Actor Danny Huston has been having a lot of fun playing bad guys lately, and his latest outing — the genre-bending martial arts-meets-Old West “The Warrior’s Way” — has him sinking his teeth into one of his baddest. Huston sat down with Metro to chat about villains, ninjas in the Old West and getting back to directing.
You seem to be enjoying yourself playing bad guys.
I enjoyed myself on this movie. The highlight for me really was the sword action sequence with Kate [Bosworth], which was shot over about four days. That was just, from a choreography point of view, very exciting, physically demanding and a lot of fun to do. But there’s another aspect to this guy. He’s quite complex — I suppose like most villains. Yet he has this quite unique quality about him. He’s vain, he’s romantic. A psychopath of sorts. There are levels to him that were meaty and enjoyable to take on.
Villains seem to always be the meatier roles in big movies.
I would go along with that, but also our hero is complex in this story. It has a wonderful sort of Zen balance to it, this film, which I suppose is indicative as to where it comes from. The hero, in a way, has renounced violence. Our heroine needs violence to conquer her demons. But the violence in this film, for me personally, it’s so exquisite, so beautiful to look at, that it loses its violent impact. Unlike another film I did called “The Proposition,” written by Nick Cave, which was very violent — a few people are killed in it. I recall stamping on somebody’s head.
Martial arts in the Old West is an interesting mix.
I didn’t know quite how the ninjas [and] all of that was going to work. It at times confused me, to be quite honest.
Who would win in a fight, you or Kate?
Kate’s pretty damn good. She’s very athletic, she’s quite a crafty little swordsman. But if she started fighting with me, I think I would just lay down and let her do whatever she wished.
Will you be returning to directing soon?
I’m developing a film called “Day of the Dead,” which is based on a novel by a guy named Kent Harrington. I’ve been optioning this book for 10 or 15 years. It’s become a bad, costly habit. So I’ve got to get this thing made, and I’m looking to start production on it hopefully next year. I’m itching to get back in the saddle and direct again. One of the really tough things about directing, other than the job itself, is waiting for your picture to have this green light, this eternal green light that you wait for. And that can be really painful.
