Hello, My name is Jason Getepcio and I'm Rosey Night, and welcome back to Extra Visions week on covers of all things Deadpool and Wolverine. We're dropping episodes every single day leading up to the release of Deadpool and Wolverine, covering everything from both characters, comics, origins, the long history of mutant film adaptation.
In today's episode. In the previously on, we're talking news things that you might see at comic Con, and we've got a lovely interview with none other than Pyro himself, Aaron Stanford, who will be reprising his role in the upcoming Deadpool and Wolverine movie, and what a lovely chat.
It was her first news.
First, The Twisters rocks the box office with a Category S five powerful eighty point.
Five million dollar opening.
I know it was gonna happen, directed to make around fifty in its opening weekend, but folks, uh, we.
Love natural disasters.
We want to see this, Glenn Powell, we love Daisy Anker Jones, we want to see The Twisters.
Rosie your take, I'm not surprised at all.
I came out of seeing this movie and I was like, Oh, this movie's gonna make a lot of money. Like not just because obviously there's adults, there's people like us. We're like, oh, we're gonna see a movie. We're gonna go and see Glen Powell. You want to see Katie O'Brien wearing a cowboy hat, like, we want to see Sasha Lay and she's like a cool tornado nud Like. There's all those things that draw us to it, the fact that Lee
Isaac chungk From who directed Manari, made it. But I also feel like, if you're like ten or eleven years old and you go and see this movie, you're probably gonna think it's the coolest movie of all time. So I really think that some of this this money is likely rewatches, not just by adults, but also by like cool kids who like love Weather.
You know, I'm saying that cool. I'm saying that cool. I love it.
Updates Marvel announces panels, booth send more for Singing Oh. Comic Con which is coming up quite soon. There's a special Deadpool and Wolverine event has been announced.
I believe that will be. My prediction is it's just gonna be a screening. I think they're gonna screen the movie on Thursday night, So if you've got a ticket for that through the nottery, congrats.
On Friday, Editor chief C. B.
Sebulski and special guests will leave will reveal the future direction of the Marvel Comics universe after the events of the Big Blood Hunt event and the big day for marvel In at San Diego Comic Con will be Saturday, where Kevin Figi will make his triumphant return to call h to reveal what's next for the mcu don don's.
That just is so exciting to me as a fan of this stuff. I love to see their little graphic designers, my passion timeline.
It's gonna be hilarious.
Last time we saw them there it was four years ago and that was when we heard about Blade. Blade has still not come out, Dug Dad, So I hope that we get some Blade news. I would my predictions for this are. I would assume that we will see probably the whole cast of Fantastic Four there. Whoa that will be my like that the four that we know about. I believe they will get fought on stage. I think
that would be quite a big deal. And I guess our next piece of news could hint at the other stuff that we're gonna see.
What an incredible transition for mere professional Rosie. Speaking of which, Kevin Feigey recently at a press conference for Deadpool and Wolverine revealed that quote the after meaning after the Deadpool and Wolverine movie is clearly now that we have characters from the X Men world, the Mutants we haven't had access to before.
Figi continued, so this.
Is the beginning of that, and every movie post Deadpool of Wolverine will be the Mutant era coming into the EBCU band.
I just want to say congrats to you and to me, Jason, because really we've been waiting for this for so long.
We've made it.
We've sat here, we've predicted, we've wondered, we've been in the comic shop and we've been like, when, well, the X Men come to the EMCU.
We've been on this show and we've said the same thing.
So I think this is great. I also think it is a huge It's kind of it seems like a throwaway comment, but I think that we can kind of say it's actually like a huge turn away from what we've heard before with the you know it, you know
the kang of it all. I think we're kind of going to focus more on building to the X Men and building to whatever that means, whether that's X Men versus Avengers, whether that's some X Men kind of solo movies recreating that phase one, which I think would be a good idea, like a Storm movie or something like that. You know, I'm very interested to see where it goes, and I think we will at least get a hint of that at San Diego Comic Con this weekend.
I'm very very excited. And once again, you're Rosie. You pointed out we were right.
We were right, baby, right right, And it's finally happening.
Coming up or chat with erin Stanford.
He has played a drug addicted fisherman, he has played a traumatized time traveler, and of course he's played the fire loving mutant Pyro in the X Men series and he will reprise that role in Deadpool Versus Wolverine. It's our absolute pleasure to welcome to the podcast.
Aaron Stafford.
Aaron, thank you for joining us today.
Thanks so much for being here.
What an intro. Thank you guys.
Yeah, we are we are like deep X Men lovers on this podcast, and I believe you are our first mutant.
You are our first ever X man ever had on the show. Ever.
We've had a lot of creators who've worked on it, but I think you're you're our first mutant.
I'm shocked to hear that There's been so many generations and iterations at this point, right.
Yeah, yeah, especially with like the New Cartoon Show and so many movies. But we're super happy to have you here. And something we always ask, like when we have a guest on is like we sometimes ask like, what's your comic book origin story? But for you, like what's your acting origin story? Like how did it begin?
Oh, it's not too exciting, it's it's uh, it's you know, it's something that that I liked from a from a very young age. I grew up in a in small
town Massachusetts, very very very far from Hollywood. So I did like, you know, little community theater here and there, school plays and stuff like that, and ended up going liked it enough that I went to college to pursue it and moved to New York afterwards, sort of with an idea in my head that that I would be struggling pretty much for the rest of my life and would probably be doing just like off off off Broadway theater forever and and uh and and have a day
job and that and that was you know, that was sort of my my my goal. And and when I was in New York, I did that. I did I did theater, and I did a lot of small independent films. Is that was a really that was a time when independent film was really happening in New York City. There was there's a lot of stuff going on. It was a real indie indie boom. And I got I was very very fortunate to pretty early on in my career land an absolute dream role. It was this film called
Tadpole and Weaver. Is this with Sigourney Weaver? Yes, And and it was I played this this young private school kid and Sigourney Weaver was my stepmother. And and I fall in love with with my stepmother? Is the is the the plot? And just as it was winning the lottery, it was it was. It was a lead role opposite
Sigourney Weaver and John Ritter and bb Newworth. And I was completely untested and just was was lucky enough that the director, this Guyry Winnick, just decided he saw something in me in in the audition room and said that you know this, this is our guy, and and we're gonna we're gonna give him a shot. And and it's absolutely because he gave me that shot, that that that I went on to uh to have a career.
Let's talk about that career, because you're talking about twenty plus years now as a working actor, which is a tremendous career.
You've worked Mike.
Lee, and you've worked, You've done you've worked on television, you've worked on the stage. When young actors come to you and they're like, how do I how do I do it? How what do I need? What are the skills? Like? How do I work for that long? What do you tell them?
Yeah, you know there there isn't an answer to that question. It's it's it's what everybody wants to know. It's it's what I wanted to know when I you know, when I when I first started. And you're going to talk to one hundred different acts and they'll give you a hundred different stories of how of how it worked out for them, and the only there's there's basics that that that that you need and then the rest of it's
just how it all unfolds. So the basics that you the basics that you absolutely need are a true passion and and a love for acting, for the craft, for the craft, and you you really really need to be devoted.
I remember when I when I went to acting school, you know, they didn't sugarcoat it like the like the first day we were there, it was one of those look to your left, look to your right things, you know, and they basically said to us, they were like they said, flat out, anybody in this room who can do anything else, who can imagine doing anything, I mean, anything else with
your life, go do that, you know. So because it's just it's just really it's really really difficult to to stay working and so you have so you have to absolutely love it because it's the only thing that's going
to keep you going. And you need to devote yourself to it, and you need to have tenacity and keep at it and just endure the steady diet of rejection that is the life of an actor and all of the you know, the the failures and false wins that you think you you know, got the role, and then you get cut out of the movie and it's hugely disappointing or the role wasn't what you thought it was, and you know you're actually just background, you know, So all of that stuff you have to be have the
fortitude to get through it. And then the and then the main thing. You know that that the third magic ingredient, which is which is why you'll hear every actor has a different story, is you have to be fortunate enough to get to somehow get that role like I did in aadpole And you have to you know, I've had there's an actor I'm friends with, Tom Pelfrey. You went to the same college as me, Rutgers University, and he
said it very well. He said, you have to be you have to be very good in something that is very good, that is seen by everybody, and and and that, and that's what it takes to get on the map. You know, you you have to you have to be great in a role in some in in something that's very good, that is seen by a lot of people, and and that that is no easy trick, and and and people get to that all all sorts of different ways.
It's interesting because one of the things I love about whenever I see you pop up and it's something like comedy bang bang, it's like.
You know, whether it's whether you want to.
I mean, I'm a big impros so like John Johnny Appleseed.
Joddy see.
Whether whether it's like, uh, you know, one episode hit on mad Men or comedy Bang bang, or a show that's built around you. You always bring something where you're like, oh wow, that was great.
How do you how do you balance that?
You know you're gonna you know, it's a it's a guest spot one episode. How do you manage what you have to do, stay true to the character and try and make an impact in that in those kind of small hits.
Well, first of all, it's very kind. I really appreciate you say I.
Watched too much television to do a big, big TV Me.
Too, Me too. I'm a you know, I'm a fan first, So yeah, I mean, you don't want to go in there necessarily with the plan of how you're going to bend the job or the role around you and make it what you need it to be, and you know, go in with the mentality of like, you know, though this is my shot on mad Men, this is my one mad Men episode. I better make this sing. You know a lot of people are seeing this. This is my shot, me me. You know, you can't, you just
can't think like that. And you know, as actors, you we really are servants to the story. You know, you're you're you're a servant to the material, and you just have to approach every part, large or small, from that perspective, and you just have to really familiarize yourself with whatever story is being told. You read that script over and over and over again. You research, you know, show like mad Men. You make sure you know who the characters are,
and you've seen all the episodes. You understand the world that you're in, and then you understand, you know, what what your function is within the story. And then you know, you go in and you do all of the character work that you would do for for any for a large care you know, for for a big overarching character, you know, in an entire series, and you just you create a backstory for yourself and you make sure you understand when you're in the scene, where are you coming from? Immediately?
You know where are you going to be right afterwards? How do you feel about all these people? What are your relationships to these people? And you just have to, you know, just do all of that in your head and and build that that infrastructure. And you know it's in my opinion, it's it's really the same for every job.
Yeah, and you've I mean you like you said, big breakout role is opposite you know, Sigourney we the bebby New Earth. You've worked with like Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart, like the cost.
Of mad Man.
What's it like to be a working actor and kind of over this twenty years just get to work alongside like icons who are already icons to you, probably before you even start.
Yeah, it's really surreal, As I said, since I since I'm a fan first especially you know, you get to work with somebody like you know, when I found myself in scenes opposite Ian McKellen, you knows, as a young aspiring actor, I had watched you know, he did this version of Richard the Third which is sort of reimagined to take place in this kind of like World War twish world period, and watching him and being in awe of his ability and then suddenly you're you're looking him
in the eyes, you know, and in a scene with him, and it's surreal. It can be very intimidating at first. And what I found very quickly was that you had to sort of be in a state of denial about what you have to sort of suspend all of that stuff, all of that baggage, all of that excitement and all
of that the worship. You know, you have to you have to sort of put that aside and just like compartmentalize and just lock that away and just I'm in a scene with my scene partner and and I've just got to dial in on that and everything and in this scene is too from and off of this other human being. And and then after you're done with the scene, that's when you can sort of let let it all flood in. And that is often when it when it
hits you, and it's it's fantastic. I'm I couldn't feel more fortunate to have come into contact with with all the all the people that I have.
In this business scene MH.
You talked about the the work behind the scenes, building out a backstory excepter. I remember reading an interview with you about Twelve Monkeys where you talked about researching combat veterans and trauma to bring that performance to life. What did you do to kind of build out the backstory of Pyro, who is very different in movie form than from the comics, And then did that approach change at all.
When you reprise the role now years later.
Yes, it's it's it's certainly. It certainly shifted for for Deadpool because Deadpool is a very different sort of of of of comic book film. So most of that, most of that work building out the character of Pyro that you know, it all goes back to the original the first film that I did, which which was X two, and that, in my opinion, was was the most complete portrait that you ever see of Pyro. You know, there was there was real attention to detail. There were all
these little moments built in. The screenwriters, Mike Doherty and Dan Harris. They were very very careful too, you know, to make all of their characters nuanced and complicated. And Piro, you see all these scenes where he's he's kind of
this arrogant, brash young kid. He comes off like kind of a jerk, and then they built in these these little tiny vignettes and there's this really great moment where you know, Piro is staring at a picture of someone else's happy family on the mantle and you see something going on behind the eyes, and he's sort of clutching
his his lighter, you know, like a security blanket. And you know, so for me, I what I read that scene, I said, Okay, you know this this kid's this kid has there's some pain there and and and what's his family history? This is obviously a happy family. He never
you know, he never had. And so I, you know, for for Pyro and in that film specifically, you know, I built in this character who came from a very very dysfunctional, difficult, heartbreaking situation with with with his family, and it informs who he is and it's you know why he has all of these defense mechanisms. You know that that he throws up of trying to act tough and trying to act cool and trying to act like he doesn't care when actually, you know, the exact opposite
is the case. And he's and he's really desperate for uh for love and uh and attention and he doesn't even he doesn't even find it. At Professor X's school. You know, he's Bobby and in rogue. You know, they're the ones who connect and he's sort of on on on the fringes of that and he never quite gets inside. He never finds somebody until Magneto meets him and immediately sort of becomes this surrogate father figure, you know, encouraging him and telling him he's special and uh and and
to come along and find a new family. So that was all all that backwork was was done, you know, all the way back then in X two and obviously pulling what I could from the comics. But as you said, it was the character was was very, very different, And the reason for that is because I think they had a very specific thing they wanted to achieve with the Professor X the ex kids. You know, they wanted they wanted these young kids, and and they wanted I think
really because it's a visual medium. What they wanted was fire and ice. They wanted you know, Iceman opposite Pyro, and they knew eventually those two would face off. So anyway, so you know, all that being said, all that was still in place when I came in for the for the for Deadpool. But the movie just is just a very very different tone. So, you know, Deadpool is you know, it's it's like a it's it's a body comedy, you know, it's a it's it's it's a send up of the
superhero genre. So it's the Pyro in Deadpool. It's it's more of a caricature and and and less and less of a of a portrait.
Yeah, and you kind of talked about the the life of a working actor. You don't know which role is going to break out, you don't know how long you're gonna have to grind. How did it feel to then get a call about a character you played, you know, a decade and a half ago, and say, hey, we want you to do that again, because that feels very unlikely.
It is very unlikely. It's yeah, it's it's the last thing that I expected, you know, as you said that was it was like twenty twenty years ago, and they had long since moved on from the old cast. I think the last I think the last time they used most of the old cast was Days of Future Passed. I think that was it. And after that sort of sort of passed by, that was the last one that I thought like, oh, maybe maybe they'll call me back up,
you know, but but but no, I didn't. So I was just like, Okay, well that, you know, that was a very fun and interesting chapter of my life that is now that is now finished. So Yeah, to get a call was to say the least. Uh, it was surprising. And you know, as I said before, you know, as an actor, you learn, you learn not to get too excited about anything because so many things just don't pan out, or they almost happen, or they don't happen the way that you want them to. So I was very measured
and reserved. You know, when I first got there, my agent first started getting a lot of phone calls about checking my available and what was going on with me, and you know it was it was from MCU and we were like, well, what could this be. We don't know, and then they said, you know, Sean Levy wants to get on the phone with you, And then it became clear what it was about. And I just talked to him and he said, yeah, well, you know we want we want to bring him back. And uh, it's cool.
There's there's something specific, there's something specific that we want to do with you, and you're gonna like it. And you know, I can't show it to you until you sign all the papers and until you say yes. But but it's it's it's legit and and it's real and and so you know, I trusted him and uh, and I was not disappointed.
One more deep cut because I want to ask you about before we let you go, one of my favorite movies, Twenty fifth Hour, directed by Spike leaves small role in that, but I think for me it's uh uh, you know it's I think it's the maybe the most effective post nine to eleven movie. It doesn't deal directly with it, but you feel the event throughout the film.
You've worked with so.
Many legends, as Rosie has said, But what was it like working on that film? Written by David Benioff of Game of Thrones fame?
That's right. Yeah, well I didn't meet David he was he wasn't on set that day, but it was a chance to work with with Spike Lee, which was which was you know, a great honor and very cool. And my role was opposite it was only one scene and it was opposite Barry Pepper Mark I love.
Yeah, it really is one of his favorite films.
Yeah. So yeah, Mark Q's is your you know, is your garden variety Dick. You know, like you don't like your You're meant not to like him, and uh. As an actor, it's funny, you get so you get stuck with those roles sometimes and we don't get stuck with him. You're gifted these you're gifted the roles sometimes, but you're gifted the role of a heel and your job is to like have a punishable face, you know, in that role.
And it's tough because as an actor, you know, you what you always hear is like it's your job to defend your character. You know, you have to justify your character. Nobody thinks that they're the bad guy, nobody thinks they're an asshole. So you have to put all the work in to figure out, like how is this very punishable dickhead, Like what is he? How does he see it? You know, how does he imagine this situation? How he's not the dick in this situation? You know, So you have to
do that while ultimately also serving your purpose. So it's an interesting balancing act because there's always that side of you that's trying to make this character more human and more relatable and more empathetic, and then there's the other side of you that also has to perform that role of being the guy that everyone's like, yes, I'm you know, I'm really glad that he got punched so that so that was one of that was one of those roles, and it was you know, working with with Spike was great.
You know, he's he's one of the he's one of these directors who you know, at that point, he'd been doing what you know, doing his thing for for quite some time and he just had supreme confidence and you know, everything happened. Everything worked like clockwork on that set, and everything happened very quickly, and he called out what he wanted, how it needed to be done. He would shout out an adjustment, you would do it, boom, we got it
moving on. You know, really no nonsense guy. But it was, uh, that was very early on in my career, so it was it was a real thrill to work with him.
Well, Deadpool and Wolverine comes out July twenty sixth. Aaron Stafford, thank you so much for joining us.
Yeah, thank you so much. It was a joy.
Thank you guys, this pleasure.
That's it for today's episode, folks, and thanks to Aaron Stanford for taking the time to join us.
What a wonderful that was.
Light moment.
Thanks for listening.
Bye. X ray Vision is hosted by Jason Kisupsion and Rosie Knight and is a production of iHeart Podcasts. Our executive producers are Joelle Smith and Aaron Kaufman. Our supervising producer is a Boo Zafar. Our producers are Carmen Laurent and Mia Taylor. Our theme song is by Brian Basquez.
Special thanks to Soul Rubin and Chris Lord, Kenny Goodman and Heidi A disco moderata