Austin Butler comes face-to-face danger while filming his latest role. Butler spoke with Josh Brolin for Interview Magazine about his upcoming film, The Bikeriders, and forming a motorcycle gang with his castmates.
“There’s such a trust,” Butler said about the bike riding scenes. “When we’d be in these groups of 40, riding bikes down a tiny road, and you’re thinking, ‘If anybody were to crash right now, all of us would go down.’ And we’re not wearing helmets, riding through cornfields as fast as we can.”
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“Doesn’t seem like the most sensible thing,” Brolin remarked. “I don’t know how they insured the film, to be honest,” Butler laughed. “And you’re riding behind a picture car as well, it’s kicking up pebbles in your face, so you’re getting hit in the eyes with rocks. It was so visceral.”
“Sounds like heaven to me,” said Brolin, who regularly posts pictures of his motorcycle collection on Instagram. “I envy you deeply, and I did the minute I heard you were doing it.”
Butler stars in the latest film from Jeff Nichols, a ’60s drama about a Midwestern biker gang, which also stars Tom Hardy, Jodie Comer, Michael Shannon, Boyd Holbrook, and Norman Reedus.
In line with the title, The Bikeriders make no compromises when it comes to riding their motorcycles. “To get to ride motorcycles through Cincinnati, through these cornfields, it was just amazing,” Butler said. “You know what that feels like, where the wind is in your hair. You feel like you’re mainlining god.”
While Butler is undoubtedly successful, he still admires those around him, including his The Bikeriders co-star Hardy, whom he likens to the late great actor Marlon Brando. Hardy surprised Butler, who says he was unprepared for what he would see from him initially. “Tom Hardy surprised me,” he told Brolin. I pictured him to be this grizzly bear, always serious.
“And really, he’s one of the funniest people I’ve ever met. He’d be joking around until action is called and then go into being the most intense guy I’d ever seen. It reminds me of the stories I heard of [Marlon] Brando, talking to the camera operator until the moment action is called.”
In the film, the two stars portray members of the Vandals, a fictional Chicago biker gang, who are bound to protect the group against an evil rival. In the midst of the ongoing actors’ strike, The Bikeriders remains undated after its original release date of Dec. 1.
