Posted in: Exclusive, Interview, Movies | Tagged: Alicia Silverstone, exclusive, interview, James Tupper, Le-Van Kief, Saban Films, The Requin

The Requin Star James Tupper on Survival Film, Le-Van Kiet & Veganism

When James Tupper signed on to play Kyle in the survival thriller The Requin, he jumped at the opportunity. "I've always dreamed of being an action star, and I got tired of watching Tom Cruise do it. I thought it would be really fun to be the lead in a great big film where you battle for your survival and your wits, strength, and mental fortitude are tested." The film follows a couple on a romantic getaway who find themselves stranded at sea when a tropical storm sweeps away their villa. They are forced to fight the elements while sharks circle below to survive. I spoke to the Hardy Boys star about what drew him to working on the Le-Van Kiet film, how co-star Alicia Silverstone got him to try a vegan diet and the film's grueling physical demands.

"I watched a lot of [Le-Van's] work before I worked with him, and it was. I just thought it was tremendous," Tupper said. "I discovered during filming that he the train he used in 'Fury' that there's a giant fight scene on that goes through the night they're jumping off that it never moved. So he was moving stuff past at an alarming rate, green screening, rocking it, figuring it out, and causing accidents. He never moved the train and just sat in the studio. So he's figured out this incredible feeling of movement like in our movie, for instance, when we're on vacation in Vietnam and the flotel that we're on pitches violently to the side. Instead of moving the thing, he pivoted the camera. He had a guy like pull the light that was hanging straight from the ceiling. He pulled it violently to the right, and then he had two stunt guys drill-throw the bed down into the wall where the two actors were. I think they enjoyed that little too much, but they pushed it really hard, and it was smashed. It looked like the room had moved, and it hadn't. He's figured out how to do this and this really incredible way."

In addition to working with the writer-director, Tupper also got to know Silverstone, who turned him toward a healthier lifestyle. "When we first arrived, they put us in a bubble, so we weren't allowed to really leave," he said. "One of the first things you said to me, she goes, 'Hey, they're giving us food. Do you want me to organize your food? Do you want to be vegan for the next few months? And I was like, 'Yeah, I do. OK.' I was like, 'What are you going to say to your leading lady, right?' [laughs] I started eating vegan food. That's all I had. I'll tell you the inflammation on my body went away. It was incredible. I had a big revelation because I was a steak-eating normal guy. When I started, I shifted my diet dramatically. I started eating a lot less dairy, less red meat, pork, and chicken. Even today, I'm just doing that officially. She really helped me become healthy."

Tupper credited the crew for staying on top of the actors' safety. "We were in the water all day, every day like we shot the thing in a chronological order," he said. "After we left the security of the house and we were in the water, we were in the water till the rest of the film. So we spent the morning like 6 am until whenever we finished in the water, it was good. The water was cold often [laughs]. So they got us a couple of hot hoses that pumped hot water. Between takes, we sit there, and they would check our body temperature, our core temperature. So if we got too low, they would pull us out, and it did. We did a couple of times we got we got a break. We got an unsolicited break. You got to keep the actors alive to the last scene."

While the film was shot during the pandemic, the isolating nature of its setting was limiting enough. "It all worked together," Tupper said." It was fine to be isolated. I think I would have gone crazy after a while, but knowing that there was a bookend in where the film was going to shoot for this number of days, I was able to do it. But yeah, you become hermetic; you seal yourself off. You don't really talk to anybody, and you can you just grind through." Saban Films' The Requin, which also stars Diedre O'Connell and Jennifer Mudge, is in theaters, on-demand, and digital.

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