Interview by Rafy Mediavilla, with Actor & Comedian Vas Sanchez From The Shout! Studios Movie “Castle Falls”. Out Today On Theaters, Digital & VOD.
Directed by Dolph Lundgren (Ivan Drago In Rocky IV)
After decades of neglect, Castle Heights Hospital, this symbol of the city’s segregated past has been packed with dynamite and is ready to be demolished. No one knows that a gang leader, now in prison, hid the 3 million dollars in cash he stole from his rivals inside the abandoned building. Now, three desperate parties want the money – a blue collared ex-fighter (Adkins) who finds it while working as part of the demolition crew, a prison guard (Lundgren) willing to do anything to pay for his daughter’s cancer treatment and a ruthless gang who claim to be the rightful owners. The demolition charges are set, everyone clears out and the Castle is set to fall in 90 minutes. The clock is ticking. Who will find the cash and: will they get out alive?
Criticólogos:
Let’s talk about, George, I truly love George. I think George was the everyday guy, what is it about the character that just drew you to him? Did you know where you were getting into when you were doing the audition?
Vas Sanchez:
A little bit. You know, I did the audition because I liked the fact that George was like cracking jokes like in the script. He was kind of funny, and I liked that.
And when I did the audition, you know, originally, I wasn’t in a lot of the scenes originally. But Dolph said after he after we met, he really liked the life that I brought to George. And he was he wanted to put me in more of the film. So, I think George and I kind of met in the middle. I brought a lot of me, and he was already there, and it was one of those really cool moments where you just built to be a character, I think.
Criticólogos:
What about George was something that is yours that basically you put into from your personality into the character? Or what was it of you just following instructions for the director?
Vas Sanchez:
Yeah, I you know, George, I’m a stand up comedian when I don’t do acting. So, George, making jokes and stuff will that’s like the same. Like, I was like, absolutely the same way with George.
But then George has this sense of being a father and being a family man that I unfortunately I don’t have. I’m working on it, but I don’t have it yet. So, I learn, you know, my brother, he and my sister, they both have children. And so, I’m an uncle so I can feel a little bit of that. But mostly that was something that was there and that we really wanted to play with this idea of family and wanting sort of a better life. So that was a little bit more directed and a little more crafted and really beautiful stuff and really drove the passion of the character.
Criticólogos:
How fun was it for you to watch [Dolph & Scott] the guys just play out in set and everything that happened? Because to me, the movie played out it just it felt to be a lot of fun.
Vas Sanchez:
Yeah, no. It was amazing. Dolph was always a hero of mine. I grew up watching all of his stuff when I was young, and Scott was a recent new hero of mine being. I always love action films. And Scott is a rock star. Action film. So, watching them do fight choreography and all that stuff was really, really cool. I really enjoyed sort of everything. Any moment that involved me having to do a stunt. I was like, really excited. So, it was it was really, really cool, really fun to watch those two guys work, for sure.
Criticólogos:
Did you pick up something new that you learn something from them? You know, I’m writing this down. I’m taking this as a sponge.
Vas Sanchez:
Between those two men. I think I learned a lot. Honestly, really. Most importantly, I learned like that to be the character genuinely, you kind of have to be really present and have fun. And Dolph would allow like Scott and I to go and just kind of talk for a little bit. And in all of our little chit chat, that’s where the chemistry was sort of developing for the friendship. And those two men allow for that to be there on set. They allow for that space and that kind of energy to exist.
And so, for me, I was like, Man, that’s what I want every chance I get any project I work on, I want to make sure that I can have space to be myself and connect as myself to my other actors and the rest of my team because it just generates such a better connection, a much more believable chemistry. Once once the cameras are rolling. So, I learn especially that I learned to the most between the both of them.
Criticólogos:
Did you guys like bonded talk about past projects in the in the downtime? [With Scott Adkins & Dolph Lundgren]
Vas Sanchez:
Yeah. So Dolph would make little jokes here and there, there was one moment where we were, actually the whole building was a real building that were going to demolish, so like there were pieces and parts of stuff everywhere and he kind of kicked the piece of this aluminum away. And when he did, someone was like, Oh, that was like an Ivan Drago kick, you know? And he kind of like, laughed and kind of got in his stance. And that was kind of funny.
But really, Scott and I talked a lot about all the different movies that we both loved growing up and we like we talked about like Bloodsport, and we talked about a lot of Van Damme and a lot of Steven Seagal. And that’s how he and I became like, really, really like Close, which was really fun and great. And like every now and again, somebody would make a joke about like He-Man or, you know, something like that, was it? And Dolph was awesome. Like, he would just kind of joke right back, real quick. And then we move on because we didn’t know how sensitive, you know, to be like, do we talk about this stuff with him or what? But he was great.
He definitely like leaned into it. And the producer on the movie was the same producer from Universal Soldier, which was like one of my favorite movies. So, I chatted with him for a little bit about that, too, because when I was a kid, that was like one of my favorites,
Criticólogos:
Was there something else that you think people should be, you know, really paying attention to it in the story? [Beside the heavy action scenes]
Vas Sanchez:
I think there’s a really heavy handed subtext to sort of the American health care system and a lot of the flaws that exist inside of it. And I think it’s important for everyone to sort of just kind of pay attention to the note that’s given there. It’s not a huge, heavy handed like stick it to the system, but it’s definitely there and it’s definitely something that I think we can improve on in this country. So, I think it’s important to sort of make sure that that’s somewhere being paid attention to. Other than that, though, action, action, action.
See the full interview below:
Trailer:
