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Cape Town - Kevin Connolly (Eric "E"), Kevin Dillion (Johnny Drama) and Jerry Ferrara (Turtle), sat down for a quick Q&A about the Entourage movie.
After taking a break from doing the show, what was it like to get back into the skin of your character and what do you like about the character?
Kevin C: It's been great for me. There are different plusses and minuses for everybody’s characters. I think E was not so much the straight man, but I think he was just sort of in the center navigating it and wasn’t really always so comedically driven. He is more of a serious person. [Writer/director] Doug [Ellin] always kind of had me as the moral compass and it was always very important to him that I treated women well. I liked that, because I got to do lots of kind of straight acting and I always had a girlfriend and cool relationships with people. Honestly, there are so many great characters that for me, personally, I wouldn’t have wanted to play anybody else besides my character. So I loved it.
And in terms of the break and getting back in, when you do something for eight years, the way we did it, with the level of intensity that we did it, it’s easier than getting back on a bike. [Laughs] Put it that way.
Kevin D: Climbing back into Johnny Drama was cool. I started by watching some episodes and catching up on him, just getting a feel for him again, and that was fun in itself because I hadn’t seen him in a long time. It sounds weird, but it was really kind of easy, I guess, like putting on an old shoe. It felt like I was at my mom’s house and I’m putting on a shoe from when I was maybe seventeen, eighteen. And it just fit perfect. It was comfortable right away.
We started with a couple walk and talks, where you don’t cut the camera. You just walk and bounce dialog, and right away, it felt like old times again.
Jerry Ferrara: The thing I’ve always loved best about Turtle, is that I am way more uptight than he is, and I was raised by some strict women, so I get to say things and live through him a little bit. He has no air in my lungs: he has no conscience, he just kind of lets it fly. I was never like that. So it was kind of fun to be able to live like that. What I respect most is the loyalty he has as a friend. I like to think my friends think of me that way, that I’m that loyal.
And just getting back into the role, there were nerves for a minute, only because you just change so much. When the show started, I was 23. I’m now 35. We just had that little two-and-a-half, three-year break, so it wasn’t like, ‘Oh, I need to go do research,’ like I’m playing Abraham Lincoln or anything. But the night before, I was thinking, ‘Can I still do this? I did it well at one point in my life. Will I be able to do it as well?’ And the minute after Take One, which got the rust off, it just felt like an extended break.
How was it getting back with the actors in this ensemble? Does all that chemistry just come back?
Kevin C: Honestly, I’m sure that if you talk to everybody, everybody would say the same thing. It starts to sound like almost a cliché after a while, like a kind of automatic answer, but it really is the truth. I mean, you walk into the makeup trailer at six o’clock in the morning after not having seen the guys and you legitimately think that no time has passed at all. It’s just instantly right back to where it was.
Kevin D: That didn’t fade at all. It was right there. And it was right there immediately. And I knew it was, because as soon as we get together we start talking—busting each other’s chops. It’s the same banter. You feel it right away. I call it chop-busting, but maybe it’s just like this New York thing where guys just kind of bust on each other. It’s all good, good fun.
Jerry: Honestly, it’s the best part of the job. It really is. And it’s not even a job—that’s not even a fair thing to say. But I can’t explain it because chemistry is something that you can’t really cast. You could try and everyone does try and sometimes you get it right, sometimes you don’t. The chemistry is either there or it’s not.
Sometimes there are people who don’t get along at all off screen and have a ton of chemistry on screen. Sometimes they love each other off-screen and have zero chemistry on. In this case, we all happen to become great best friends off-screen who have a great time when we’re making the show, and then it’s translated on screen. So, we hit the best of both worlds. It’s that variable that you can’t account for when you’re writing a script or when you’re casting a show. It just either happens or it doesn’t, and in our case, it did, and we’ve been riding on that for a decade. So it’s great.
Without spoilers, was there a moment during production or a scene that you filmed that was particular fun or memorable for you?
Kevin C: There’s a scene in the movie where we have a beach party and it’s a hard day where we have all of our cameos. There were like 30 or 40 people that showed up for these cameos—all these big mega sports stars and Ronda Rousie. I mean, everybody was there at this party, and we’re all hanging out.
Kevin D: You know what? It’s funny. There were a lot of great ones, but I think the best one is the last one we shot at the Golden Globes. There was something about that day—just sneaking shots at the Golden Globes. Stuff like that is so cool. I think that day is what makes my character’s part in the movie, just some really great moments. But, Oh, my god, there are just so many really cool bits. There was another scene that I really liked—I have a nice psychiatrist in the movie that’s going to be very funny.
Jerry: Quite a few. We were just doing some pickups, like a lot of movies do, and we did some stuff at the Golden Globes. I can’t say much because it’s heavy story-driven points, but the fact that we got done what we got done, and I don’t think it’s ever been done before, just left me in awe. It was just an adrenaline rush. Also, there was a montage when we were shooting this party scene, and it had everything. It had ups and downs. We literally had fifty cameos. I mean, we had four guys who later that same year go on the same Super Bowl doing cameos, which we didn’t know at the time
Entourage opens in cinemas nationwide on Friday, 24 July.
(Photos: Warner Bros)
