Casper Van Dien on His New Role in ‘The 2nd’ and the Lasting Appeal of Johnny Rico (INTERVIEW)

The new action flick The 2nd, out today on VOD, pits Ryan Phillipe’s Vic Davis against Casper Van Dien’s Driver, an ominous character who’s known only by his job description. Or, part of it, anyway. Working for a shady, well-funded organization with a political motive in mind, Driver leads a team of bad guys into a college campus to kidnap Samaire Armstrong’s Olivia, the daughter of a U.S. Supreme Court Justice.

With the campus mostly empty due to the holiday break, Olivia is one of the last students to leave, along with Vic’s son, Sean (Jack Griffo). As Vic arrives to pick up Sean, he notices some suspicious activity, which sets the chain of events in motion. What could be loosely described as Die Hard goes to college, The 2nd has Vic matching wits, and blows, with the Driver’s crew, and eventually Driver himself. Ahead of the film’s release, we spoke with Van Dien about what went in to portraying Driver, squaring off against Phillipe, and the appeal of smaller-scale action flicks. And, of course, the lasting appeal of Starship Trooper’s Johnny Rico.

“The director, Brian Skiva, called up and he said, ‘Look, I think you’d be perfect for this, I think you’d knock it out. I think this is totally written for you.’ So, I really have to go look at myself in the mirror and see why he thinks this is written perfectly for me, because he knows me pretty well,” Van Dien says with a laugh. “So, I either have to question who I am or question how he sees me or how I’ve acted around him, because Driver maybe not your most likable character. I mean, there are likable qualities about him, but he’s not necessarily somebody I can trust.”

While the character of Driver has traits shared with other antagonists whose motivation solely comes from their chosen profession, including those that Van Dien as played before, it was that notion of trust that he took into consideration for his portrayal. “I played the character that you can trust exactly what they’re going to do, but with this guy, if he was put in position of power, if he was in the military, he would actually probably do a really good job as what he’s supposed to do. But, he would probably also start a drug ring on the side. Some things, he’d probably go above and beyond. He might be really good at what he does, but he also might like might take it to a level that’s… not as honorable. There’s something just enough off about Driver that makes you go, ‘I wouldn’t trust him with my children.’ Maybe I would, if there was something in it for him.”

Though Skiva’s hand-picking of Van Dien may have prompted some self-reflection for the veteran actor, the straightforward premise of the story and its non-stop kinetic pacing were aspects that he also found appealing. “It was a fun film for me to shoot because it’s going back to the ’90s, ’80s action movies, we’re really doing all these fights, we’re doing everything. Ryan and I got to do it ourselves, then we had good stuff guys to help choreograph it with us. We had to work on it for nine nights before the dojo, so we had a lot of training and time beforehand. And [Ryan’s] already physically fit. I’ve trained with my guys before, so it kind of felt natural.”

Of course, as Van Dien explains, it takes a lot of work to make something look and feel natural on screen. “We went over it during downtime, what little downtime we’d have, we would also go over the fights and train them, because it’s like a dance, so you don’t get seriously hurt.” Still, despite all the precautions, he says that there were still nights where he had to ice himself afterward, even if the work he did paled in comparison to what the stunt team has to endure. “You’re gonna get hurt, doing all these physical activities. But I didn’t fall out of the second story, third story window on fire. The stunt guys are just really great guys, they really work with you and what you can do.”

It was this camaraderie between the two stars and the stunt team that helped create believable fight scenes, which is crucial for a film with limited budget and shooting schedule. “They know some of the guys that I’ve trained with,” Van Dien explains. “My mom’s best friends Garrett Warren, who was the stunt coordinator on Avatar and Logan, he’s done all the fight choreographing. So, they get us in there and they know some of the things we can do and they work with it, see what we can do and they help us. They’re amazing and they’re so hungry and they want to do this and they show us what they can do. Because you’re going for it. What we do is we go over repetition, repetition, and we are hitting each other, you know, we’re pulling punches in certain places that we’re not at work. You know, you get some cuts and bruises. I had some cuts and I had some bruising. It’s just what happens.”

While Van Dien has appeared in dozens of projects ranging from more modest productions to huge Hollywood blockbusters, he also says that there aren’t quite as many differences between them as one might image. “Everybody always would love to have more money, more time, but we have these one-and-done, you have to do the prep work,” he explains. “Now, they do the prep work on all these big movies, they get more time to do more prep work, you always wish you had more time. You always wish you could do more. And then when you’re in it and you know you have to focus and you have to go, you’re like, I cannot, especially when you’ve been movies as long as I’ve been, and as long as Ryan’s been in, we have no choice but to really go for it. If it’s going to be our bodies and our faces there on camera, and if we’re half-assing it, if we’re doing one thing that not right, it’s gonna look foolish.”

“That’s going to be honest, because they’re not going to polish it as much as they can on one of the big ones,” Van Dien continues. “They’re not going to be able to, so you have to go for it. There is a rawness to it, but even then you still wish you had more time. On the big movies they say the same thing. Like, ‘Aw, I was we had more money, more time.’ And I’m like, ‘You have 100 million dollars. What are you talking about?'”

Along with the bumps and bruises Van Dien often went home with, he still holds out hope that Driver and Vic Davis may face off again. “I thought it was a great role to play and I hope that maybe there there’s another one coming after this cause it would be fun to do,” he says. “But I love being in his head. It’s a lot of fun, you know. I love the thowback action movies and I love doing something that feels good. Of course, you always wish you had bigger budgets, more time, but the character was a lot of fun.”

While there’s a chance Driver could once again grace the screen, Van Dien also spoke about the character he’s best known for: Johnny Rico. The actor first played the character in 1997’s sci-fi cult favorite Starship Troopers, and has reprised it a handful of times in various sequels and spinoffs.

“I will forever be Johnny Rico,” Van Dien admits. “I cannot go out anywhere without somebody going: ‘Rico, what are you doing here?’ Or just go: ‘Come on, you apes wanna live forever?’ or whatever. People scream at me all the time — and it’s good screaming. It’s good screaming because they’re not yelling profanity at me. They’re yelling because he gets so excited and they can’t help it. But I’ll be at the grocery store, and they’re like, ‘What are you doing here, Rico?’ And I’m like, ‘I’m getting toilet paper!’ They get so excited, and for me, it’s intoxicating because they can’t even help it sometimes. Or when a younger guy comes up to me and says, ‘My dad took me to that,’ or ‘My dad just introduced me to that.’ So, dads are showing their kids this. It’s got a longevity.”

“That movie was so much fun for me, and I’m so thrilled that it’s still loved as much,” Van Dien adds. “And, unfortunately, it seems so right for the time we’re in right now.”

The 2nd is currently available on VOD. 

https://youtu.be/IycoX5vR0WQ