Jack Black Breaks Down His Most Iconic Characters | GQ

oh boy here comes another fiery hoop here comes another opportunity to show what I can do it's a dance with with the big guns to dance with the big guns is that a thing - ility so high fidelity was my big breakthrough role I got that because John Cusack was a fan of my band tenacious d he thought I was funny and I felt I'd be good in in the role I was nervous about it because it was a movie about rock and roll and it was about people who worked at a record store and were kind of snobby and and had real strong opinions on what music was good and what was bad and I was like I don't know if I want to do that I have a band I really am a musician I don't know if I want to make a movie about people criticizing music eventually I realized I'd be an idiot to turn down this role it's a great character and I took the plunge and had the time of my life the director Stephen Frears is one of my all-time favorites to work with I called him the Warlock because he had the thick juicy bushy eyebrows and he looked like he had magical powers and he was grumpy and he would often times lay on the ground and just look at the sky say I'm too old to be directing this movie but then he would get up and he'd give me like the perfect piece of direction and a lot of that movie was just adrenaline for me I was just like don't blow it jack this is your big chance so I came out of the gate windmilling just acting as though my life depended on it so the big finale of the movie there's a concert and my character whose only criticized music and musicians the whole movie is finally up on stage and he has to actually perform and there was a lot of talk about what song I was going to sing and one of the writers DVD incentives wanted me to sing that Marvin Gaye song and I was like why would I do that song I mean that song is a good song and everything but I'd rather do like a bigger more iconic so I'm like let's get it on and he's a kind even's diva cent s or like let's get it on dude that's a big song alright if you think you can handle it I think I can handle it and then it came time to sing it and do the scene and I did it and the first take I was a little trepidatious I was a little tip tone a little bit I was a little cautious and um it definitely sucked and I'll never forget Stephen Frears the director said God and he got angry at everyone on the site except for me he didn't say anything to me extra this is the finale of the film everyone on your feet aah cheering excitement everyone Jack great job let's do it again and I said oh man I know he's yelling at everyone else but think he meant to be yelling at me but he didn't yell at me whatever it was it gave me this crazy adrenaline goose and I came out in the second takes wing in and that's the one they used in the movie [Music] [Applause] shallow house after a high-fidelity I don't have to like send my headshot and resume around anymore I start getting offers one of the big offers I got was shallow how to work with the legendary Farrelly Brothers who were coming off a unprecedented string of successes you know they had huge comedic blockbuster movies Dumb and Dumber all that stuff with Jim Carrey and with Ben Stiller they had that huge hit Something About Mary so when they came a-knockin i said yes and ya found out that Gwyneth Paltrow was gonna be playing opposite me so I was stoked because I was a huge fan of hers not only as an Academy award-winning actress but also I knew that she was funny as hell I saw an SNL just crushing it and I was like she's a real character actor she's not just like a leading lady romantic interest she's also like a straight-up badass when it comes to inhabiting different characters and she really you know got inside that one literally and figuratively like emotionally what it was like to be that person and also she was inside of a suit that was like three times her size are you sure that's what you want to do [Music] [Applause] the cuckoo clock was mine that was my own little spin on it my little improvisation Jason Alexander's in the movie as well and he's on the Mount Rushmore of television comedy because of Seinfeld one of the great and blustering buffoons of television history and it was awesome to get a chance to go toe-to-toe with a legend it was cool just hanging with him on the set he had a lot of cool stories but you know what was cool about the Farrelly Brothers is it was a really funny script and a funny story but it had a lot of them emotional underpinnings to you know it was about how we judge people mmm by the way they look and we don't really go beyond just their physical appearance and it had some cool resonance in that way and I think that's why it stuck around for all these years people still compliment me on that movie and I think that's why it struck a chord Orange County so I did this movie Orange County which among other things was the first time I worked with Jake Kasdan incredible director of Jumanji the next level in Jumanji welcome to the jungle and I had such a blast working on that character he's kind of a Jeff Spicoli he's a stoner and he is kind of a big brother to Colin Hanks character but um it was a real blast to play because he's just sort of living life by the seat of his pants you know just following his nose and he's kind of a train wreck of a human being but he's also kind of lovable and it was a great character for me do you want me to call Public Safety do you want me to get naked and start the revolution I had a lot of fun with it and in that movie I got to party with Colin Hanks was great we had a great chemistry what yeah some cops are right on my ass no listen I've been thinking about it we are going on Mexico buddy right now I got to work with Ben Stiller and a rad scene she named Joe John what is it Joe John Ames Joe Tom Johnston Johnston Joe yeah everybody on the in the cast and Jake were just incredible to work with I'm very proud of that movie I mean it was just sort of an amalgamation of all the stoners that I knew growing up in Hermosa Beach but no no one in particular maybe weirdly closest to myself of all the characters of Italy School of Rock so I did Orange County right and Mike white wrote Orange County and Scott Rudin produced Orange County and so Scott hatched this plan to give me the lead role in in a movie and he was talking with Mike white about it like what can we do because Jack's so funny in Orange County well can we do that that would really feature him as the central character and Mike had this idea he was like I think he should be teaching kids out of rock and Scott Rudin's that go write it and Mike just told me hey I've been hired to write a script for you and what do you think about this concept I was like yes do it go and he wrote this script and I didn't tell him any I didn't guy give him any guidance or anything I didn't really develop it at all I just read his first draft was dynamite is hilarious Scott Rudin the producer said I want you guys to meet this director Richard Linklater I was like I love Richard Linklater right I saw his film slackers which is this incredible you know bohemian movie about artists and eccentrics in Austin Texas and I was like but that's such like an art film I don't know if he's really the right director to direct a big you know studio comedy but then we met him and I was like oh I get it and that's kind of the genius of Scott Rudin knowing who to put together to make magic happen because Linklater was taking it seriously and taking it to another level of like believability he wanted everything to be rooted in in reality and to believe that these characters are real and these kids are real and that this crazy scenario could have happened in real life and that's the combination that made it special and so he and Mike worked together on another draft and they worked worked out the beats and we rehearsed it a lot richard is is a theater guy at his core that's his roots and me too so I was super comfortable with that workshop and scenes with the kids and and finding new beats like that scene where we're all going around the classroom and I'm assigning people their jobs and their musical instruments and we basically write a song in the room and one in one scene without cutting that was all workshop through rehearsal you know and added into the script do you remember this thing I taught you a minute ago yes and a lot of the movie had that rad like malleable development feel to it and it's definitely like the movie I'm most proud of that's the one that really I felt like all the planets aligned and when we did the first read-through with the whole cast it was just that it's just lightning in a bottle that's the only time I felt that I was like meant to do something and now the rest is all just gravy and I say I can die happy got my school of rock yeah everyone had their two cents but I would say that Linklater had real strong opinions about certain jams yeah he wanted that that Zeppelin song really badly and he's the one that said hey you know I tried to get the Zeppelin music in Dazed and Confused a movie that he directed before School of Rock and they said no so would you do me a favor and just make a video plea just beg them to use the immigrant song that we ended up using the you know that that Viking and so I did I begged them on video with a huge audience of extras in the mood in the movie theater that we were shooting in and they all chanted with me Led Zeppelin please bless us with your love I don't remember what I said it was ridiculous and off the top of my head and he sent it over there to them to England and it worked they were like oh that's funny that's funny mate yeah we'll let him use the song that's not a very good imitation of Jimmy Page but um and it's a great thing because it's one of the one of the best parts of the movie that's all [Music] the summer you get an $850 I didn't go for the guy miss aura I was involved in a lot of the music any music that I sang that was like original music I wrote or had a hand in writing that song is actually a band called Moony Suzuki and that was the song I was having real trouble writing I was I was trying to crack the code and I was like there's too much pressure it's the big finale song the end of the movie and I wrote a bunch of different drafts and none of it was working and then it was a Saturday night and I went to see The Strokes the band that opened was called the Mooney Suzuki and they were so funny and hard rockin and I was like god I wish I could write a song like that that would be perfect for the end of the movie and I went backstage after the show and I said you guys I loved your set um I'm doing this movie called school of rock would you want to take a crack at writing the finale song I got some lyrics here that Mike White wrote and they're like yeah I'm gonna take a look at those I'll give it a crack I'll give you a text I'll give you a text if I come up with something I was like all right good luck and I didn't have high hopes the next day I get the text with the rough of the song and just killed it crushed and I was so excited because I was like yeah I think I might have cried a little bit [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] but that just goes to show like the stress and like this the last-minute scrambling that can go into making a movie because we were already making the movie at that point we didn't have the ending song so it's crazy the kind of turmoil that you can put yourself through making these kind of movies but thank God we got it thank you Mooney Suzuki King Kong so coming off the School of Rock I was just like riding high on a cloud I was like things couldn't be better I just like had a home run of a movie that I'm super proud of and everybody seemed to love it and when my agent was like what do you want to do now what kind of movie you want to make that's like I don't know she's like who do you want to work with and I was like well I just saw the Lord of the Rings trilogy and guy those movies are so good if I could ever be in a Peter Jackson film but I know that's never gonna happen and then like the next day I get a call from my agent sent dude Peter Jackson wants you to be in King Kong I was like what no really you gotta go meet him I was like well I'm gonna mess it up when I'm gonna go meet him on my blood I'm gonna say the wrong thing and I went and met him and they didn't want me to audition or anything did it was he and his wife and their writing partner they just wanted to show me like an animated sort of version of the end of the movie when King Kong is up on top of the Empire State Building fighting off the the the airplanes the by wing planes and it was just a beautiful sequence I got chills watching it and they said so do you want to be in our movie and I was like yes yes do so then we go off to New Zealand and it's a long shoot we're there for like six months which is twice as long as a normal movie because it's just huge and sprawling and I was in heaven loved being in New Zealand Wellington New Zealand beautiful country going to work every day was just I didn't want it to end like when we got to the end of the shoot I I'm not ashamed to say I shed a couple man tears because I I just wanted to live there and and and never stopped making King Kong's so the huge scene where I'm fighting off all those prehistoric insects and disgusting and flesh-eating bugs usually when you do a big special effects thing like that they say very precisely walk three steps and then swat at this tennis ball and then look up because then other things coming but this time Peter Jackson was like forget all of that just walk into this set and it looks like a disgusting prehistoric like losing landscape and just pretend like there's literally thousands of man-eating bugs coming at you from every direction and just go off just be swatting around and for your life and we'll just add all the special effects later as I okay it was such freedom I didn't have to worry about blocking I just could let my imagination run wild and that's basically what that scene is we're all just like swatting at monsters in art from our subconscious mind it's really fun to shoot an incredible cardio I'm gonna start a new exercise class called killing man eating bugs naturally today so Nacho Libre was an incredible opportunity to work with amazing filmmaker Jared Hess I was such a huge fan of Napoleon Dynamite and I got the call that he wanted to collaborate and I said okay meet me at the top of the parking lot over at the ArcLight theater so we met there was a weird place to meet I don't know why I wanted to meet there there's a nice view of the city I thought it would be a good place for an epic power meeting looking at the view of Los the Los Angelenos skyline and he told me the idea of this guy that had two life's one life that was just for the Lord and this other secret life that he has to where he just he loves wrestling then we would but they they can't coexist you know a man of the Lord cannot live a life of you know violence so he's torn his soul is torn and the way that he described the world was so funny and rich I was worried though it's like dude he's a Mexican character I don't know if I should play that character and he told me that he had a plan for that was that my father was Swedish and my mother was Mexican and they they I was born in Mexico and I grew up there but that's why I'm a gringo I wouldn't have to you know to any of the things that would be considered spicy so we dove in headfirst and just had a ball and it was such a beautiful location we filmed all in waka miss Mexico [Music] so me and Hector start off as enemies and over the course of the film we come become best friends and also we have philosophical differences I am a man of the Lord and I believe in in God and faith and he's a man of science he only believes in science but somehow we still work together to become one of the great wrestling tag teams of all time I don't take the rules I do get a lot of people saying going out of my face John Shaw then they borrow some sweets that's another good one and a lot of that is just imitating Jared Hess the director has an incredible talent at doing voices and character work himself and I always told him to you got to be the star of a movie you're so funny and he has no interest in that doesn't want to get up in front of the camera but it's one of the things that makes him such a great director even they say they say you're never supposed to do it but he gives the best line ratings and sometimes I would even say let me hear how you would say and he would say I would just bust a gut laughing so hard he made it really easy I recommend working with Jared if you want a really hilarious performance and I really worked my ass off learning how to wrestle it wasn't without injuries I at one point sustained a bad gash on my eye diving out of the ring and I hit my head on some of those folding chairs and I had to be rushed to the hospital and the producer said hey he's an actor he's got to be able to use his face let's not just get a search and let's get the best plastic surgeon in Mexico over here as soon as possible and this incredible plastic sir came to the hospital and she was dressed in a full ball gown she had come straight from like a fancy event to where she was in a ball gown and she did the surgery on my eye and as you can see she did incredible work you can barely see it you can't see it really at all yeah thank you wherever you are incredible surgeon Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny well you know my whole career kind of got jumpstart about Tenacious D because that's how I got high-fidelity my big breakthrough role and I always got a special satisfaction out of doing tenacious T because it was the it was the one job that I had where I was the writer director you know auteur of the project and you got a special source of pride with that because you're not just a puppet in someone else's game even though you know all movies are a little collaborative and you get to put your two cents in Tenacious D was my baby you know so even while my career was taking off and I was getting all these big Hollywood movie roles I always kept the burner going for Tenacious D and in between movies working with Kyle on new material and new songs and we realized that we were at a crossroads it was time to take it to the next level we had already done a TV series a little limited HBO series we did our big album and it was time to make Tenacious D the movie and we worked really hard on on writing that story and when I like to answer what should it just be like another weird adventure of tenacious d or wouldn't and we realized no it had to be the origin story of tenacious ooh where did we come from and it had to be the true story of exactly the way it went down with some extra details to make it more exciting like we never actually met Satan at a crossroads but we had to put that in there to make it give it a little extra rocket sauce yeah it was magical we got everyone we wanted I wanted meat love to play my dad we wanted Ronnie James Dio to be in there to be my inspiration we got Tim Robbins to play the creepy stranger everybody that we asked said yes and we made the exact movie we wanted to make we made a kickass theme song music video to promote the movie we went on SNL we did everything he could do and then the movie came out and nobody went to see it and we were devastated but we were still proud of the movie you know and over the years it's been like what has it been like 12 years now 13 years people still come up to us and tell us how much they loved the movie when we play concerts all around the world to thousands of people they all know every word of the songs from the Pick of Destiny so it really has sort of built a cult following over the years just because something doesn't get you know a hundred percent on Rotten Tomatoes and zero people go to see your movie doesn't mean that it has to be the end of this story if you if you love the the work that's all it really matters because they can find an audience further down the road the holiday so I had done nacho the Pick of Destiny King Kong and then I got this offer for this movie that was a lot different in tone it's like softer it was sweeter this is a romantic comedy but it was really well written and I was like oh you know what my mom's gonna love this one and it was also an opportunity to work with Kate Blanchet no sorry Kate hold on a second we're living here and it was also an opportunity to work with Kate Winslet the great not to be confused with any other Kate Winslet and I was like wait a second this isn't really gonna happen Kate Winslet's not gonna do a movie with me she's gonna go for a leonardo de capital mic blackity yes you was Hey I got you the best drink in town but I didn't know if you liked a little dog whipped cream or a big dollop so I got both and you can have each one with a little big dollop great by the way thanks really great thanks I'm feeling good I've been working out with Arthur I'm sure it's an awesome workout I'm sorry I was trying not to picture it okay well the workouts not that great I was the big winner there cuz just getting to be in a movie with her and cameras were rolling and I'm looking across at one of the best actors living and in her eyes are the reality of the character and she's just like a pro on another level so I learned a lot just from like doing scenes with her and watching her and how it committed she was and how real she was I mean that's not really something you can learn you can't learn to be charismatic like that you got to be born with it but just her level of commitment was infectious and I felt like I picked up a lot of a lot of that energy you know traffic Thunder so Tropic Thunder was a rad project that dropped in my lap ben stiller was gonna do this big epic comedy out in Hawaii sounded like paradise the cast was intense yeah danny mcbride but this is before eastbound and down so people didn't really know what an incredible firecracker of an artist he was yet and he got Robert Downey jr. but this is before Ironman this is after his like scandal it was like his career was over so he was he was on the comeback trail at that point people didn't know he was about to explode and be the biggest superhero movie star in the world there's a lot of people that were like getting ready to pop in that movie you could feel it on the set there was a lot of electric energy the movie itself was groundbreaking in that it was super dark and funny and real like cinematography was Academy award-winning level there's a lot of things you had not seen before in a comedy and it was hard comedies are supposed to be super easy but dude the locations were remote you say oh you're filming in Hawaii oh that must be really chill that's probably paradise but every day dude we had to get in a weird Jeep and drive over Hill and Dale like really intense landscapes mud spraying God for like an hour and a half to two hours every morning you get out there and then get into your costume and makeup and and and work and we were like slogging screaming bloody murder hiking up mountains and doing really intense scenes but in the end of it at the end of the day it was worth it because it was funny as hell and really original but the scenes that I remember the most are the ones where I felt like I was actually gonna die I was on the back of a gigantic water buffalo Charlie Chester he's a fashion chic c'est l'heure de chez Dede it was carrying me around a mountain pass we were on like our 13th take and I didn't blame the water buffalo cuz I'm I'm heavy and it didn't want me on its back and it just started buck and I was like I want you off my back right now and it started bucking bronco nothing oh and they were like God God looks like I can't stop him he's blue I went flying flip ass over teakettle somehow miraculously landed between two big boulders little wind knocked out of me but no lacerations no injury miracle I should have died and then uh been still it is everyone okay we take it from the top guys I was like you we're not taking it from the top Buffalo and I just walked off the set I thought justifiably I didn't think I was a being a diva at all and then been realized dude I realized I didn't know that you almost died I didn't know what happened I didn't see it you weren't even on camera I was like it wasn't even on camera because when something like that happens you want to know that at least you got some rad footage know if it went off the road and the cameraman was like no this shots no it's good over there I keep the camera here cinematographers never one of their showed no anyway sore subject turns out though that water buffalo was pregnant that's why it was freaking out no one knew cuz she wasn't showing and the baby's fun and guess what they named it jet black if he ever made a big ass water buffalo named Jack Black Elmo was Jumanji welcome to the jungle yeah I love the true munch of the original Jumanji with Robin Williams Kirsten Dunst and the rest they're on Jumanji IL incredible movie incredible performance by Robin Williams because he thrived in characters and scenarios that were extreme because he's such an extreme like 100 miles a minute brain of a comedian it's like he's from another planet so he's playing more from work it fits his personality because it's like what are you how do you do this and in Jumanji that movie he's this guy coming out of the game he's been in the jungle for 20 years barely surviving and he's insane and it works because that's like right in his Lane because he's got some insanity to him you know that's what makes him so exciting as a performer and that's why you mangy the first one kicks so much ass is because he got Robin Williams at the peak of his powers in the perfect role for him you know so we get an opportunity to revisit Jumanji it's a big title big shoes to fill but it's a great take the script is is electric and what's really the best thing about it is reading it knowing that you've got Dwayne the rock Johnson and Kevin Hart in those roles it was like those guys are gonna be hilarious I could just see it I heard their voices while I'm reading it you're telling me that you're Spencer I am Spencer I'm yep that's Benson and they're offering me the role to be the most popular girl in school I was like I know how to be the hot chick from high school I know for some reason I know how to do it Hey oh my god you guys there's like literally a penis attached to my body right now Martha come look at my penis and it was just like I hope I get this part I mean I know I've been offered the part but I feels too good to be true like the last minute I'm but I I got it I kept it and and we made it and just as I had anticipated grand slam home run felt good feels good to connect I don't know I mean it's just you know and like it comes natural the fact that I'm not instagramming this right now is insane here's the thing about Jumanji though it's thinking about Jumanji welcome to the jungle it was something that I realized that we were bringing to the table because the first Jumanji it's this little kid plays Jumanji the board game and gets sucked into the game you don't see him cut to 20 years later he comes out of the game and he's like the jungle I've been in the jungle but you never see what he saw for those 20 years but in our movie you're going into the game you're going into the jungle I think we got like sucked into the game and I was pushing early on I hate to toot my own horn but I basically named the movie because I was like you guys that's the difference this movie is we're in the jungle it should be called Jumanji welcome to the jungle and one of the marketing dudes were saying you know there anyway now I feel I feel dirty for having taking credit for the naming of the movie but it's true Jumanji the next level Jumanji the next level is all about the new elements Danny DeVito Danny Glover Kevin and Dwayne playing those new old characters is so perfect and it really is my favorite part of the movie are these new elements because it kicks so much ass and Dwayne and Kevin are perfectly suited to those roles because they are bickering old farts you know what I mean they fight each other all the time but they love each other but they hate each other but they love each other and it's perfect and I think that's what Jake and the writers were thinking they were like how can we capitalize on this insane relationship that they have and how could we use that and harness it and yeah he's bickering old dudes that have this love for each other and of course you know we got Aquafina in there and she's a dynamo she's incredibly funny talented character actress those were the things I was most excited about the the the trio of new rocket sauce my part I got to play a new character and I was scared about it you know I was like this is this is gonna be a real challenge I don't know if I can pull it off and you know I had the same fears and concerns with nacho libre has like I don't know if I should play this part there's if there's a spice in there if I get it wrong but I felt really good about my performance I felt like I really found the voice and the character I was really proud at the end of the day what I was able to come up with I'm excited for people to see [Music]

Channel: GQ

Views: 4,278,207

Rating: 4.9437032 out of 5

Keywords: celebrity, iconic, jack black, tenacious d, iconic characters, jack black interview, jack black 2019, jack black gq, jack black funny, jack black movie, jack black movies, jack black character, jack black characters, jack black tenacious d, jack black show, jack black school of rock, jack black nacho libre, jack black the holiday, jack black king kong, jack black tropic thunder, jack black jumanji, jack black shallow hal, jack black high fidelity, gq, gq magazine

Id: 6BTJ7feX0aQ

Length: 39min 43sec (2383 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 19 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/lesjo]

He talks a bit about Peter Jackson's King Kong! Nice, it's a very good movie.

[u/Danulas]

School of Rock is one of my all-time favorite movies, so his take on some of those moments was super interesting!

[u/staypuftmallows7]

The biggest omission is Bernie. Maybe they left it out because he would have to talk about the real Bernie, which could probably get controversial. I also would have liked to hear him talk about Be Kind Rewind. I think that one's pretty split on liked it/hated it. I liked it though

[u/King_Of_NY87]

Disappointed no airborne

[u/Technosnake]

That's not Jack Black that's Jablinski Games

[u/RaphtotheMax5]

Kung Fu Panda 1 and 2 are so good, same with School of Rock, love Jack.

​

Edit: Damnit they didn't even go over Kung Fu Panda, what a crime

[u/become_taintless]

What, no Eddie Riggs from Brütal Legend ?

HOW IS THIS EVEN A LIST?

[u/MAGMA_CHUNKZ]

what a bizarre selection of roles.

no Lamont from the Jackal

no J.D. from Saving Silverman

no Motorcyclist from Anchorman

no Jack from Heat Vision and Jack

what are we doing here guys?

[u/corruptrevolutionary]

I was hoping he’d talk about The House with a Clock in its walls because I loved him and Cate Blanchett together.