ComicBookMovie | Victor Webster

I had a wonderful chance to speak with the starring cast from Scorpion King 4: Quest for Power and I had three of them together during one of the interviews. Here I take you through the chat with its titular hero—The Scorpion King—and the man who would take over the mantle of this amazing character from The Rock—Victor Webster

The conference call had already begun when I was introduced to Victor Webster. I interviewed Will Kemp first, whose interview will be up right after this one, and then continued with Don "The Dragon" Wilson. 

CBM Manny: “Victor! Victor Webster…

Victor Webster: “Hey Buddy…”

CBM Manny: “How are you?”

VW: “Fantastic buddy how are you doing!?”

CBM Manny: “I'm good and I must say—You’re an excellent replacement for the Rock as Mathuyus. You did phenomenally in the character role. Not necessarily like you are the Rock or are trying to portray the character as the Rock. It’s definitely a character you made all your own…I didn’t realize you were that big bro! My God, and I’ve seen you in a lot of your work. Did you get that buff for this film or are you already (normally) that big?

VW: “Well I’m 6’5” and because the rock was so big. I felt it would be a disservice to come in and not be as big as I possibly could. Especially because he’s [Mathuyus] a big tough badass barbarian. Who (you know) kicks Ass! And you know, you want to see big action stars in these big action movies.
 
I definitely spent a lot of time training. Probably put on about 15 pounds of lean muscle which was very difficult in itself. About 6-8 months of training, eating..non-stop. I usually walk around at about 230 pounds so it was quite extensive training. Trying to keep that up with a 6-8 week 14 hour shooting schedule was really difficult.”

CBM Manny: “Did Lou ever walk up to you (when filming his scene) and ask you ‘Bro, Do you even lift?” Or did he not bug you at all for working so hard to get bigger?”

VW: “He’s like ‘What’s up puny human!’” [laughing]

CBM Manny [laughing]: “Now it felt like you gave a more serialized appeal to the movie. I mentioned this to Ellen [Hollman] and of course you heard me talking about this with Will. It didn’t feel like a movie [Scorpion King 4], it felt like an extension of television series. Like Hercules or Xena. In that extension was a comfortable and familiar story […] It didn’t feel like a straight-to-DVD movie or a VOD. Does that make any sense am I close to what you would describe as the feeling of this movie?”

VW: “I think a lot of that comes from the chemistry in the cast. I think when you see a TV show that’s been running for a while, those people have melded together the chemistry has become really good. You can feel that on camera. I think it was luck and a lot of skill in the casting by Universal and Mike Elliot. I think that they put together a great cast and we’re just lucky we got along so well. We’d hang out when we weren’t working and we’d hang out on our one day off on Sunday. […] We really gelled together and I think that’s what you’re seeing and that’s where the feel comes from.”

 
Victor spoke about how this cast played more with the comedy and interjected those sensibilities into the film, where the previous entry was far darker. The original film was more about adventure and how the rest of the series had a departure from that feel. This film would return to a more family friendly adventure style film. Which was refreshing. You do see this shine through as you watch. It has a nice amount of campiness without becoming too cheesy.
 
CBM Manny: “I remember watching you for the first time in Wishmaster 4 (I’m a big Horror film Buff) and Mutant X. Then as Coop on Charmed and recently in Continuum, which is a show my household watches avidly. Can you give us…that’s a very varied set of shows from Horror to Superheroes, to more supernatural scenarios to pure Sci-Fi, story driven sci-fi—now Fantasy. What kind of roles do you prefer playing? Or do you like playing in all of these diverse genres?”

VW: “Well the reason I got into acting was I didn’t want a real job. I didn’t want to do the same thing every single day, sitting in a cubicle under fluorescent lights…would kill me working on a construction site all the time. Where I had to the same thing every day. I had hundreds of jobs before I decided to step into acting. And I think that’s one of the things I love, is going genre to genre playing different characters. I think that’s what really appeals to me and challenges every actor. You know? It’s nice to be able to do comedy, it’s nice to do action, to do horror. To play the psycho, the hero. That’s what I love. Why I continue to stay in this profession. It’s so much fun and it’s incredibly challenging."

I don’t have a preference. I’d say my favorite to watch is action comedy. Therefore might be my favorite to do. But I do love to do dark killer-stalker roles. Or the straight comedies, like half-hour comedy. It’s hard to say, but I have to narrow down. I’d say Action Comedy.”

CBM Manny: “I’ll you same as I asked Will…Favorite Comic Book Character?”

VW: “Ooohh, Deadpool!

CBM Manny: “Oh good choice! Good choice.”

VW: “Hands Down.”

CBM Manny: “If you had any opportunity to play any character in comics or film, past, present or future. Hero, villain, or normal and human…like Nick Fury. Which would you play?”

VW: “Hmm, Neo from the Matrix.”

CBM Manny: “Interesting…Actually you know who I’d think you’d be great to play…you look like this particular character. I had a conversation with a gentlemen who was an unnamed SHIELD operative in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and he is campaigning to play this character with the studio. The community has fancasted Josh Holloway in the role. The character’s name is Quasar [Wendell Vaughn]. You look like the character [your hair can be bleached].”

VW: “Quasar—I like the name Quasar.”

CBM Manny: “He is an insanely powerful comic book character. He should be popping up sometime soon in the next set of films. You should look into him! Consider him as a character you might be able to audition or campaign to play.

VW [chuckles]: “I should look at that then.”

 CBM Manny: “People are all in uproar at CBM because of the characters omission in the recent Guardians of the Galaxies film and a lost opportunity to introduce his normal human SHIELD agent appearance in Captain America. They’re hoping he’ll make an appearance sometime soon. You do look like him. […] Would be interesting to see you as that character.

We were running out of time and I wanted to make sure I had a few moments to speak with the legendary Don “The Dragon” Wilson and I was unable to talk to Victor about how he felt beating up UFC legends, like Royce Gracie, Antonio “BigFoot” Silva, and Don “The Dragon” Wilson. Including Roy “Big Country” Nelson using his signature overhand right on Victor’s character a few times, which had me feeling that punch through the screen.
 
CBM Manny: “It was a pleasure speaking with you Victor and I left Don for last because he is one of my personal heroes.

VW [Laughing]: “So Don, the best for last…I see! [No i'm kidding]”

CBM Manny [laughing]: “No, no…oh crap.”

VW [laughing]: “It’s been a pleasure Manny.”

CBM Manny: “Thanks Victor, it definitely has.”

Victor Webster will be seen beating up some of the best fighters in history in the Scorpion King 4: Quest for Power, releasing tomorrow, Tuesday, January 13th, 2015 on both Blu-Ray & DVD, and is currently the co-star in the amazingly popular science fiction hit, Continuum on SyFy; returning for it’s 4^th season in April 2015. Victor will also be featured alongside Richard Harmon and Jennifer Spence in a Sci-Fi variation of a holiday film in A Christmas Tale.

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