Will Smith Talks I AM LEGEND
By: Jarrod Sarafin, News EditorDate: Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Source: Ryan Rotten at Shock Til You Drop
While at the press junket for I AM LEGEND, Ryan Rotten had a chance to talk shop with Will Smith on his "Robert Neville" character in I AM LEGEND. The film will hit theaters in a few days in both standard theaters and IMAX, giving Batman fans a few treats of their(trailer & prologue respectively) own before the film starts. In the interview, Smith talked about shooting in NYC and his character dealing with loneliness & madness.
Here's a sample of it:
Question: Would you comment on dealing with the loneliness and the madness the role asks you to explore in the film?
Smith: It was such a wonderful exploration of myself. Because what happens is you get into a situation where you don't have people to create the stimulus for you to respond to. So what happens is you start to create the stimulus and the response. There's a connection with yourself that where your mind starts to drift to in those types of situations you start to learn things about yourself that you would never even imagine. In order to prepare for that, we sat with former POWs and people who sat in solitary confinement. That was the framework for creating the idea. The first thing they said you start to create a schedule. You will not survive in solitary if you don't schedule everything. We talked to Geronimo ji-Jaga, he was formerly Geronimo Pratt of The Black Panthers, he was in solitary for over three months and he said you plan things like cleaning your nails. You take two hours that you have to, because it's on the schedule, you have to just clean your nails. He spent six weeks and he trained roaches to bring him food. I'm sitting there like, 'Oh my God.' The idea of where your mind goes to defend itself, either he really did train the roaches which is huge or his mind needed that to survive - either way, you put that on camera and it's genius. For me, that was the thing to get into the mental space where what the truth was for Robert Neville didn't matter. The only thing that mattered was what he saw and what he believed. How many of you picked up on the mannequin shot with the little turn of the head? There's probably six or seven of those in the movie. I'm a better actor for having had to create both sides of the scene with no dialogue.
Question: Was the grey hair a special effect...
Smith: Special effect. We had the world's best grey hair people come in. They were from Europe. [laughs]
To read more, click here.
I AM LEGEND hits standard and IMAX theaters this Friday.
More From Mania
DRMASTER TO RELEASE LUNAR LEGEND TSUKIHIME VOL. 6
Hakugei: Legend of the Moby Dick Vol. #6
(Thursday, November 30, 2006)
Hakugei: Legend of the Moby Dick Vol. #4
(Friday, May 5, 2006)
Hakugei: Legend of the Moby Dick Vol. #3
(Thursday, March 23, 2006)
Urotsukidoji: Legend of the Overfiend/Legend of the Demon Womb
(Saturday, May 11, 2002)
Comic legend Gaiman sues comic legend McFarlane, Image comics
(Monday, January 28, 2002)
B5's LEGEND Lives On Part Two
(Sunday, January 20, 2002)
B5's LEGEND Lives On Part One
(Friday, January 18, 2002)
See more related content





I`m definitely going to see the IMAX version, if nothing else for the Joker. Does anyone know if they are actually going to release I AM LEGEND in IMAX in the UK?