VIN DIESEL ON ‘FURIOUS’: ‘I KNEW WE HAD TO GO DARK’
On-, off-screen family turmoil drives ‘Fate’
LOS ANGELES Following the astounding $1.5 billion box-office success of Furious 7 in 2015, star and producer Vin Diesel faced difficult next steps.
The $4 billion Fast & Furious franchise would go on. But the next chapter would be the first without co-star and “brother” Paul Walker, whose death in 2013 rocked the close-knit cast while Furious 7 was still in production. Fans bade farewell to Walker’s character in a poignant, final drive-off.
Diesel wanted to give his central character Dominic Toretto an appropriately somber turn for the eighth installment.
“I knew we had to go dark. Some of the people involved in the film were questioning whether it was too dark,” says Diesel, who talked over an early script with his longtime girlfriend, Paloma Jiménez. “She said something so powerful — that the world doesn’t want to see Dom happy in this next chapter. Not after (Furious 7). Not after the biggest ending in film history. Happy is the last thing the world wants to see.”
Far from happy and under the control of the new villain Cipher (Charlize Theron), Dom goes rogue and betrays his screen family (played by Michelle Rodriguez, Dwayne Johnson, Tyrese Gibson and Ludacris) in a tumultuous The Fate of the Furious (in theaters Friday).
“When you have a franchise that’s built on the theme of family, and it’s artfully executed, it’s a twist the fans and newcomers will appreciate,” says director F. Gary Gray.
The Fate family had real dramas on the production, which shot on location in Cleveland, Havana and Mývatn, Iceland. Diesel says he had difficulty dealing with his missing co-star. Wearing a “Brotherhood” T-shirt featuring his and Walker’s images as he talks at the Four Seasons Hotel, Diesel describes constant remembrances of Walker and one emotional breakdown on the set. “Every day I thought of Paul; in every meeting, I would bring him up,” says Diesel.
Johnson called out unnamed male co-stars on Facebook for their conduct on the set before filming ended. Diesel acknowledges the knock was aimed at him, declining to elaborate on specifics. He says he and The Rock have worked it out.
“We’re a family. We all have to be on the same side,” says Diesel.
He says Johnson backed him up when he broke down about Walker.
“Nobody was more ready to fight for me than Dwayne that day. That’s who we are,” says Diesel. But “it’s two alphas. Being an alpha is sometimes a pain in the (butt).”
Both the off-screen drama and onscreen family turmoil have ensured sizzle. Diesel trumpets a treasonous Cipher kiss in front of screen wife Letty (Rodriquez), which he calls the “tsunami” of the first Fate trailer (139 million global views in 24 hours). He boasts it’s “the biggest moment in screen history” and he has called Fate “the best movie ever.”
Diesel is so pleased with the result that he might continue rupturing the screen family in Fast & Furious 9 (April 19, 2019) and Fast & Furious 10 (April 2, 2021).
“There are a lot of layers going on,” says Diesel. “I want people to walk out with questions. The more questions, the greater the appetite is for the next chapter.”