gotten married because they feel they don’t have enough money. She’s unhappy working as a nurse’s aid at the hospital and wants to move to Seattle for the chance at a better job.

“I think the last people Jake ever expected to be standing in front of were the CIA,” says Schumacher. “They operate on a ‘need to know’ basis, they lie to him about his brother’s death and don’t tell him about the mission or why he’s doing it; they just dangle the money in front of him. I think it would be very flattering to have top CIA agents call you and say ‘We need you, and your Country needs you.’ And faced with the possibility of a hundred thousand in cash in his pocket, Jake accepts, but I think he makes the mistake of thinking he can walk away whenever he wants.”

Of course, with so many potential buyers after the nuclear device, things don’t always go according to plan. Even though they’re surrounded by surveillance from the CIA and other forces and everybody in the whole world gets into the action, Oakes and Jake still have to rely on each other as partners.

Action Films

Producers Jerry Bruckheimer and Mike Stenson and executive producer Chad Oman developed the project from a story by Gary Goodman and David Himmelstein and a screenplay by Jason Richman and Michael Browning. “I’ve always taken the script and then gone out and cast it, and this is the first time I’ve been handed a cast… and what a present to be handed,” notes Schumacher, discussing the casting of the film. “Anthony Hopkins’ range and power as an actor has been proven over and over again,” says Bruckheimer. “I feel that his role in Bad Company expands upon the Hopkins persona that audiences already respect and adore.”

“I am an action movie buff,” declares Hopkins, speaking about his attraction to the project. “Films with Schwarzenegger, or Harrison Ford in the Indiana Jones films. They are all pure entertainment and I like them very much. I’m not good at sitting, watching serious stuff. I get bored. It can be hard work being in an action film, but it’s also a good change of pace and a lot of fun.”

The Silence of The Lambs

Hopkins, who won an Academy Award for his role as Hannibal Lecter in The Silence of the Lambs, recently reprised the role for the record-breaking sequel, Hannibal. He has also received Academy Award nominations for Best Actor for his performances in The Remains of the Day and Nixon as well as in the Best Supporting Actor category for Amistad.

Discussing his character’s dilemma in the story, Hopkins says, “Oakes and the CIA team have only one link to solve their problem and that is to train Jake to pose as his twin brother. I think it sets up quite a wry, ironic and comedic situation for Chris Rock who, of course, plays both Kevin and Jake.”

“Oakes is an old-timer and knows exactly what he wants,” continues Hopkins. “He’s dealt with kids like Jake before and he has patience for them because he can recognize the value in them. Oakes knows he has to manipulate, kick butt and be tough with this ‘young punk,’ as he calls him. He has to beat him into shape, and cajole and punish him in order to get him to respond. Jake is street smart, witty, and he’s a scared guy too. When he and Oakes are being chased, Chris really played up being the coward and he’s very funny at that. Jerry Bruckheimer is a good guy, and I learned so much from him,” says Rock, explaining that the opportunity of working with the famous producer was what drew him to the project. When you go to a big theatre with a bucket of popcorn, you want to see a Jerry Bruckheimer film – you know it’s going to be big. Jerry gives you your money’s worth every time.”

Attaining top-flight success in the comedy world with numerous Emmy and Grammy Awards, Rock has recently been increasing his presence in the feature film world. He co-wrote and starred in Down to Earth and also recently starred in the critical favourite Nurse Betty.

Twins

“Jake Hayes makes his living hustling chess for money, scalping tickets and working as a DJ,” says Rock. “He’s kind of a Jack-of-all-trades. When his identical twin brother, Kevin, gets killed, Jake has to switch places with him to pull off the mission. Jake and Kevin grew up on different sides of the track. You often hear on TV news magazines about how twins separated at birth end up the same anyway. My thought is that a kid in Harlem jumping up and down on a dirty mattress is just as happy as a kid in Beverly Hills jumping on a trampoline, just as long as they both get a hug and something to eat. Jake’s jobs are unstable and his girlfriend Julie is kind of fed up with the situation,” Rock explains. “He doesn’t want to break up with her. He wants to do the right thing so he takes this crazy spy job hoping to get some security in his life and keep his girl.”

“It’s true for Jake that it starts out with the money, but he does try to do the right thing,” stresses Rock. “It’s not like any of the other characters in this story are working for free either, and no one’s making a big deal about them getting a salary.”

Brilliant

“I had met Chris on a public service announcement I did regarding Education, and I was a huge fan of his ever since I first heard him doing stand-up because he’s such a brilliant young man,” says Schumacher. “He’s one of those comics where the humour is so real and so brilliant. It’s fun to just hang with Chris and talk about anything because there isn’t a subject in the world that you can’t talk about. Watching his mind work is really phenomenal. He’s always saying things you wish you had thought of because they encompass exactly what you’re feeling about the zeitgeist at that moment, whether it’s politics, or sex, or violence.”

“Chris’ comedy is so outrageous and he pushes the envelope so much, but he is truly a gentleman and highly intelligent, not just on a street level but on a real level,” observes Schumacher. “There is so much of him in the character of Jake Hayes, but when he had to be serious I think he did a great job and even surprised himself.”

“Kevin Pope is a dignified, serious and very elegant young man and Chris Rock played him beautifully,” Schumacher says of Rock, who actually also had to play a third role as Kevin Pope’s undercover identity — antiquities dealer Michael Turner. “With Chris’ intelligence, I knew if he didn’t feel comfortable about acting, that he would learn.”

Total Professional

“Anthony Hopkins is a total professional, and everything that goes with that,” says Rock. “He has really lived life, been all over the world and worked with everybody. I learned so much just from being around him. It was like learning through osmosis. With the approach Anthony took to Oakes, we didn’t play the ‘I’m from London and we do it this way and you do it that way’ thing,” says Rock.

“Personally, I’m much looser than the stereotypical image of British uptightness, and so that’s how I approached the character,” notes Hopkins. We didn’t have to play opposites or act like we didn’t have anything in common,” Rock continues. “It doesn’t matter if you’re working hard in Brooklyn or in London – you’re still working hard. It’s no different – we’re just guys. As our characters, we start out not liking each other, but we have a mission to accomplish and eventually we get around to working as one.”

“Chris Rock is a very funny man,” says Hopkins. “I admire comedians and comics but that is not my business. I am not Chris Rock and I am not a comedian. I am witty and I have a sense of humour in a wry, throwaway, laconic way. I have admiration for people who can get laughs and be funny all the time, but being the straight man, on the sidelines, that’s an easier position to be in.”

Common Ground

“Anthony and I have nothing in common and everything in common,” says Rock of working with Hopkins. “I had as good a time working with him as I would with any guy, any age, black or white. We’re both pretty dedicated to our work, and he was really good with comedy. He knows the way for him to be funny is not to act funny, and there’s an art to being a good straight man. Comedy is hard to play, and a joke demands attention. If I did something crazy or just out of the ordinary, Anthony knew how to say that one line that made the scene even funnier.”

“Anthony Hopkins is simply one of the greatest actors we have and he is wonderful with comedy,” notes Schumacher. “When you’re with Anthony, you find that he is very witty, does great impressions and tells great stories. I think we make a great mistake in our culture by compartmentalising people, thinking that just because someone is a serious actor that they don’t have a sense of humour, and similarly just because someone has a sense of humour that they can’t be a serious actor. It’s not always true.”

“During production, Anthony Hopkins and I spent a lot of time together talking about our lives and we developed the kind of close relationship that you can have with someone of the same age,” says Schumacher. “We talked about things we had gone through, similar experiences, what we’ve learned along the way, mistakes we’ve made and things like that. It is a wonderful friendship.”

“Joel Schumacher was very easy to work with, very patient and a charming man,” says Hopkins of his director. “Joel is always well prepared and shoots fast. He creates a good balance between letting the actors have room to improvise and come up with ideas, and still not letting us run riot. Ultimately the director has to be in charge and have the authority to keep things in check.”

“Joel was receptive to allowing us to improv with lines here and there, but it always grew out of the scene and out of the story,” says Rock. “Rather than having a set-in-stone way about the script, Joel wanted the dialogue to flow naturally. At the same time, he had a big scope for the way he covered the film.”

Stand-Up

“I’m very loose about improvising,” notes Hopkins. “I can throw in a few one-liners but I don’t like to carry on improvisation throughout scenes. The danger in that is you can lose focus to the point where the scene never seems to end.”

“Chris improvised because he’s used to doing stand-up, and the other actors had to be able to just go with it,” says Schumacher. “Anthony improvised sometimes too. I encourage the actors to do that as much as possible as long as it’s working for the scene. If it isn’t, we go back to the script, but sometimes the improvisations are the best part of the movie. In stand-up, you get an idea and say a joke. If people laugh, it’s good, and if they don’t, it’s bad,” says Rock. “In film, when I’m saying lines that are supposed to be funny, I have to disguise my delivery of a joke so it doesn’t come across like I have a mic in my hand.”

“In any movie, the greatest tool any actor can have is the other actor,” notes Schumacher. “In Bad Company, Chris was working with Anthony Hopkins all the time and was surrounded by a wonderful ensemble company of actors. Kerry Washington who plays Jake’s girlfriend, Julie, is a wonderful actress, as is Garcelle Beauvais-Nilon who plays Nicole, a reporter who was his brother Kevin’s girlfriend.

Ensemble

It is such a solid cast, from the CIA group including Gabriel Macht and John Slattery and Brooke Smith, to Peter Stormare, who is from Ingmar Bergman’s ensemble company of actors, and Matthew Marsh, who is a wonderful British actor from stage and film.”

The team of actors well-represents Schumacher’s intentions of Oakes’ team. “I didn’t want Oakes to just be a crusty, old fuddy-duddy CIA veteran who had been at the Agency for a hundred years because I think we’ve seen a lot of that,” explains Schumacher. “We wanted him to be progressive and learning and moving forward. So, instead of surrounding him with the good old boys, we gave him a brilliant and dynamic young team. Gabriel Macht is Agent Seale, Brooke Smith is Agent Swanson, Daniel Condon is Agent Carew and Shea Whigham is Agent Welles.”

“Agent Seale is a surveillance specialist and Oakes’ right-hand man,” says Gabriel Macht, describing his character. “He’s a Delta Force recruit and I would say the strong arm of the group. He’s a very ambitious young man who wants to take whatever task is at hand and get it accomplished. He trusts Oakes like a father and I think in turn Oakes respects and trusts him like a son. Seale sees the hurt and pain Oakes is going through over Kevin’s death and yet he will also try to level with him and contend with him to keep focus on the mission.”

“Seale respected Kevin Pope as a fellow agent who knew his own game,” says Macht. “It’s heartbreaking for Seale when Kevin is lost because of a screw up in circumstances. Seale is the one character in the CIA group who is rooting for Jake Hayes from the beginning. It’s kind of out of this world for Jake to become Kevin, the brother he never knew, and for him to take on this undercover identity and surmount such an obstacle in only nine days. But Seale says to Jake ‘We’re all really behind you,’ in an act of telling him to be confident in who he is. I think Seale really believes it.”

Conflict

In preparation for his role, Macht did research on the CIA and on Delta Force. “I talked with a couple of guys who have been inside,” says Macht. “They taught me some of the technical aspects such as how to walk around with a gun and what happens when these guys come into conflict. Anthony Hopkins is fascinating and working with him was terrific,” says Macht. “He’s like an everyman, and he doesn’t take on the movie star attitude at all. He seems to view acting as the job that he does as his part of making the film. When I’d talk to him about acting, he’d say ‘Let’s not talk about that – it just gets into your head and you over-think things.’”

“I think Anthony comes at his work in an instinctual way,” says Macht. “He’s so relaxed that he sort of hypnotises you and you just fall into the scene, almost coasting along with him. It’s really special and I haven’t experienced that with any other actor. He’s incredibly giving and taught me a lot. You come to work on time and know your lines but then relax, have fun, be playful and don’t take it all too seriously.”

“I’m a big fan of Chris Rock’s stand-up and sketch comedy, and I see him as a strong voice of my generation,” Macht notes. “He has really keen perceptions on life and society. I would get a bit star struck at times because we’d be working together and Chris would start to improvise about something we were talking about and I’d think, ‘I’m not watching TV, I’m right here listening to Chris just fly.’ His imagination is so sharp.”

Peter Stormare was cast as the Russian black market contact, Adrik Vas, one of the characters from the darker side of Oakes’ and Jake’s reality. Stormare previously worked with director Joel Schumacher, appearing with Nicolas Cage in 8mm, and with Jerry Bruckheimer, appearing in the producer’s blockbuster Armageddon.

“We had such a great time with him on Armageddon, he played this crazy Russian astronaut” says Bruckheimer. “When we discover talented actors, we love to bring them back in very different roles. Peter loved the script and wanted to play a bad guy, so we brought him on board. The opportunity to work with people you like and admire in a wide range of movies is one of the most exciting and enjoyable aspects of making movies.”

CIA

“John Slattery plays Roland Yates, the head of the CIA,” says Schumacher. “Yates’ job is to stop terrorism at any cost, no matter whose life is sacrificed… keeping the Company notion in mind that one life is not as important as the many.” Kerry Washington plays Julie, Jake Hayes’ girlfriend. “Kerry is, I think, one of the finest young actresses that we have around right now,” says Schumacher. “I saw her playing a shoplifter in a small film called Lift and she was great.” She has also received acclaim for her roles in the films Save the Last Dance and Our Song.

“When I was called to meet Joel about the film, I thought I was coming in for the role of Nicole, which Garcelle Beauvais-Nilon played,” recalls Washington. “For Nicole, they were looking for a very tall, very sophisticated supermodel, and I didn’t really see myself in that way. I thought I would just go in and do my best, and look as fabulous as possible. Joel told me they were thinking about me for the role of Julie, which had just been created. I was really excited to be part of this film because it has so many different stories and layers to it.

“Julie loves Jake a lot, which makes it harder for her to explain to him about the change she’s trying to make in her life,” Washington explains. “She lives with her sister, helps with the kids and commutes into the city, and she’s scared if she doesn’t make a drastic change, she may get stuck living that way from the rest of her life. She wants to finish school, get a better job, and move out of Jersey City to start a new life, to be the woman she hopes and wants to be.”

“Jake is a wonderful person who is very smart and funny and he’s created skills and resources to survive,” continues Washington. “I love the aspect of the story that looks at how environment affects who we turn out to be, because Jake is just as smart as Kevin. But in Julie’s eyes, Jake isn’t applying his intelligence in a way she hoped that he would. She doesn’t understand what is going on with him but it turns out to be enough of a mystery to keep her in town for a while because she wants to make it work.”

Chris Rock

“Chris Rock is so bright and he’s constantly seeing things in a way that is so fascinating and so hysterical, and he’s so open about sharing that,” Washington says. “I think that a lot of comedians aren’t able to not be ‘on,’ and that they have to be performing all the time. I feel that can sometimes come from a place of insecurity, and that is not at all where Chris comes from. He’s a really committed actor. For as different as he and Anthony Hopkins may be, they’re both so phenomenally talented, and so incredibly intelligent. It was such a joy to be on set with them and to be part of this process. Garcelle Beauvais-Nilon plays Kevin Pope’s girlfriend Nicole. She doesn’t know that Kevin is dead, and yet Jake is there, looking like him and sounding like him. Jake’s caught in the middle, because she’s so attractive and she thinks he’s her boyfriend, but he knows he can’t do anything. It sets up an interesting dilemma.”

“Audiences may know Garcelle Beauvais-Nilon from Double Take or The Jamie Foxx Show,” Schumacher notes. “Both Garcelle and Kerry are beautiful and very talented. They both have depth and they’re able to work with comedy, and a lot of times those things don’t go together.”

Matthew Marsh, a veteran of dozens of stage, television and feature productions in a career spanning over 25 years, was cast as the evil Dragan. “Dragan is a deeply troubled and very disaffected man,” Marsh says, speaking about his character. “There were problems in his homeland during the break up of the former Yugoslavia and some of his family was destroyed, and this fuelled his psychopathic nature. He has become a freelance troublemaker and has allied himself with some misfits from other countries, all crusading to cause some trouble for Uncle Sam.”

Out Of Their League

“Oakes and Jake are really quite out of their league when they’re messing with Dragan,” jokes Marsh, taunting with a villainous pride while describing his character’s interactions with the film’s heroes. “They’re just floundering in the shallows with Dragan circling like a killer shark, waiting to pick them off.”

“I love playing a huge spectrum of parts,” says Marsh. “I wasn’t aware of it at the time, but three years ago, Joel Schumacher saw me in a London production when I was portraying German quantum physicist Werner Heisenberg, one of the greatest geniuses of the 20th century. So one month you can be doing long speeches about philosophy and physics and the next you can be chasing people and jumping out of cars… and I like it all. I remember going to see Anthony Hopkins playing a classical role in a London stage production when I was a schoolboy,” recalls Marsh. “He made an exit to do films in America shortly afterward, and I think the way he approached his career inspired a whole generation of British actors to move away from the English snobbishness that film acting was somehow wrong. He is huge in England in terms of his influence on actors. Having met and worked with him on set I may also say that he sets a great example of how it’s possible to be such a big star and remain an amazingly nice man.”

Characters

“Agent Diane Swanson is a CIA special operative agent, who is good with languages and has a lot of experience in Eastern Europe,” says Brooke Smith, speaking about her character. “She has been working with Oakes for a while and she definitely has a crush on him. It can be attractive to see somebody working when they’re really good at what they do. Swanson and Oakes don’t really have private lives and they’re both very much into their work. I also think she sees him as being more human and having a morality about him that she hasn’t seen elsewhere in the CIA world. With the rest of the guys, I think Swanson holds her own and maintains her femininity at the same time,” Smith notes. “Swanson worked with Kevin Pope for a long time so when her CIA group is recruiting his twin brother it presents a lot of weird, complicated emotional elements,” explains Smith. “We’re mourning Kevin and we don’t really have confidence that Jake can complete the mission. When we meet him, he’s a little unrefined, and we have to civilise him, teach him the Czech language and everything about antiquities.”

“Brooke Smith is an incredible actress and I enjoyed my time immensely working with her,” says Macht of working with one of his CIA group co-stars. “When you go to location you hope to make lasting friendships with people. In a way, Brooke feels like sort of an older sister to me. She’s very cool.”

Smith has praise for her CIA group co-stars as well, including John Slattery. “I’ve known John for a long time and he’s one of the funniest guys I’ve ever met in my life,” notes Smith, who also glows with appreciation for the talents and on-screen support of Hopkins.

“Anthony Hopkins is very solid and you know that he’s there for you,” says Smith. The Silence of the Lambs’ was one of the first films I was in, and although I never got to work with Anthony, I used to sit and watch him while he was playing Lecter. It was amazing.”

“During this production, I actually got to do some improvisation with Anthony,” relates Smith. “Joel and Anthony and I talked about doing a scene to reveal how Swanson felt about Oakes. Joel made some notes and we discussed it and then we just did the scene, and I really enjoyed that.”

Filmakers

“Seven years ago, Joel Schumacher called me to meet with him,” says Smith. “He saw me in the Louis Malle film I did, Vanya on 42nd Street. He said he liked my work and wanted to work with me. That project didn’t happen but then he called and offered me this part. I’m a filmmaker as well so I usually like to know what the frame includes but with Joel I didn’t have to worry about any of that. I knew I was in very good hands.”

“Joel is wonderful because he knows when you needed help and when to leave you alone,” says Smith. “He knows when to come in and say something and it was always and completely the right thing, exactly what I needed.”

“Joel has created such a broad range of work and he brings all of that experience and insight to everything he does,” says Washington. “While he may have been thinking technically about big crane shots, explosions and smoke, it was obvious that he was still thinking creatively. He never lost that artistic spirit or consciousness about whether the moment during the take was a realistic moment for the actor. It could have been so easy to get lost in the gunshots and pyrotechnics but Joel didn’t let that happen, which was so inspiring as an actor.”

“Joel was very relaxed and seemed so confident about letting everybody get on with their job,” Matthew Marsh notes about working with Schumacher. “Both on and off set, Joel took the time to chat about all sorts of different things, not just what we were going to be doing next. He created a very civilised atmosphere for everyone to feel that they could contribute and at the same time he had a presence that seemed to rise above all the hundreds of people working on set.”

“I felt totally honored to be working with Joel Schumacher because I was brought up on his movies,” says Macht. “I loved his earlier films – Car Wash, Flatliners, and The Lost Boys. His knowledge of film takes him a long way. He knows what he wants and gets the job done, but he’s very sensitive to his actors and very good at working with young actors and actresses. In my mind, he created the most stress-free environment I’ve ever been involved with. It felt very carefree. He let us be playful and let us fly.”

“Film is a very collaborative medium and I enjoy it because I am a team player,” says Rock. “Working with other actors, I believe the best you can give somebody is to be prepared, know your lines and care about the work. I think the best part of working in film is having the chance to work with a lot of really fun and creative people. Bad Company was a perfect example of that with fun, creative people like Jerry, Joel, Anthony, Gabriel, Kerry and Garcelle.”

The Production

“Jerry Bruckheimer is quite unique, and working with him is a wonderful experience from start to finish. It’s bliss,” says Schumacher, who, following their collaboration on Bad Company, is currently re-teamed with Bruckheimer for Schumacher’s eighteenth feature, the forthcoming Touchstone Pictures/Jerry Bruckheimer Films production, Veronica Guerin (tentative title) “With Jerry, you get unconditional support and I got the opportunity to concentrate on directing without having to also produce as well,” continues Schumacher. “Jerry truly loves his movies and it shows in everything he does. I’ve worked before with some of the people on Jerry’s team, and I can tell you – they’re the best of the best. With Jerry Bruckheimer productions, you can sense that it really is a team effort because everybody’s in it together.”

“The only drawback of working with Jerry is that you get very spoiled,” Schumacher muses. “I don’t know how many movies God has planned for me, but if I got a contract that said, ‘The rest of your movies are all going to be with Jerry,’ that would be fine with me. I’d be a very lucky guy.”

New York

With casting complete and the production team assembled, Bruckheimer and Schumacher launched into production on Bad Company in the spring of 2001. “The story is set in New York and Prague and we shot in both places,” says Schumacher. “We wanted to take every advantage of Prague’s natural beauty and unique architecture because, as a city, it reflects the course of its history,” observes Bruckheimer. “There are influences in Prague ranging from Baroque to Renaissance, which add a perfect mystique to go along with the storyline.”

“Prague is a sort of meeting place for a lot of people,” says Schumacher. “It’s one of the most beautiful cities in the world, and the people were great to us. Hitler did not bomb Prague, so a lot of the famous architecture is still intact, and it sort of looks like a fairy tale kingdom.”

“Many of the scenes in the script were written as taking place in rooms, but once we got to Prague we figured, what’s the pointing of shooting there if you’re not going to really capture the environment?” notes Schumacher. “We were allowed unprecedented access to certain landmarks such as the roof of the National Opera where no film crew had been before and may never be again.”

“Dariusz Wolski is a brilliant cinematographer and I was thrilled he could shoot this film for us,” says Schumacher. Wolski previously worked with Bruckheimer on Crimson Tide and most recently lensed Julia Roberts and Brad Pitt in The Mexican.

“I had asked him to work with me on my first Batman movie, Batman Forever, but it hadn’t worked out… until now,” continues Schumacher. “Dariusz really took maximum advantage of showcasing Prague, as well as New York, while capturing the visual drama of an action thriller.”

Design Team

“Jan Roelfs and I had done Flawless together, and he is a fantastic production designer,” Schumacher says, speaking of Roelfs, who earned Academy Award nominations for his work on Gattaca and Orlando. “He assembled a great team from the United States and from Prague, and he did a phenomenal job.” Completing the stellar design team was Hungarian-born costume designer Beatrix Pasztor who, among her nearly two dozen features, has enjoyed a long working relationship with director Gus Van Sant, working on such films as the Oscar -winning Good Will Hunting.

“Prague is a city of bridges, with the Vltava River running right through the centre of it,” Schumacher explains. “Charles Bridge is one of the most beautiful bridges in the world and people come from all over just to walk across it. I also decided to put a scene on Strelecky Island, a small landmass in the middle of the river because that way the audience could see the Charles Bridge and all of Prague in the background. In real life, you can’t drive a car onto the island but we did it for the film.”

“Prague is a beautiful city,” notes Rock. “It’s kind of like New Orleans without the food. And, of course, New York is home for me. I’ve filmed a lot of movies in New York.” And Rock got the chance to star in the production of his newest film, shooting scenes in his hometown.

Prague

In late April, after almost a month of filming in New York, the production moved to Prague, Czech Republic. For weather cover and scheduling purposes, some of the States-side interior sequences were captured during the film shoot in Prague. “In the film, Julie never goes to Prague,” notes Kerry Washington, also a native New Yorker. “But since they shot the Grand Central Station sequence for the film in Prague, it was kind of ironic that I got to go all the way to Prague to be in New York.” Like other members of the cast, Washington was pleased for the opportunity to visit the historic city.

Filming also took place outside of the city of Prague at the old Chotesov Monastery and in the nearby bucolic hops fields — hops being an essential ingredient in world-renowned Czech beers. Other notable locations included the Olsany Cemetery, which is one of the largest cemeteries on the European continent.

The filmmakers’ pre-production scouting trips also revealed some other location gems that were incorporated into the backdrop for action. One example was an enormous abandoned natural gas silo in Kladno, which was torn down after production wrapped. Even though it is now gone, the site will likely remain in Gabriel Macht’s mind following a particularly memorable production experience.

“We went to this incredibly beautiful location to shoot the sequence in the silo,” begins Macht. “Inside, they had constructed an iron platform about fifteen feet off of the ground. As Agent Seale, I rolled in on a motorcycle to meet a Russian named Darius, played by Petr Jakl, who is a six-foot-eight, 280 pound Judo Olympian.”

Bond Films

“In the scene, Darius gets a call that he is to take Seale out,” continues Macht. “At an opportune moment it all clicks that he’s got a gun to my head and I whip around and slam my laptop into his face and we go into a huge grappling fight. Growing up, my brothers and I would play fight in staged combat that was more like movie fights that Roger Moore would have as Agent 007 in the Bond films. So, for me playing Seale in Bad Company, doing this ‘play fight’ for a real movie was incredibly invigorating. To be 6 foot, 180 pounds and be challenged to find a way to outsmart this big bad guy was sort of like a dream come true.”

Swordsmanship

Although Macht had fight experience in swordsmanship from playing Mercutio in a college production, and recently played sharpshooter Frank James in American Outlaws, taking on hand-to-hand combat with such a disproportionately matched opponent gave him a crash course in the rigors of physicality in the action genre. “The hilarious thing about filming the scene was that this amazing athlete had no idea how to fight in film, so he was throwing me down on the iron grate and strangling me,” Macht continues. “I was telling him, ‘Okay, soft hands, soft hands… just eye contact. This is all fun and games and we’re just playing here.’ And then he’d attack again. It was just hilarious. I got through it and it was cool, but I had bruises from head to toe.”

Performing in the action genre can be extraordinarily demanding for actors, as most of the cast of Bad Company would attest. “During one sequence, I had to run down about 50 steps through a group of nuns, burnishing weapons, leap through a wall of fire and then run back up what then felt like three thousand steps,” recalls Matthew Marsh, referring to one of the action sequences for his character, Dragan. “There are, of course, many technical considerations to getting the perfect version on film, so by the time we got to about take eight, I literally could not do the running back up the stairs again. At the end of the take I would kind of collapse on the stairs for about five minutes until the First A.D. saw I was reviving. And then we’d do it again. But all in all, it was great fun.”

“I’m in better shape now than I’ve ever been in my life,” says Chris Rock - whose previous forays into action-comedy included Beverly Hills Cop and Lethal Weapon 4 - “This is definitely an action film, straight up, with a dash of comedy, of course. But it’s the action that gets you, and I mean that on a very personal level. I may not have been jumping off of buildings, but I was jumping and fighting and running up stairs, down stairs and running down the block… doing a lot of running.”

Stunts

“I’m in good shape, and I did my own stunts in this film,” says Anthony Hopkins. When asked about continuing to work in the action genre and doing stunts, Hopkins replies, “I don’t see myself leaping over cars and all that, but I’m very fit and I’ve got courage. In the past, I’ve been injured a few times doing stunts. I have snapped my Achilles tendon, smashed my arm on a horse once, and I’ve almost broken my neck. You can get hurt doing physical things, but it’s all part of the fun of it.”

“We were filming at night, chasing the bad guys up this huge staircase,” Smith recalls. “It was an interesting moment for me because I realised right then that being an actor, or an actress, really is like playing. I know that guns are bad, but these were fake guns, and it was just like when we were kids, when we used to play and pretend and chase each other around.” The production most definitely had a bevy of experts and consultants to keep the actors safe and the action of the characters as credible as possible.

“We had experts that are CIA veterans who went through the script and also came to location on a weekly basis,” says Schumacher. “They made sure that things were as accurate as possible, and they’d tell us, ‘The CIA wouldn’t do that,’ or ‘They would do this.’ For instance, the CIA veterans taught us that they would never transfer a bomb and money in exchange in the same place. It would all be done through computers, and there would be people in separate locations so that there would be a fail-safe for both sides. So, we changed the script to reflect that point, even though sometimes you have to take license as a storyteller.”

“The CIA was very gracious,” Bruckheimer adds. “They even allowed us to film in one of their buildings in Virginia, which is highly unusual. We took great care to pay due respect to the men and women of this agency who work around the world for our country in what can be a very dangerous situations.

Comedy

“Even in making a comedy, we always try to keep the basics real,” he explains. “The comedy comes out of character because if you set up the story properly, in a believable environment, the audience understands the awkward situation in which Jake finds himself because they’d be in the same predicament. The most entertaining humour is always found in real life.”

Film editor Mark Goldblatt, ACE, earned an Academy Award nomination for his work on James Cameron’s action blockbuster Terminator 2: Judgement Day. He previously worked on Jerry Bruckheimer Films’ Pearl Harbour and Armageddon and earlier in his career, provided additional editing on the Don Simpson/Jerry Bruckheimer production of The Rock for Touchstone Pictures. Goldblatt and his team began editing concurrent with the start of principal photography. In editing both action and comedy, timing is such a critical factor, and Goldblatt worked closely with Schumacher through production and post-production to achieve the perfect movie-going experience.

“Our composer, Trevor Rabin had a difficult task in approaching this film, but he was able to create a very provocative, haunting score,” says Schumacher. “He was able to weave in the elements of old-world Prague with a kind of street sensibility, mixed together with all of the action beats and currents in the story.” Rabin has collaborated with Bruckheimer numerous times, composing for Remember The Titans, Gone in 60 Seconds, Armageddon and providing an intricate, unnerving electronic score for Bruckheimer’s techno-thriller Enemy of the State.

“We also brought in a British, new-age hip-hop musician named Tricky, whose very progressive, urban music took the soundtrack to a whole other level,” continues Schumacher. “Trevor and Tricky were able to weave their music and score in and out so I think we have achieved something that’s very unique.” Music Supervisors Kathy Nelson and Bob Badami also joined the Bad Company production, continuing their long-standing collaboration with Jerry Bruckheimer.

Academy Award

Anthony Hopkins (Oakes) received an Academy Award® as Best Actor for his performance in The Silence of the Lambs (1991), and was subsequently nominated in the same category for his performances in The Remains of the Day and Nixon. He was also given the Best Actor Award by the British Academy of Film & Television Arts (BAFTA) for The Remains of the Day. In 1993, he starred in Richard Attenborough’s Shadowlands with Debra Winger, winning numerous critics’ awards in the U.S. and Britain. In 1998, he was nominated as Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Amistad.

Anthony Hopkins Filmography

In Hannibal, the highly anticipated sequel to Silence of the Lambs, Hopkins reprised his role as Dr. Hannibal Lecter. Upon its release, Hannibal broke box office records as the largest R-rated opening of all time, and third highest-grossing opening in box office history. Hopkins also recently starred in the acclaimed Hearts In Atlantis for director Scott Hicks, recorded the narration for the mega-hit comedy Dr. Suess’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas, and starred in the forthcoming features The Human Stain, and in The Devil and Daniel Webster co-starring and directed by Alec Baldwin. In 1998, he starred in Meet Joe Black, directed by Martin Brest and Instinct, directed by Jon Turteltaub. In 1999, he starred in Titus, Julie Taymor’s film adaptation of Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus with Jessica Lange.

In 1992, he starred in Howard’s End and Bram Stoker’s Dracula before starring in Legends of the Fall and The Road to Wellville. He made his directorial debut in 1995 with August, an adaptation of Chekov’s Uncle Vanya for which he composed the musical score and also played Vanya. He also starred in the title role in Surviving Picasso and with Alec Baldwin in The Edge, a dramatic adventure written by David Mamet and directed by Lee Tamahori. The Mask of Zorro, directed by Martin Campbell and co-starring Antonio Banderas and Catherine Zeta-Jones, was released in July 1998, and Amistad, directed by Steven Spielberg, was released in December 1997. Hopkins’ earlier films include 84 Charing Cross Road, The Elephant Man, Magic, A Bridge Too Far, The Bounty and Desperate Hours.

Born December 31, 1938 - in Margam near Port Talbot Wales - the only child of Muriel and Richard Hopkins, Anthony was educated at Cowbridge Grammar School. At 17, he wandered into a YMCA amateur theatrical production and knew immediately that he was in the right place. With newfound enthusiasm, combined with proficiency at the piano, he won a scholarship to the Welsh College of Music & Drama in Cardiff where he studied for two years (1955-1957). He entered National Service in 1958, spending most of his two years as a clerk at the Royal Artillery unit at Bulford. In 1960, he was invited to audition for Sir Laurence Olivier, then director of the National Theatre at the Old Vic. Two years later, Hopkins was Olivier’s understudy in Strindberg’s Dance of Death. Hopkins made his film debut in 1967, playing Richard the Lionheart in The Lion in Winter, starring Peter O’Toole and Katharine Hepburn. He received a BAFTA nomination and the film received an Academy Award for Best Picture.

After starring as Captain Bligh in The Bounty with Mel Gibson, he returned to England and the National Theatre in David Hare’s Pravda, for which he received the British Theatre Association’s Best Actor Award and The Observer Award for Outstanding achievement at the 1985 Laurence Olivier Awards. During this time at the National, he starred in Anthony and Cleopatra – opposite Dame Judi Dench as Cleopatra and King Lear. Hopkins became a U.S. citizen in the summer of 2000.

Bad Company is out on DVD now.

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