HOLLYWOOD Q&A

Q: I’ve seen the guy who plays Drax in the “Guardians of the Galaxy” movies in a lot of things lately. Where did he come from?

A: I’m assuming you mean what’s his career background, rather than where was he born. (If I’m wrong, the answer to your question is Washington, D.C., and you can stop reading now.)

It’s natural to wonder about his background. Usually when notably muscle-bound actors show up in big roles out of nowhere, there’s a sports career behind them somewhere, and so it is with Dave Bautista, though his was a particularly theatrical sports career.

Prior to being Drax the Destroyer in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Bautista was a pro wrestler who fought under the clever nickname Batista. He became a superstar in that most film-friendly of sports before shifting over to films.

He moonlighted for a while, but aside from the occasional cameo at a major wrestling event, Bautista is now a full-time actor.

Q: What is the least amount of time passed before a movie has been remade? I know “Cabin Fever” was remade about 10 years after the original.

A: Unfortunately, that question is not as straightforward as it sounds.

British entertainment site MusicMagpie took a big-data ap

proach to the issue of film remakes, gathering information on 1,438 films that were either remakes or remade, going all the way back to 1902. Regarding time gaps, the authors found that a whopping 21 films on the list were remade within a year of their original release, however these were mostly “regional adaptations of foreign titles.”

That’s not really what you’re asking about.

Closer to the spirit of your question would be the various superhero remakes we’ve seen recently. In that case, it’s basically a tie between old frenemies the Hulk and Spider-Man. The 2008 film “The Incredible Hulk,” starring Edward Norton as the famed doctor with the angry, green alter-ego, came just five years after “Hulk,” which told the same story with Eric Bana in the title role.

Meanwhile (or almost meanwhile), 2012 saw Andrew Garfield star in “The Amazing Spider-Man,”

a mere five years before Tom Holland retold Spidey’s origin story in “SpiderMan: Homecoming.”

Complicating things further, these super-cases weren’t even included in MusicMagpie’s study. The authors of the study argued that superhero films like these fall under the category of reboots, rather than remakes, because they often (though not always) feature significant story differences.