Save this article to read it later.
Find this story in your accountsSaved for Latersection.
Fernandez has been killed by Statham onscreen so many times, he has trouble keeping all the details straight.
They didnt want him to get hurt.
But then Tom Cruise comes along and he wants to do all his own stunts.
He produced a lot of his own movies, so there was nobody to say no.
Then you got Keanu Reeves.
Its five in the morning, hes training with these fighters.
So wed sneak in these little fights with him and the producers would say, You did it?!
Yes, he did it, and now theyre impressed that he did all this stuff.
Not only that, the directors are impressed.
Now, they could shoot him without hiding his face.
So now they can get a longer performance and make their days and move on to the next scene.
Jason himself is very good, an athletic man.
With fights, he helps choreograph them.
We train, he rehearses them.
By the time were on set, he knows every move so theres no hiccups.
What is he looking for?
Along that story line, hes already been down in the dumps; now he needs to shine.
His thing is he doesnt want to get punched.
I told Jason on this movie, Hey, you got to take a hit.
The audience wants to see you take a hit.
All right, Eddie.
So theres some hits he took on this movie.
But other than that, for Jason, we choreograph with a fight team.
We figure out the area were going to be in.
Is it outside, inside, is it in a bar?
And Im like,Hell yeah!
We redo the fight choreography, we shoot theprevisagain, and then we show him and then David.
Once we get green-lit by everybody, thats what were going to do.
We rehearse it, and rehearse it, and rehearse it.
Thats whats really cool.
A lot of actors dont do that; theyll just take a stab at break it down.
Not him, hell go as far as we could go.
I mean, after he takes on agiant shark, theres really almost nothing he cant take on.
We finally say, Hey, youre out.
So, yeah, he gets some blows.
Then his character wakes up and hes in a van like, What just happened?
How are we going to get him out of these handcuffs?
You did action choreography onThe BeekeeperandA Working Man.
Is that by design?
How are we going to bring him down?
I started thinking of how you bring a tree down: You start chiseling away.
Thats exactly how we broke that fight.
But it was just too much to put in a movie where we were crunched on time.
We had to X a lot of these actions out.
It came down more down to ground and pound, just finish it up real quick.
Jason knows his audience.
So when you come to plotting the action, do you keep that in mind?Of course.
No, thats not Jason.
The audience loves Jasons look.
We want to ensure that hes okay.
We do body hits, a lot of body hits.
And its all internal, you never see it in the face.
Vulture compiled a ranking of histop kills in all his movies.
And a bunch of things that you are in and have choreographed are on there.
Is that you?No.
At that time, I was one of the stunt fighters.
I played a henchman.
But its so funny because the hand got cut, and then there was the neck.
I mean, the head.
Its a little cheesy, but its so cool.
InCrank 2: High Voltage, Jason crushes a guys testicles, then jams a needle in his neck.
Was that you?No, but I was there.
It was a closed set.
We all give a shot to stay away and let them feel comfortable.
Thats a very hard thing to do, a scene like that.
Even though we think,Oh, that was funny, its hard to shoot it.
It takes a lot out of people, a lot of energy, a lot of emotions come out.
InThe Mechanic, Jason harpoons a guy, snaps his neck, and uses him as a human shield.
You?I hardly remember that.
I played one of the henchmen that comes out of the plane.
I forgot what I do.
And I remember Jason had to jump off the bridge.
I was so involved in all that and I forgot what I was doing in there.
But people send me pictures:Oh, yeah, I played that character.
I think I got shot by him.
Youve died at his hands so many times, it becomes a blur after a certain point.
What youre proposing is out of character for me?
Or: Lets amp things up, Eddie.Oh, he wanted to amp things up all the time.
And if he says,Nah, I dont want to do it, theres always a good reason.
It doesnt make sense.
So then David and him talk about it and they said, You know what?
Well scratch that, you do this instead.
Hes thinking like an action choreographer himself.Yeah, of course.
I mean, hes LeBron.
When he starts, when he gets on set, hes that guy.
He needs to know what this guy would do throughout the whole film.
Jasons films are filled with him using interesting, unexpected items to bludgeon or kill people.
And then David would go, I like that.
I mean, things like that just happen all the time.
Hey, theres a chain hanging; Im going to hang a guy.
Boom, bring in the riggers, put a harness on this guy.
Were going to bring him up.
Instead of a real chain, put a fake chain on him.
Its just so many things that happen on set, like I said.
Once you actually get in there, more ideas come.
And then some of the ideas said, Well, I cant do that if this is there.
So what are we going to do?
Well, thats a heavy piece of machinery, we cant move it.
All right, so now we have to rechoreograph everything and eliminate certain things, but lets add this.
So you got to be thinking a lot on your feet.
