This may be difficult to digest but little Abigail Breslin may be Hollywood’s newest action hero.
You can laugh but it’s true. While the Oscar-nominated youngster behind Little Miss Sunshine is unlikely to become the next Chuck Norris, in her latest comic thriller, Breslin has taken up a shotgun to blast her way through Zombieland, which topped the weekend box office with $25 million in gross takings.
“I never thought I’d be in a zombie movie so it was kind of fun to do,” said Breslin during a recent phone interview from New York.
“I don’t know if I’m trying to branch out. I just do each movie because of the character and the story so I just really liked Little Rock (her character).
“She’s a con-artist and she’s really tough, smart and really brave and fun to play and it’s a zombie movie — how can you not want to (do it)!”
Described by director Ruben Fleischer as “Midnight Run with zombies,” Breslin’s latest movie casts her and Emma Stone (Superbad) as clever sisters who coerce fellow rambling apocalypse survivors Woody Harrelson and Jesse Eisenberg (Adventureland) to sojourn to sunny California in order to seek refuge at an amusement park from a worldwide plague that has turned everyone into the walking dead.
Although spending the opening weeks of production surrounded by carnival rides was thrilling, perhaps the only thing more surprising for Breslin was her adopted skill at shooting zombies — an attribute Stone has praised her 13-year-old co-star for.
“That was nice of her to say but the first time I was not very good,” insisted Breslin. “Once you get used to it, it’s not so hard but you still have to go through all of the gun safety stuff.”
She may now be wielding firearms and killing zombies in R-rated fashion with Woody Harrelson but don’t expect Breslin to be any less an innocent kid. Perhaps best exemplified by her infamous on-set “curse jar,” Breslin kept her adult co-stars in check by collecting money for charity each time someone stepped out of line and cursed in her company.
“I don’t think I even counted up how much we made. I think everyone was trying to watch (their language),” laughed Breslin when asked about her well-behaved castmembers. “Nobody stands out in my mind (as being a potty mouth).”
