Good Morning Arizona in Phoenix talked with Josh Hutcherson and Elizabeth Banks for segment on The Hunger Games that aired on January 30th.

Not a whole lot of negotiators on film look like Elizabeth Banks. They’re usually gruff, jaded, overweight, sloppy, and any other cliche description you can think of. Most of those adjectives don’t much apply to Banks, whose negotiator even uses her looks for the job. However, even though the actress doesn’t come anywhere close to the appearance of a 300-pound 50-something, she still gets to do plenty of things those old men get to do.

She gets to shout, “This is my negotiation,” and without having to be bold and off-putting while doing it. That’s an accomplishment right there. It’s a nice little twist on the genre, and in my brief conversation with Banks, that’s what she seemed to be the most impressed about when it came to Man on a Ledge, the new thriller involving Sam Worthington hanging on a ledge for mysterious reasons…mysterious reasons that were mostly revealed in the trailer.

Here’s what what Elizabeth Banks had to say about no-brainer titles, playing with archetypes, and working with Gary Ross:

When you got the script, were you pretty taken with the title? I don’t think it could be more straight-forward.
[Laughs] You know, I’m always intrigued by things that promise exactly what they are, and then back it up with other things.

You also got Zack and Miri Make a Porno and The 40 Year Old Virgin, which, again, make for pretty straight-forward titles. [Laughs]
[Laughs] Yeah, it’s what makes the marketing a lot easier. “This is what you’re getting, everybody!”

[Laughs] You don’t even need a trailer. Jumping into the film, what I think works about the film is the structure, which is pretty tight.
I agree. It read like a really tight thriller. Two of my favorite movies in this genre are Inside Man and The Italian Job, and, to me, this is a great combo of those two movies. I love things that surprise me and trick me, and I definitely felt like…clearly there’s more going on than a guy on a ledge, and you know that’s going to be the case. You don’t really know what you’re watching until the twist comes, and I love that. As an audience member, I love that. The archetype is pretty well set up, but you don’t see the twist coming.

You even get that classic archetype line, “This is my negotiation!” When you approach an archetype like this, do you try to infuse it with something different, or did you already see it as being different on the page?
[Laughs] One of the things I really liked about this is that gender doesn’t come into play. She’s not girly, doesn’t have a breakdown, and I basically got to play this as a man, which I appreciated. I felt like that was kind of new. I also liked that I got to run around, chase bad guys and do stunts, that really appealed to the tomboy in me. Also, we spent a good amount of energy creating that sense of camaraderie that the NYPD clearly has; it’s sort of a boys’ club that exists there. I just wanted to make sure I actually had something to do and say. I feel like my character’s the smartest one in the room.

I like how you say boys’ club, because a lot of the movie feels like a pissing contest.
[Laughs] Yeah, I know.

There’s even that line Titus Welliver has, the one about Mikey sticking his dick in the wrong door. [Laughs] It’s one of those great, “Who would say something like that?” kind of lines.
[Laughs] I know. I mean, you’d be surprised, the NYPD dish it out to each other.

[Laughs] I’ll be using that line in the future. You mentioned how the role wasn’t gender specific, and usually this character would be a tired, 50-something old guy. Do you see a lot of roles like that, non-gender specific ones?
No. I mean, I mostly just read “wives” and “girlfriends.” Yeah, she’s got a bit of John McClane in her, which is a lot of fun for me.

Is it ever tiring just seeing the girlfriend role?
Yeah, but they get weeded out now a little bit more. By the way, sometimes the girlfriend is a pretty interesting character. [Laughs]

[Laughs] I thought Our Idiot Brother handled women well.
Yeah, I really thought so, too. Each sister was very recognizable, but at the same time there was a lot of nuance and specificity.

When you’re doing a film like this or The Next Three Days, where they are these fairly tight yarns, does it require you to be pretty disciplined with the material?
You know, not really. So much of that is done in editing. I’m really just trying to play authentic character beats, and whatever gets me to that place. In The Next Three Days, I was in jail isolated from my loved ones, so I spent a lot of time sitting in corners and not talking to anyone…so that was not a very fun moviemaking experience. [Laughs] On this I sat around on a rooftop with Edward Burns drinking coffee, it definitely felt like we were cops on a stakeout. We were actually out on the ledge, so that was a true gift, since you don’t have to act that. The sense of adrenaline pumping through you, the sweaty palms, and the nervousness — I definitely felt I had a four percent chance of dying at any moment. [Laughs] In the back of your mind it’s, “Accidents happen, accidents happen!” I had an amazing group of stunt guys I trusted and precautions are taken, but human error and accidents happen, so I was thinking, “Something could go wrong.”

It’s interesting comparing The Next Three Days and Man on a Ledge because both of a lot of their drama takes place off-screen. We don’t see that, but do you fill in those blanks for yourself?
Absolutely. I had a really strong backstory here. I heard an amazing story before we started filming, from a female negotiator, about a fellow police officer who was in a bad custody battle with his wife, and he took his daughter hostage. It was a bad situation and the negotiator ended up getting the daughter out, but then he ended up killing himself. Two years later, the negotiator ended up killing herself. You know, that was the backstory I kept going through in my mind, that she lost a fellow police officer and it wasn’t just anybody. What would bring that much notoriety to someone? You know, I spend a lot of time in New York and I used to live here, so I know what the Post cover looks like everyday. I know if a police negotiator let a police officer die under their watch, of course they would splash their photo on the cover of the newspaper, there would be an investigation, and the whole thing would go sideways.

For the most part, these guys have a pretty great track record. You know, their motto is, “Jumper’s jumper,” meaning if you want to kill yourself, you go to the top of the building and jump off, and you’re not still standing there by the time I put my pants on, head uptown, and have a cup of coffee. [Laughs] If you’re still there by the time the negotiator gets there, you likely want to live and will let your rational mind takeover, unless you’re just crazy. They usually can help someone in that situation, so their track record is pretty good. It is life and death, and I never would want someone’s life in my hands. They’ll also tell you, once you get there and the person does go over, then you really blame yourself.

I know I gotta wrap up, but I gotta say I’m really looking forward to The Hunger Games.
Thanks!

And I actually haven’t read the books, but I’m a big fan of Gary Ross.
Oh yeah, he’s a great moviemaker and a great storyteller.

Yeah, he has a great handle on character. How is he as a collaborator?
So much of it is that. He’s a writer too, so every character matters and it’s about the fun performances he’s trying to get everyone. I mean, Effie Trinket is an amazing character, so we had a great time figuring her out together. I can’t wait for people to see it.

It looks a lot different from Seabiscuit. [Laughs]
Yeah, it’s very different from Seabiscuit, but I think all his movies are different. I’m really impressed by Gary’s taste in everything; he has such great taste.

FilmSchoolRejects.com

With director Asger Leth’s (Ghosts of Cité Soleil) Man on a Ledge opening this weekend, I recently got to speak with most of the cast about making the movie. The film centers on an ex-cop (Sam Worthington) convicted of a crime he didn’t commit who stands on the ledge of a Manhattan building, threatening to kill himself. However, what appears to be a suicide attempt is something else altogether. The film also stars Jamie Bell, Anthony Mackie, Elizabeth Banks, Ed Burns, Titus Welliver, Genesis Rodriguez, Kyra Sedgwick, and Ed Harris.

During my interview with Banks we talked about how she got involved in Man on a Ledge, what kind of research she typically does for a role, and karaoke. In addition, we talked about how instrumental Jack Donaghy was in freeing her from North Korea and hints that she may be the assassin that killed Kim Jong Il (it’s a 30 Rock thing).

Man on a Ledge stars Sam Worthington as a falsely accused fugitive desperate to prove his innocence. While he hangs precariously on a ledge, his younger brother prepares to carry out a daring diamond heist. A heart-pounding thriller, Man on a Ledge also stars Jamie Bell, Elizabeth Banks, Edward Burns, Genesis Rodriguez, and Anthony Mackie. Buzzine’s Emmanuel Itier recently sat down with the cast to discuss how the story pertains to our economic crisis, their upcoming projects, and what it means to live on the edge.

Emmanuel Itier: When was the last time you were on a ledge, beyond that movie?
Elizabeth Banks: I went up yesterday, and I tried to stand up, but I didn’t have time to get in the harness, so they didn’t let me stand up there. And I’m actually glad they didn’t. I sort of leaned over.

EI: Have you been on a ledge in your life, metaphorically speaking?
EB: Sure. I’ve definitely met some precipices in my time. I’ve definitely had those moments in life where you need to make the leap. I’ve also physically done some cliff-diving in my time, and I used to dive at an old quarry off of the big sides. I’m a little bit of a dare devil. I fell out of a tree – 35 feet – when I was 12 years old and was unconscious in the ICU in the hospital for three days, and I don’t remember those days at all. So I’m a thrill-seeker in real life.

EI: Tell me about the thrill of this one – the challenge of doing this one. Were there scary moments, such as going on the ledge?
EB: The great physical challenge of this is that even if you aren’t psychologically afraid of heights, your body still has a physical reaction to being in danger. So you always had sweaty palms and the heart was always racing, my knees were shaking. I constantly had adrenaline pumping. Your body’s engine just runs really hot while you’re out there trying not to hurl yourself [laughs] down to the ground. So every day at the end of work, it was so hard just to physically calm down. And also it was very cold, it was very windy, and I was constantly worried about birds flying into my head [laughs], and I was worried about safety harnesses not being on properly, and tripping… You still have constant anxiety the whole time you’re doing it – physical anxiety.

EI: If you had to describe this movie, what is it about for you? What does it say?
EB: One of the fun themes of this movie that I think is really poignant for today is that Ed Harris plays a super villain who is essentially a corporation, and this movie is about a working class guy – a blue-collar guy – played by Sam Worthington, who really needs to stick it to this corporate guy, and I feel like that’s a theme everybody is feeling right now, especially here in America, and around the world. And it’s really fun to figure out – there’s a great mystery at the heart of this movie, and it’s fun to figure out exactly what’s going on. You think you’re watching one thing, and really you’re watching something else. And my character steps into a situation she thinks is one thing, and of course it’s something totally different.

EI: How was it to work with Sam? He’s super committed, super passionate? Tell me a little bit about your relationship…
EB: Sam has done so many of these high-octane, high-action movies. I found that what was really great about making this movie was he and I had just small character scenes to do together. He’s stuck on a ledge and I’m stuck in this window, and our challenge was to make every minute of that different and thrilling and exciting, and find something new to do and ways to give the audience new information about the two of us and where our relationship is heading. We get to create an entire relationship over 90 minutes of standing in a window.

EI: How was it shooting in a hotel? Did you feel a little bit claustrophobic at the same time, or on the contrary, did that help to be in that situation?
EB: Any time you film in New York City and you really use New York in the way that we did – we were in a real hotel and we had real tourists walking around, and we used the real elevators with people with their luggage to go up and down, and we shot on Madison Avenue, two blocks from Grand Central Station… There were just people everywhere. New York City is one of the busiest cities in the world. So I found that the city became almost another character in the movie. It was something that we had to deal with that challenged us, that gave us things to play off of. Sam and I were 22 stories up, and in the windows around us would be people at work with their coffee mugs, waving and trying to get our attention. We were constantly having to deal with those things, and I find New York a really invigorating place to make a movie.

EI: What’s coming up next for you after this one?
EB: The Hunger Games. I play Effie Trinket in The Hunger Games, and it comes out March 23rd.

EI: And what is The Hunger Games about for you? What is the message?
EB: For me, the message is for kids that everybody matters. That a revolution can happen from small acts by one person, and I think that’s a theme that’s playing out all over the world right now as well. You matter. I think it’s a really good thing to remember – that everybody matters.

BuzzineFilm.com

I’ve been a big fan of Elizabeth Banks since Wet Hot American Summer, when she singlehandedly ruined barbecue sauce forever. Since then she’s been shifting from comedies like Role Models, to the award-winning drama Seabiscuit, to her recurring role in Sam Raimi’s amazing Spider-Man movies. This week, Elizabeth Banks takes on one of her biggest challenges yet playing a New York cop trying to talk Sam Worthington out of suicide in Asger Leth’s heist thriller Man on a Ledge. We talked in the early morning – 9:00am is early for me, anyway – to discuss what she learned from real police negotiators, the importance of “bed head,” her upcoming directorial debut in Game 43 and why she’s dressed like that in the upcoming adaptation of Suzanne Collins’s Hunger Games.

CRAVEONLINE: So before we begin, I was doing some research on the Internet, and I have to ask, because if this is true, then it’s the coolest thing ever – were you really in an episode of Finders Keepers?
ELIZABETH BANKS: [Laughs] I am going to break your heart, because no, I was not.

That’s a lie?! Aw…
That’s a lie.

Internet, why?!
I actually have no idea where it even comes from. I literally have no idea where that came from.

I’m sorry for bringing that up that pain. So, Man on a Ledge.I don’t think I’ve seen you play hostage negotiator before.
No, I never have done that.

(more…)

When asked how she prepared for the role, Elizabeth Banks said she had met with a NYPD officer from Staten Island. She said, “There is a great attitude about New York City police officers and I feel like with Ed Burns there, that we really brought that out.”

HollywoodReporter.com

Actress Elizabeth Banks was in Boston to promote her latest film Man on a Ledge. The actress was born in Western Massachusetts (Pittsfield) into a divided house (her dad a New York Yankees fan, her mom a Boston Red Sox fan). Ms. Banks talked about her newest thriller, her preferences of comedies over drama and who she would love to work with someday.

Elizabeth Banks plays Lydia Mercer, a police officer who is hand picked to talk down a man on a ledge. That man is Nick Cassidy (Sam Worthington), a former policeman who is sent to prison for stealing a diamond he says he didn’t take. On what she liked about her character, Elizabeth Banks, “I was drawn to the fact that she was nobody’s wife or girlfriend. I felt that gender didn’t really matter. It could easily have been a man. It felt to me like a younger John McClane. I met with some actual NYPD negotiators before we started and I asked specifically to meet a woman. I met this great lady from Staten Island via Ireland, (joking) her accent was incredible, she was really a girl and she was like 42, a mom, wore this cute Banana Republic suit and carried this cute purse that had her piece (gun) in it. She acknowledged that the police force was a Boy’s Club, but they don’t apologize for being women. She’s not out pumping iron trying to be a man. She’s a woman and her job just happens to be a negotiator. We were really intent on showing that camaraderie (between cop and cop). She (the woman she met with) has a really good track record as they mostly do. Their whole motto is that jumpers jump. In other words if you want to off yourself you go to the top of a building and jump. If you’re still standing there by the time I put my pants on, get in a taxi and go up town, get a coffee and start talking to you, your rational mind has hopefully taken over and you may want to get saved. But the problem is that if you then do go over, they take it as their fault because they couldn’t figure out the way to get you in.”

(more…)