SEARCH HBO

HOME

ORIGINAL SERIES

MOVIES

SPORTS

DOCUMENTARIES

HBO FILMS

SCHEDULE

VIDEO

STORE

GET HBO

	Back to HBO Films Point of Origin Home Synopsis Cast and Crew Photos and Video Artist Interviews Message Boards
		Interview with John Leguizamo HBO Explain to us how you became involved with "Point of Origin". JOHN LEGUIZAMO They came to me with this offer about this HBO movie, and I'd never wanted to do an HBO movie, although I respect them. And I read this script and I thought it was pretty brilliant, I mean really classy and really exciting and inventive. The thing that was groovy about Keith Lang, the character I play, is that it was a cop. I wanted to be on the right side of the law for a while, and Keith has a really great arc in the movie. I mean he goes from being really naive to being one of the new guys on the crew. Then he gets ambitious and wants to be like the best cop possible, arson investigator. I also liked the whole thing about him defending his best friend against all odds. I really admire loyalty in people, and for me to display loyalty on camera was pretty cool. I'm pretty loyal. HBO Yeah. JOHN LEGUIZAMO For the most part. Unless you fuck me over and then you're a dead man [LAUGHS]. But other than that I'm really cool. HBO This film is based on actual events. Did you have a chance to meet any of the people who were actually involved? JOHN LEGUIZAMO Keith is a composite of John Orr's first partner and another character who was his partner for a real long time, who was a rookie when he started out. He was John Orr's partner and never believed that John was what everybody was saying. So that kept pretty true to life in the script. HBO What kind of person was he? JOHN LEGUIZAMO Well, the kind of character we-...Tom Sigel, the director, and I were creating was this guy who was really ambitious, really wanting to move up the ladder, you know the cop ladder. Except that he was also really loyal. You know, this usually doesn't go together, ambition and loyalty. But he was really loyal to John Orr and really defended him, fought for him, but at the same time he wanted to move up and, and he was really out for himself. He was this type of guy, you know, he had trouble with the ladies. Couldn't keep a woman. They were always dumping in him, dumping him and always, John Orr was stealing them from him. HBO I want you to talk about the relationship a little bit between Keith and John, in terms of trust. Because at the end your character's very conflicted. JOHN LEGUIZAMO Yeah. HBO What was it like to try and tap into that emotion? JOHN LEGUIZAMO Well, you know, I've lived life and, you know, I know I've been betrayed a lot...now I sound like paranoid but you know, thing's happen in your life, you know, best friends who do you wrong and family members who do you wrong. We've all been there. And actually, I've been on the other side of it too. So it was easy to tap into that HBO Does it make you pause sometimes, make you more paranoid about people when you get this close to characters who are so betrayed? JOHN LEGUIZAMO Well, I mean...when you do a character, whatever character it is, especially in dramas, you connect with them and then you start, you know, digging up those emotions that you have that you blocked or, or you put away to...so that you can deal with life. And then you got to dig it up and, and relive it and re-deal with it, and, yeah, it makes you sort of be in that same place you were. You know, you're wary and paranoid a little bit, but that's why you get paid the big bucks to have to go through that emotion so that people can live vicariously through you. HBO On another level, the story addresses an issue you're probably familiar with in terms of celebrity, and the idea that the John Orr character is somewhat driven by a desire to be famous. Can you talk a little about how fame can effect the way someone sees the world or their desire to be famous, how that effects their way of perceiving things. JOHN LEGUIZAMO Well, this John Orr character is such an intriguing character. I mean, when I read the screenplay, there were so many weird, bizarre levels. I mean...first of all, he was really well respected. Loved to do lectures. He was always out there, always showing up to every fire. HBO I'd like to talk more specifically about Keith, your character. What was the biggest challenge you had in portraying him? JOHN LEGUIZAMO Well, I think the toughest thing about portraying Keith was his naiveté at times. It was hard being in that situation where everybody around you, all your colleagues are so adamant and against you and every day having a battle with them and you try to defend your friend, even though sometimes you start to suspect that he's wrong. But then your ego starts getting into it and you don't want to be wrong, because that means that you're stupid or that, you know, you're a naïve fool. So it was hard to always have to be in that position, constantly defending John Orr. HBO Did you prepare in any way to play this role? JOHN LEGUIZAMO I prepared not as much as usual because I kind of felt like I related to a lot of the stuff. But I did go to the fire department and hung out with the actual investigators that had worked with John Orr, were part of the arson task force. And it was Mike Camello and Glen Lucero. I hung out with them in the Los Angeles Fire Department and they talked to me, told me what fires are about. Point of origin means, basically, where the fire starts. And that's usually where the device, in this case, the devise where the fire starts. When it's arson, then there's a device that's placed on some sort of timer that sets a fire. And the arsonist in our movie, that's how he got around it, he built these really simple devices that in a fire you would never know. He took a cigarette and put three matches at the bottom so he would smoke it outside of the place that he liked; he like crowded places, where there were a lot of women, because he loved to hear the scream of women and he liked to see people running; and he would smoke it, put it inside a yellow loose-leaf paper and he would leave it in there and put it near some flammable pillows, feathers or whatever, and then he would walk out and by the time the cigarette burned down to the matches, he'd have enough time to get away and the fire would start and then that stuff would burn up and you would never know what set the fire. Of course, you also have some great action sequences and that was really thrilling. There's a fantasy sequence that's all "Crouching Tiger", Kung-fu, Honk Kong- style, and that was so exciting. HBO I wanted to ask you about that. I mean, first of all, Tom Sigel (the director) is a very talented cinematographer. What was it like to work with him as a director? JOHN LEGUIZAMO Well that's one of the reasons I did it. It was Ray Liotta, because he's a great actor, the script and the director Tom Sigel. It was his first outing as a director, but he'd been on "The Usual Suspects" as director of photography and "X-Men." He did second unit on "Platoon". He did "Three Kings". I mean, he's a brilliant guy. But I still wasn't you know, I wasn't sold. And then on the set I realized this man knew what he was doing. He's picked up from the best directors and yet he's got his own twist on directing. HBO The special effects alone seem pretty intense. JOHN LEGUIZAMO Oh, it's going to be wild. I mean, his camera angels, his camera angels are so trippy and inventive. HBO What were some of the things he did in terms of like, presenting fires? Were you involved in any of this? JOHN LEGUIZAMO Yeah, I was, I was involved in three of the fire sequences. The first one's going to be sort of CGI. HBO Uh huh... JOHN LEGUIZAMO You know, it wasn't there, we just had to imagine it. With the motion control camera, they shot us a lot of times and then they'll just put the fires out there. And then the other one was, they set a lot on fire...they really set it on fire to make it look real and then we came in and that's supposed to be post-fire. And then we did a couple in the mountains, I don't even know what part of California, but some mountain area with tons of smoke and helicopters came flying really close. There was a point where they were right over my head and, you know, I've heard about 'Twilight Zone' so I was mad scared, man. And the water's flying out, you know, the fireman with hoses and the water's all spraying in my face. My helmet's about to fly off. I can't even talk. I'm like, "Ahh..." It was...but it got the adrenaline going. HBO Yeah. JOHN LEGUIZAMO It was exciting and at the same time it was kind of scary. You know, we had burnt out houses that they had built and then set on fire and they flew away. Like it was a tornado. HBO It feels to me that the effects in those scenes are a lot about character. JOHN LEGUIZAMO It's the brilliance of the screenplay and the brilliance of Tom Sigel together, because you have special effects and action sequences but they all relate back to revealing character, revealing what's going on inside this arsonist's head, and it's all going into what he's thinking and his psychological trauma. HBO Yeah. JOHN LEGUIZAMO This movie- it's always, always fascinating. HBO You've talked so much about John as a character, could you just talk about working with Ray Liotta. JOHN LEGUIZAMO Ray, Ray's a character. He's a character and a half, man [CHUCKLES]. He's a really great, great actor. I mean, I really learned to respect him on this movie. He's really demanding and he wants to make things really real and specific. And it's not about ego, it's about doing great work and, you know, it takes a long time for people to get to that place with their craft where it's not just about your ego, it's about trying to do good work, and that's where he's at. He's so comfortable and effortless and he's a lot of fun too, man, and he loves to improvise. Just a great guy to work with and I think he's brilliant in this role. HBO Working with HBO films. What was that experience like? JOHN LEGUIZAMO Well, I've worked with HBO for a long part of my career. Actually they started my career during my one-man show "Mambo's Mouth". So I've had a long relationship with them. But this is the first time I ever did a feature with them. And I really enjoyed it. I really, I felt like I was doing a movie, not a TV show. I didn't say "crap" but... HBO Yeah. You can say crap. JOHN LEGUIZAMO It wasn't doing TV crap. That's, because I don't like TV movies. They're really cheesy, and I felt like this was really quality and really, really brilliantly told. It wasn't made too simple, because that's what happens to a lot of TV movies. They underestimate the audience. You know, they dumb it down too much for my taste. And this was really complicated and really sophisticated. And that's what really turned me on to it. And, and they treated us well, you know. I got my pop-out giant trailer. I got, you know, they paid for my nanny, my trainer [LAUGHS]. I was like John Travolta, man. "I'm getting a chef." Fuck that, where's my chef? You know, I want my masseuse. (END JOHN LEGUIZAMO INTERVIEW)		Ray Liotta John Leguizamo Newton Thomas Sigel John Herzfeld

	HBO INFO       JOBS AT HBO       CONTACT US      TAKE CONTROL      SITE INDEX      SCHEDULE PDF      REGISTER/SIGN IN
	> Privacy Policy   > Terms of Use
	© Home Box Office, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This website is intended for viewing solely in the United States. This website may contain adult content.