Posted in: HBO, Preview, streaming, TV | Tagged: hbo max, interview, james gunn, John Cena, John Economos, peacemaker, steve agee

Peacemaker: Steve Agee Talks Dye-Beard Joke, John Cena's Improv & More

DC's latest Extended Universe television series Peacemaker is currently burning up the streaming charts and a big part of the show's success can be attributed to this guy with two thumbs, Steve Agee. Based on the DC Comics character and executive produced & written by James Gunn, HBO Max's hit series follows Chris Smith aka Peacemaker (John Cena), a man who believes in achieving peace… no matter what the cost. Agee steals nearly every scene he is in as ARGUS's top tech guy, John Economos (from Warner Bros' The Suicide Squad, Gunn's hyper-violent, triumphant take on the DC comics team). In the second part of our conversation, Agee discusses with Bleeding Cool what we can expect from Economos this season, improving his performance while on set, and the origins of the "Dye-Beard" joke.

I want to ask you about John's character arc. In Episode 3, you save the day stopping  Judomaster and in previews for the season, we see you covered head to toe in blood. Can you comment on where your character is heading? 

SA: I said earlier you could tell my character is kind of bummed that he doesn't have this adventurer type of spirit in him and doesn't like confrontation and fighting. But at the same time, he's kind of bummed that these other people get to do it. Then you can see in the van when the Judomaster (Nhut Le) is escaping and he realizes he's going to have to do something to stop him. How terrified he is. But the second he beats this dude down, you get the sense of superiority, this big head and he starts dancing and screaming his own name. I think it's an awakening for Economos. I can say that in future episodes, he's still reluctant to jump in and help out, but clearly, some other shit goes down in later episodes. I can't say what, but it's phenomenal. There's an episode coming up that when I got the script, I marked the script on the calendar, the shooting schedule I marked that day on my calendar, I was like, I cannot wait to shoot this. This is going to be a career highlight for me. It was amazing to play all this stuff.

There's so much tension between John & Peacemaker. How did the 'Dye Beard' joke come about?

SA: I don't know how this started, but James has started asking me to grow my beard whenever I shoot something with him. It started with Guardians (of the Galaxy) 2, me being a Ravager. Personally, I hate having a beard. It's the worst, but he seems to find it funny. When we did The Suicide Squad, John Economos is an actual character in the comics, he has a beard. When we got to Atlanta, a couple of weeks early to start rehearsal, he (said) 'I think I want you to dye it. I wanted a decent dye job that matched my actual hair. (Gunn said) 'No, no, no. I want it to be so obvious, it's not solid. You know, you can see some lighter areas darker.' It was funny, but there was never a purpose for it in the movie other than it would look funny. and it did look funny. I (told Gunn) 'You know, when you wrap me at the end of the day, we all go home I still have this shitty beard. I go to a restaurant, and I have this shitty beard and people are staring at me.' I think he justified it because of that when we did the TV series. (Gunn told me) 'I'm going to make Cena really reference your beard being dyed.' So we went even more extreme with showing the roots of the beard. and it's it actually pays off. I think he's done it so much that he wants to actually reference it and have it pay off.

With regards to some of the more memorable scenes we've seen so far, how much of that is scripted and how much of it is Gunn giving all of you a chance to just 'go' and improvise?

SA: Most of what you see is written and even the scenes that you see that go on for a really long time. That first scene in the hospital when Cena is talking to the janitor, it just goes on for like eight minutes or something like that. That's all written. James loves to just let a scene breathe even when it's really nothing to do with the story. It really has a lot to do with the characters. He loves to have a nice long scene where two people are talking about something really mundane, that's all character-driven stuff. That scene where he gets out of the hospital, the nurse says, you're free to go live your life. He just left the hospital. It could have ended right there, cut to him in a cab. But James likes character-driven stuff and relationship stuff. Any of the improvisations that you might see in these episodes, if it happens it's at the end of a scene where the dialog kind of ends, and James will just let the camera keep going. The scene and the cameras are still rolling and we just kind of talk our way through some shit. Sometimes it turns out really funny and ends up getting used. There's a scene in episode five where Peacemaker and John Economos get into an argument in their headquarters, and Cena just starts yelling names at him. James was just like 'Keep going!'. He was just improvising names of celebrities and sports and TV and music, and John never ever ran out of references. He just kept going. A lot of it ends up in the end credits scene. Long story longer. It's mostly scripted.

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