Let me start by talking about celebrity. Having grown up in a NFL football town, I don't get impressed easily, because we constantly saw “celebrities” walking around. That being said, Vin Diesel completely shocked and surprised me! I'll be honest – I was expecting Vin to be more like Riddick and be a bad ass. Instead, we got to interview this really great, really funny, really nice man that I wasn't expecting!
When Vin walked into the room, we all clapped for him. (For those of you wondering since you emailed me, yes, he's just as good looking in person as he is on the big screen). He acted fake shocked and said let's do that again. He then literally walked out of the room and came back in. At that point, the ice was broken, since most of us were in tears from laughing so hard. Vin was a perfect example of how celebrities are just people. I literally felt like I could go to dinner with Vin and have a conversation with him (Vin, let's make a dinner date! LOL). He was completely normal.
In Guardians of the Galaxy, Vin Diesel plays Groot. Groot is a Flora Colossus from Planet X, the capital of the branch worlds. The Flora Colossus are tree-like beings whose language is almost impossible to understand due to the stiffness of their larynxes, causing their speech to sound like they are repeating the phrase “I am Groot”. That being said, Groot does have a huge part in this movie. When we asked Vin about why he chose the role Groot, he told us that:
First of all, the people that get the most credit for me playing Groot are those people on my Facebook page. They manifested this union between myself and Marvel when nobody had an idea of what we could do. As you know, I had to shoot “Fast and the Furious 7” a little bit longer than anticipated, and there was really no schedule to be able to do a six-month role. The persistence of the social media somewhat forced us all to be really creative. Kevin Feige had went Comic Con and I was at Comic Con too for “Riddick” and kept getting asked “What is the involvement between Vin and Marvel”. We felt like, oh my God, we'd better come up with something fast. He called me and said, “I'm gonna tell you about this character. Don't think I'm crazy. I hope you will like it. I'm going to send you over some conceptual art.” I got delivered this huge book of conceptual art for “The Guardians of the Galaxy.” It's the first time that I had ever seen what they were doing with Groot which is not like anything you have ever seen in any of the comic books. It's an original Groot. I went into the living room, and the kids were there, and I opened up the book, and it was a double-truck picture with all of the characters. I said to the kids, “What character do you think they want Daddy to play?” They answered in seconds. I was praying that they would lead me in feeling good about this role. They all pointed to Groot, and they thought Groot was cool.
Can I just say how much I love this? I love that he included his kids in his decision to play Groot. He went on to tell us more about his kids:
The best thing about having played this role is something I never would have anticipated as an actor. I never would've seen this coming. I knew when I did the voice of Iron Giant that it would be cool for my kids to say “my dad is the Iron Giant.” I didn't anticipate what the effect would be from playing Groot, and this is what it's been.
When my kids are in the back seat, whenever we're driving they see trees they say, “Look, Dad. It's your brothers and sisters.” You can't beat that. I mean, nothing I would try to teach them about life and respect for nature could have been as effective as them seeing Daddy as Groot, and how appropriate.
We've never seen trees in that light. I mean, we, I guess, in 1939, when “The Wizard of Oz” came out, there was a little something us people that kind of saw that saw, you know, okay, the tree can have some kind of feelings, if they're pulling apples from the tree. This, I feel, has gone to the next level. I never thought I'd be so proud of it. In some ways, Groot is nature's ambassador, and there's something beautiful about that.
I do movies that are not necessarily for kids. So, to do this and to be able to share this with the little ones, and for them to be so excited about it and so proud of it, and to think of trees differently. They will never look at a tree the same way. No one will, after this.
We then asked about if he influenced working with the FX guys:
I went into the recording booth as a seven-and-a-half foot tree, in essence. I was wearing jumping stilts while I was recording. They had to adjust the mic, and they had never had to do that before. It was pretty intense. You just need one thing, or a few things, that get you into character, that get you into the spirit of the character. What I wanted to do is be seven-and-a-half feet tall, and I was seven-and-a-half feet tall, and it felt like I was adding something.
We also asked about his upcoming project (besides Fast and the Furious 7):
I am about to do a movie called “The Last Witch Hunter” about a 700-year old New Yorker.
He was also beyond cool when we asked him to take a group picture, and he had us all singing “Hooked On A Feeling” from The Galaxy of the Guardians soundtrack.
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GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXYopens in theaters everywhere on August 1st! What did you learn about Vin Diesel that you didn't know?
