Celebrity Sightings Gets Down w/Devon

What was it like taking on such a physically demanding role [in Idle Hands]?

It's very hard, harder than it looks. Trying to do a scene, and keeping the hand going, or when the hand goes to do something, and you're not aware and you're playing a completely different thing and it's going for, you know, a knife. The director was constantly going "Cut! Devon, you forgot about the hand." 'Cause it would go dead, and I'd be doing like this big scene, and I'd look over my hand and going," Aw, S***. Wake up, wake up!"

So you got your hand back after the movie wrapped?

I actually had to see a psychiatrist. Yeah, I got the hand back. When you start doing it for 14 hours a day, it's not like it does it by itself or anything, but you find yourself doing stuff in the weirdest places. When I was doing pre-production, I'd be sitting there on the plane, just (gestures) doing stuff and people would be staring at me going, "What the hell is wrong with this kid?"

Did you have any doubts about the physical acting you had to do when you read the script?

No. When I first read it, it was written more toward a horror, serious horror (genre). I mean, it had its funny stuff in it, but it wasn't written as a physical. It was written more that the hand just sort of came alive once in a while, and I thought it would be funnier to keep it alive all the time. I knew that I could pull it off, and I went into the audition and just played it as big as possible, and they liked it. But I knew it would be a lot of hard work. Rodman (the director) and I constantly had the sets cleared just so me and him could have the room and know exactly what we were doing. It was hard... tedious, but it paid off.

How did they do the part where your hand gets cut off?

Well, they wanted to use a sleeve, kind of a blue screen sleeve. But I came up with a different way of doing it. I would bend my hand like this (demonstrates) And put spandex around it, and they would attach a stump to this part, a movable stump, and I would just walk around like that. But god, 20 minutes later, you can just feel your fingers get numb and they'd have to take it off so I could do the arm exercises. We were doing rehearsals one day and I was making a joke. I had a t-shirt on and I kind of just did it, and you could see the stump of my hand, which actually looks kind of real from a certain angle, so we did the spandex thing. It saved tons of time. They originally wanted to do the blue screen thing, or put my hand behind my back have a puppeteer work a fake arm with a rod. So if you can imagine running down a hall with some guy on a dolly, you're asking for trouble. But we got around it.

Were you very physical when you read for the part?

It was all-physical. Most of the other guys walked in a played it very straight, very serious. And I walked in, I basically carried myself in by my hand, and slapped myself around, and the execs were just laughing because I was the only one that did it as big as I did it.

Are you concerned about being typecast as a comic actor or a teen heartthrob?

I made sure to do 2 serious, serious movies after this, just so I don't get (typecast). "The Guilty" and "Flight 180". Both suspense sort of dramas. You've got to look at someone like Tom Hanks or Robin Williams — they`re definitely role models. They'll go from "Forest Gump" to "Philadelphia". They have such a wide range. I really respect that. That's what I would like to follow.

So you're doing several different types of projects.

I try to play different characters in every movie. "SLC Punk" is about a punk rocker kid in Salt Lake City, and "Around the Fire" is about a hippie from Haight-Asbury. So I don`t want to play Devon, I want to play different characters, different colors. So I look at acting like a rainbow. There's so many different colors of emotion. I like to find your own colors for every character, and not play Devon, your typical teen.

Is it different to work on independent versus studio films?

You definitely get spoiled doing the big ones, but you have to look at... (the advantages of independent film). "Around the Fire" was probably the most independent, and I'd like to go up to Haight-Asbury and be a hippie for a month, which I wasn't sure about at first. I wasn't into the whole hippie thing, but it was actually very interesting. I mean, these were hard-core hippies, too they really used real hippies as extras, and they just set them up in this big park, and set up tents, and basically fed them, and they worked as extras on the movie. It was an interesting life to see. In Salt Lake City, you go over there, and I had to be a punk rocker with these big crazy cones (in his hair), and I actually got on a plane at the end of the shoot, and I was trying to make the plane so I didn't have time to take the cones out, so here I am in like first class, and this nice old lady is beside me, and I'm just giving her this smile in these crazy cones.

What`s "Around the Fire" about?

"Around the Fire" is a coming-of-age story about a guy that follows the Grateful Dead. His father doesn't accept what he does, and so they have the whole thing going, and he eventually gets hooked on drugs, and comes out of it by the end, patches things up with his father, and both of them come to an understanding of who they are.

When does it come out?

I don't know yet. I think that they're saving it for film festivals.

Is "The Guilty" another independent film?

"The Guilty" is an independent, but it's a 20-million independent. It's by J&M Entertainment, which is a company in England. It's dependent, but it's not. It's definitely a big budget film. I play Bill Pullman's son. It`s about a father and a son, and the son goes to look for his biological father, who is Bill. He turns out to be a rapist, so he's not... he doesn't find exactly what he was hoping for I suppose. Well, he's not a (serial) rapist, he rapes this one girl, that he (Devon`s Character) coincidentally knows too. But then everybody doesn't know about it except the audience. So it definitely keeps you thinking.

You're in competition with yourself, having 2 movies coming out at once.

Yeah, good right? One movie's gotta do good! Yeah, they're both coming out. I`m excited. One comes out a little bit before. Both completely different movies. In "SLC Punk", I definitely have a smaller role. We shot it a year ago. They just premiered it at Sundance, so they wanted to wait for that. They showed it there, and it did well, and now there are 2 coming out.

Did you plan to have an independent and a studio movie come out at the same time?

Um, I just take what's good.

Am I the first person to point out that you look a lot like Elvis Presley?

Really? No, you are not. Actually, someone said that on the movie I'm shooting now, that I resembled Elvis a little bit. Well, Thank you. That could be good. I could score with those Dallas cheerleaders finally (grins).

Of all the characters you've played, which one are you closest to?

I don't know. They're all so different. There's a lot of me in Anton, you know, the laziness and stuff like that (grins). I think there's a little of me in every character I play, not a lot, but a little. There's not one terribly close.

How old are you, Devon?

20.

How did you research your hippie role, since that isn't part of your generation?

I listened to a lot of Jefferson Airplane, Grateful Dead and stuff like that. Did some mushrooms — no (smiles) Basically, I was hanging out with this big group of hippies and seeing what they were like and how they lived. That was the basic research for that one. (For) "SLC Punk", I didn't really have to do a lot of research because it was just such an off-the-wall character, a big character. As soon as those cones were in my hair, and I was wearing that tight spandex shirt with big bright orange gloves, I was like, okay. I'm this complete different character.

What was it like working with Matthew Lillard in "SLC Punk"?

Great. I mean, my scenes were basically more alone than with him. They were telling the story of how, "Remember that one time how," and they would flash back to me chasing my mom around, who was a goat with a knife.

What can you tell us about "Flight 180"?

"Flight 180" is made by the people who created the "X-files" and stuff like that... James Wong is actually directing it. Hes a brilliant guy. We just recently met, and I thought he had some great ideas for the movie, and I loved the script, just kept you thinking the whole time.

Have you already started work on that?

No. It starts shooting as soon as I finish doing press for "Idle Hands". So, no rest for the wicked.

Is that physical too?

Yes. There's a flash back of, I envision this plane going down. And no one else on the plane is (aware). And in my mind, body limbs are going past me and there's a big explosion, so there's a lot of craziness in that. I do some physical stuff in there. He envisions the plane going down, and they kick him off the plane, along with the pilot and the people who clam him down, and the plane actually goes down. So they escape deaths plan. So now death is after them to kill them in order of their seats. That's the plan. It's very interesting. No humor. It's very serious.

Back 12.31.2007.