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The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Sunday, August 11, 2002

Diesel hits top speed as extreme outlaw

By Bill Muller
Arizona Republic

Whether it's the distinctive name, the rugged good looks, the husky baritone or his testosterone-charged performance as an outlaw street racer in "The Fast and the Furious," there's little doubt Vin Diesel has arrived.

In Hollywood, everyone's calling him the next Sylvester Stallone or Arnold Schwarzenegger. Everyone, that is, except Diesel himself.

"I don't think I'm the next anyone," says Diesel, who plays an extreme-sports star turned spy in "XXX," which opened Friday. "I think that I'm just really doing my thing and just trying to make films that I think are entertaining and make films that I'd like to see and, basically, to put as much blood as I can into each film.

"At the same time, I'm flattered to be compared to any actor that's had such a long successful run as those guys, in whatever genre. The fact that those guys have worked so long and brought so many great films to fruition, that's kind of cool."

Although Diesel is downplaying such comparisons, "XXX" director Rob Cohen thinks Diesel is the perfect action star for the new millennium: multi-ethnic (he's half African American, half Italian American), irreverent, physically imposing and, Cohen says, quite talented.

"He's there with top spin," says Cohen, who also directed Diesel in "The Fast and the Furious," "because the guy can really act. You've got a theater-trained actor with the body of a boxer, of an athlete. He's got the gravelly voice, and he's got a surprising vulnerability.

"So you take that acting power, combined with his action athleticism, his great voice and this charm and his multi-ethnicity — you get a very potent new force."

In a scant four years, Diesel has gone from bar bouncer (where he got his stage name) and struggling actor to magazine cover boy with a series of performances that turned Hollywood heads.

"It was a slow burn," says Diesel, whose real name is Mark Vincent. "There were some people who perked up from 'Saving Private Ryan' (in which Diesel portrayed doomed Pvt. Adrian Carpazo), not a lot."

Two years later, in the sci-fi movie "Pitch Black," Diesel played a convict with the ability to see in the dark, a skill that comes in handy when his spaceship crash-lands on a planet ravaged by nocturnal predators. In "Boiler Room," he did a turn as a hotshot stockbroker who talks hapless investors into worthless deals.

Diesel says those two movies helped showcase his range.

"When 'Pitch Black' and 'Boiler Room' came out on the same presidential weekend of 2000, that's when people started really lining up," he says. "That's when it really, really started, because it was two contrasting roles."

Diesel sees some of himself in each part he plays, including Xander Cage in "XXX."

"I think we both kind of have always had this problem with authority I think we're both extremely independent," he says of his character. "And we both probably don't take ourselves too serious at times."

Ironically, Diesel's success stemmed from his failure to be recognized as an actor. In 1994, he poured his frustration into a 20-minute short, "Multi-Facial," in which he played an actor auditioning for a series of roles, claiming different ethnicity on each interview but always going home empty-handed.

"The whole reason I was bouncing was to leave my days open for training, auditions and theater," he says of his work at New York bars. "You get, I guess, frustrated to some kind of boiling point. Then I felt like I had to go make a film, a short film; that's how it started."

Luckily, one of the people who ultimately saw "Multi-Facial" was director Steven Spielberg.

"That's what was wild about it," Diesel says. "I did 'Multi-Facial' out of frustration and out of a need to be artistic, then a couple years later, Steven Spielberg sees it and writes a role in 'Saving Private Ryan' for me. So that's bizarre. That was a Hollywood fairy tale."

Although those roles were solid building blocks, Diesel didn't hit the A list until "The Fast and the Furious" grossed a surprising $144 million last year. The movie was written with Paul Walker as the star, but Diesel stole the show as the film's antihero.

"I think that I always was optimistic about it and working toward it being a great film," Diesel says of "The Fast and the Furious," "and it felt like it was turning into a great film. But you never really know until the film comes out."

There's going to be a sequel to that outlaw-racing film, but neither Cohen nor Diesel will be involved. The director says he doesn't think there's anything fresh left in the idea, while Diesel reportedly asked for too much money.

Besides, they're busy trying to reinvent the spy movie with "XXX," replacing cloak and dagger with tattoos and snowboards.

Of course, the film called for Diesel to use his physical prowess, and there were some scary moments, including riding along on the back of a speeding hydrofoil.

"The water was so cold, a person couldn't last two minutes in the water without being subjected to hypothermia," he says. "And I wasn't fastened — I'm standing on top of this concave shell roof and I'm speeding along and no life preserver, and I have to lean over and act out all these things. It was a tough balancing act with high stakes."

Diesel also took 10 weeks of extreme-sports training to make sure he exhibited the nervy fearlessness that permeates the athletic pursuit. But he already had some experience in that aspect of the film.

"Growing up in New York, we did really crazy things," he says.

"Hanging on the back of a New York City cab on roller blades going 40 miles an hour up Eighth Avenue in rush-hour traffic ain't the smartest thing in the world."