Interview with “The Duel” movie actors Dylan Sprouse & Callan Mcauliffe
Upon discovering that his best friend, Colin (Sprouse), has been having an affair with his girlfriend, Woody (Mcauliffe) decides that no modern form of revenge could possibly satisfy him. Instead, Woody challenges his closest companion to a classic contest of honor – a gentleman’s duel to the death. When two of their friends join the act, the once inseparable group of men inch closer to the day of destiny and test the bonds of their relationship until the moment of no return.
THE DUEL will release as a one-night-only theatrical event in partnership with Iconic Events on July 31, 2024
Criticólogos:
Dylan. I saw that you were producing the movie and also acting on it. So I want to ask, what were the challenges of wearing those two hats? And were some things you learned from that process?
Dylan Sprouse:
This is really my first time executive producing, and, part of it was from necessity from the jump, because I think we wanted to get this thing rolling in a way. And, Luke, Justin and I were all kind of first timers doing what we were planning on doing there. But I was also very careful to separate the producer hat from the actor hat while on set. Most of my production side was in the post and the pre-production.
So for me, I think there wasn’t much difficulty. Although I will say I’m very used to as an actor, having a very particular role in the project and then it being done, and then I just appear afterwards for the finished product. So this is actually been really nice being all throughout the production cycle and kind of checking in and making sure things are aligned and, so that’s been very fun. I couldn’t have done it on a better project with so many people that I love very dearly.
Criticólogos:
Open question for either of you too, I’m really curious because the movie’s on Modern Story, but since it’s a Duel, there’s some vintage props in sets. So did you guys, wanted to keep something? Or maybe you kept something?
Callan Mcauliffe:
I wish we could have kept our respective pistols. That would have been amazing. but of course, they were on loan to production. and they were not ours to keep. I don’t remember if I did take anything either. You know, wittingly or unwittingly, if I ended up with anything in my pocket. But I don’t think I did. All I have, all I have are the memories, unfortunately. But they’re good enough.
Criticólogos:
Dylan, do you want to add something?
Dylan Sprouse:
I kept some of the character art. I did keep, there were some drawings, like sketches of us in our suits from wardrobe with some of the bits of the materials. And I kept mine just because I thought it was so cool of a little keepsake. I do like to keep one thing, though, you know, we were just renting all the historical stuff. We couldn’t take any of that home, though, I wish it would be nice to have a pistol in the house.
Criticólogos:
Callan, your character has a lot of anger because of the betrayal of his best friend. Was there any strategy you use to channel your character and getting in your role?
Callan Mcauliffe:
Nothing that I remember in particular. I mean, I despise Dylan in real life just so completely. It was a fairly natural transition. I mean, all I took was my imagining it happening to me and having a dear friend, choose to shatter the relationship in such a way. And you know, what his anger was quick to come to me. But it was just the script itself, it was so perfectly written from the get-go and knew exactly where to place this guy and myself. And so more than anything, it was a joy.
Criticólogos:
Do you guys have any story behind the scenes or something that happened on set that you want to share?
Dylan Sprouse:
I will say that we, uh, we shot this during Covid. And one interesting fact is we did this over a month and a half, and I believe we did over, I think, 1500 tests over the course of that. Yeah, it was a lot of tests, and we did not have a single positive Covid case.
The very strange part was our medic was at the party afterward, and we were all at the wrap party. We’re still in lockdown, but at the wrap party, the medic came up to me and gave me that fact, and then he winked at me, and I was like.
(and I asked) So are you lying? He was like, nope. Didn’t we? And he was like, we didn’t, like statistically impossible. I was like, okay, but you know, who knows? We didn’t have any on paper and no one was actually sick. So, I think the gods were looking out for us.
See the full interview below:
Trailer:
