FROM THE NEWS ARCHIVES OF CINEMA CONFIDENTIAL
ON SET INTERVIEW: Seann William Scott on "Dukes of Hazzard"
POSTED
ON
07/13/05 AT 2:30 A.M.
BY ETHAN AAMES
By Thomas Chau, on location in Baton Rouge, Louisiana I've met Seann William Scott quite a few times and here is a guy who has definitely
not let Hollywood get to his head. He always speaks to the press, and with folks off camera, with an enthusiasm and ease unmatched by most actors. Down in Louisiana, while taking time out from filming a car chase sequence
one day, Seann William Scott sat down with a group of Internet buffs to talk
about filming a project he was really excited about: The "Dukes of Hazzard"
movie starring himself, Johnny Knoxville, Jessica Simpson, Willie Nelson, and
Burt Reynolds. Scott, wearing a Led Zeppelin shirt and blue jeans in character, talks about
the project below. Q: We hear that you really wanted to do this movie. Was it because you were
a huge fan of the show or the script itself for this one? SEANN: It was because I was a really big fan of the show. I was. I just thought
it could make a really cool movie. It's not that it's just a buddy comedy but
it's all about two guys hating each other and towards the end they're good friends.
I liked that these two guys were best friends from the very beginning, and they're
crazy. I thought it could make a really cool movie set in the South about this
family. People are really familiar with these characters. It's not tongue-in-cheek;
they expressed to me that they wanted it to be in the tone of "Smokey and
the Bandit" and "The Blues Brothers" and stuff with more of a
"southern rock cool." I though that’d be cool. Q: And how has the experience been so far? SEANN: This whole experience has been probably the best I've ever had, certainly
the most fun I've ever had. Pretty laid back. Q: How excited were you to see the General Lee for the first time? SEANN: It just looked great. I had actually, at that point, been working with
a guy back in L.A. just training with a car; not the General Lee, but other
cars. So the first thing that I thought about was, "How is this car going
to handle?" But then after I'd been driving with it and practicing with
it and I accomplished that, then I just kind of sat back. I think it's amazing
to see this action with a car that everybody's so familiar with, in the backwoods
and on dirt roads and stuff. And getting [stunt coordinator] Dan Bradley and
everybody from the whole "Bourne Supremacy" crew, I think was real
cool for our film because we do a bunch of really big jumps in this movie. We
don’t have any CGI with any of the car stuff. I think it’s a real
experience when you see this car going through really fast really wild and you
see me driving a lot of the times and also a big chase in downtown Atlanta.
It's just incredible. Q: Did you have a Catherine Bach "Daisy Duke" poster growing up? SEANN: No I don’t think I had a Catherine Bach poster, but I know a lot
of my friends desecrated those, big time. [Laughs] Q: How good did you get with the training? SEANN: Pretty good, [but] we got the best in every situation. We have the best
driver in the world in drifting and best guy in rally racing and stuff like
that. So obviously there’s a lot of stuff that I didn't do, but there's
a lot of really incredible things that I don't think we've ever seen an actor
do. Q: Why did you want to play Bo Duke instead of Luke? SEANN: [Laughs] I wanted to drive the car. At first, before Johnny came on
and I agreed to do it and I was like, "I just wanted to learn how to drive
the car." I thought it would be a lot of fun and I wasn't going to do the
movie without Johnny. The studio suggested a couple people, and I'd never met
Johnny, but I thought we'd be a perfect team for this movie because we're both
a little bit unpredictable. I thought, it would just be cool if we do this right.
The two of us would be a lot of fun and really crazy. Q: Is Johnny as crazy as we think he is? SEANN: No, no, he's a great guy. I didn't know anything about him before. I
just knew the same stuff probably any other guy would. He's just a really, really
good guy. Really smart and a lot of fun. Q: You have a strong comedic background and so are we going to see a lot
of that in this film? SEANN: Yeah, I think actually different though. A lot of the stuff that I've
done is just really broad [comedy] and the characters are not that bright. Obviously
with the "American Pie" films and "Road Trip," my guys were
kind of dicks. These guys [in "Dukes"] are good guys. I think he's
much funnier in many ways than some of the things that I've done. Because it’s
a little bit more layered. He's constantly trying to teach Luke what he thinks
are really deep philosophical ideas, but they're really simple. Q: You must be pretty excited about your career so far... SEANN: I've always been. Ever since the first "American Pie," I've
always been happy to just have an opportunity, I just didn't think it was going
to be with comedies. Now I really like it. I don't really necessarily think
I'm a funny guy, but I like the opportunity to take on something that I don't
feel I'm the best at doing. This was a really big opportunity. After "The
Rundown," there was just a lot of shit out there. This script was even
mediocre. The idea was great, but Jay came on with his guys made it great and
very specific. It all came together well. "Dukes of Hazzard" opens in theaters August 5th.

