Josh Hartnett
Interview By: J.P. Mangalindan
JPMangalindan@TheCinemaSource.com
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Any fantasies of Josh Hartnett au naturale have been laid to rest with Lucky Number Slevin, where fantasy becomes reality. In what some might claim is a gratuitous move (and others a welcome one), the actor traipses around in a floral-pattern bath towel for nearly one-third of the flick.
"Paul [Guigan] came up with the idea of putting me in a towel in the first part of the movie at the very last minute," Hartnett says of the decision. "I thought it would be funny and good for the character to be in the presence of all these big, bad gangsters with nothing but a towel on."
He may not pose much of a threat (though even that matter is disputed in Slevin), but Hartnett's little half-nude stint might have been off-putting for male actors less than secure in their appearance ' not that the actor has anything to worry about in that department.
"As far as the genre goes, it's unlike any other film that you've seen. It has a comedic element. Obviously it has a suspense element. It's a film that doesn't adhere to a specific genre."
Hartnett plays down-on-his-luck Slevin, a guy who takes the cake as poster boy for worst case of mistaken identity. Identified by Goodkat (Bruce Willis) as someone else, Slevin quickly finds himself embroiled in a street war between two of New York City's crime bosses and tailed by Detective Brikowski (Stanley Tucci). It's the set-up for a film that's equal-parts comedy and thriller, a bevy of various genres mixed into one vehicle, which is most notable perhaps for writer Jason Smilovic's unorthodox dialogue.
"If you think the dialogue and the script is overwritten, then you haven't met Jason: [he] talks like every character in this piece. He is constantly referencing and digressing, moving further and further into his cocoon of his exciting ideas while everyone else is sort of watching him as some sort of act, some sort of stage show. But he's genuinely like that. He's writing what he hears." Hartnett believes Smilovic's idiosyncratic way with words will propel the writer to well-deserved fame. "I have a feeling he'll be around for a while writing this type of movies, until this type of movie becomes too popular and everything he does from here on out will seem like he's doing that same old thing."
This September, the actor appears alongside current offscreen flame, Scarlett Johansson, in Brian De Palma's adaptation of The Black Dahlia as Officer Dwight "Bucky" Bleichert, an L.A. cop investigating the death of a Hollywood starlet in the 1940s. Hartnett seems even more excited by Black Dahlia ("It's going to be stunning") than he is about Slevin ' if that's at all possible. In contrast to Slevin however, the prep work for Black Dahlia was physically taxing.
"I'm playing a detective ex-boxer, so that meant seven months of training," he admits. "The guys who trained me didn't cut me any slack: I was boxing for about four months six days a week, training like I was going to be in a championship bout."
And fans who couldn't get enough of him in the buff can't wait.
