(The Reservoir Dogs 2-Disc Collector's Edition is out now on DVD and Blu-Ray)
(Hell Ride is TBC in UK)

Transcript of Michael Madsen interview for Hell Ride at The Four Seasons, Beverly Hills on 29 July 2008

Madsen strolls into hotel suite, wearing a vintage orange nylon shirt emblazoned with pictures of motorbikes. He wears faded jeans and leather boots. Hell Ride reunites Madsen with Quentin Tarantino - serving as executive producer - with whom he made Reservoir Dogs 16 years ago.

This movie, Hell Ride - all about bikers - seems like it was made for you?

Well, its definitely right up my alley. I've been trying to escape the Mr. Blonde tag for a long time, and maybe I finally did that. If audiences start calling me The Gent now [name of his biker character in new film Hell Ride], at least I'll feel updated.

Whose decision was it for your character to wear a tuxedo throughout Hell Ride?

Mine.

It reminded me a little of Mr. Blonde. I'm sure a lot of people had the same reaction.

Well, Mr. Blonde wasn't wearing a tuxedo. Listen, I'm trying to get off the Mr. Blonde tag. I don't really want that to follow me around for eternity. I'm glad to have done it and it gave me a good career and I'm happy for it, but I'd like to progress into, you know, 2008. Mr. Blonde was a lot more violent than The Gent. I tried to bring some humour to The Gent. I don't think Mr. Blonde was very humorous.

And Quentin Tarantino is also executive producer on Hell Ride?

Quentin has put his name on it; he cut the movie and put the music in it; he's all over it.

What's it like working with Tarantino?

I love Quentin. I love him like a brother. I think he's at the top of his powers right now. I think that Kill Bill was an astounding achievement in cinema. Let's face it-Nobody has ever been able to make a picture the way that he does, even though everyone tried to copy him. No one has ever been able to achieve the same thing and if I could just make pictures with Quentin for the rest of my life, that would be okay with me because at least you know when you are working on a picture with him that there is going to be something about it that is going to be damn good. He reached back and pulled me back into his vortex at a time when I was very frustrated with some of the films that I was working on and that was a gift that I will forever be grateful for.

When it comes to acting, how do you get to those dark places?

I think the best way to get to that place is to not try too hard and just let it be what it is supposed to be. After all, I'm not the one who wrote any of those scenes that you may be referring to. I'm only trying to give credibility to the author, and I don't take it home with me.

It seems like you had a blast on Hell Ride?

I sure did. It was a gas, it really was. It was great fun and I'm really hoping for Vol 2 and 3 cause its supposed to be a trilogy

And Hell Ride is the third time within the space of a year that you've worked with Vinnie Jones?

He just gave me a coat, for God sakes. He's such a great dude, and a really good friend. I can count my true good friends on one hand and he's one of them.

Hell Ride is a real male fantasy flick. Guys on bikes with plenty of gorgeous semi-naked women ready to do their bidding. What did your wife think?

Well, she's very tolerant. We've been married for a while and she's very understanding. But she knows that it's a job that I do.

What is it about motorbikes that lend themselves cinematically? Is it because motorbikes are a cultural iconic male fantasy - the idea of being on the open-road on a motorbike?

Yeah. A motorcycle is a big machine. It's a force to be reckoned with.

Is it a plus for you when you get to ride a bike in a movie?

Being an actor is a very neurotic thing to do for a living. Trying to sit at a table and do dialogue scenes is not fun. But if you can get on a Harley and ride around behind a camera truck, that's when my job is fun.

And Quentin knows what he's doing. Did he school you on bike movies?

He's a walking encyclopedia of film history. He knows more about movies than any person on the Earth. He knows who made them, who's in them, when they were done, what happened to them ... it's amazing. I don't know how he has all that information in his head, I really don't know how he keeps track of it all. As far as motorcycles are concerned, I didn't need a lesson on that. I've been riding bikes my whole life, I understand what that's about.

What does a motorcycle movie mean to you?

It's a spaghetti western on wheels. It's a rebellion against all there is. It's a spaghetti western on motorcycles, there's no better way to state it. That's what it is. Look at The Wild One. That girl in the diner asks Marlon Brando, "What are you rebelling against?" and he says, "Whaddya got?" Isn't it a good time for that kind of attitude?

Do you prefer bikes to cars?

Yeah. I do. When I was a younger man - when I was 25 or 35 years old - I used to ride into town all the time. When I first moved here, I used to work at the Union 76 gas station in Beverly Hills [NOTE: This is the most iconic gas station in all of LA. Its beneath a "pagoda-style" orange awning, and still a place to spot stars given its just a few blocks from Rodeo Drive and one of the few gas stations in the neighbourhood]. It was a full-service gas station and I worked there for about two years pumping gas and changing flat tires and that kind of thing. And the first thing that I did was, I bought a motorcycle. I saved up and I bought a Harley-Davidson Sportster.

Did you pump gas for celebrities?

Well, to be honest with you, yes. I was a blue-collar boy from Chicago and I was just looking for a job and, little did I know, that it was right in the heart of Beverly Hills. And what would I know of Beverly Hills, right? I knew the TV show, The Beverly Hillbillies, but I never really knew what Beverly Hills was all about. So when I first started working there - I think it was Christmas Eve, the second day that I was there, and Fred Astaire came in with a flat tire on a Mercedes. I was pretty shocked, you know? He gets out of the car and I went, "Holy shit! Its him!" I didn't know what to say so I was like, 'You've got a flat tire, huh?' and he's like 'Yeah. Yup!' And he snaps me out a 0 bill and I told him it was .50 to fix it and put the spare on, and he just walked off. And I went in the front office and my boss Ray was in there, and I said, 'Was that, umm . . .?' and he goes, 'Yeah. Now get used to it! Get used to it, kid!' And I was like 'OK, man'. And, sure enough, I mean, God, you know Jack Lemmon used to come in there every day with his MG and Cicely Tyson and Warren Beatty and Don Knotts. And, oh my God . . . Peter Falk, and everybody that you can imagine would come in there, and I'd be squeege-ing their windows and looking in there going, 'Holy shit, its him,' you know.

As an actor, did you ever get to work with any of these people later on and go, oh by the way, I pumped gas in your car?

Warren Beatty was supposed to be Bill in Kill Bill; he was originally cast as Bill [NB: the role in Quentin Tarantino's 2003 Kill Bill ultimately went to David Carradine] and me and him had to go out and have dinner together and hang around together because he wanted us to be familiar with each other because we were gonna play brothers. But he was really so, err, . . . Everything to him is a quiz, you know what I mean? He thinks about everything so much and everything becomes an equation and a quiz and I'll be tested later, and you know, I didn't know what that was all about. But that's the closest I ever got to working with someone who actually came in to the gas station. But then Warren got fired by Quentin. He fired Warren because he said Warren didn't understand what the movie was about, which I don't think he did, and that's when David took over.