Sharlto Copley

I'd love to go back. Neill would too. There's no scoop - theres' an amazing story outline from terri and neill and I think it's just a matter of when it happens and not if.

no, BUT WIKUS DOES. constantly wondering - "WHERE THE FOK IS HE? HE SAID THREE FOKKEN YEARS MAN"

do you know where that comes from? The infamous very first test i did for pete jackson that ended up accidentally winning me the wikus role. We shot wikus pretending to evict human shack dwellers from their shacks so we could build homes for the alien prawns. in the townships, they often sell sweets on the street corners, so while shooting i saw these real human kids and thought wikus would try and sort of "bond" with the children in a lame uncomfortable way... so i bought some sweets and tried to give them to the kids. most kids took them, one started crying like mad and ran away...

it was neill's choice. he made the call i think after seeing me doing the improvised test i did for pete. i don't think it was always his plan for the lead to improvise, but in my specific case i think it began to make more and more sense to him that we go that route.

it wasn't actually much of a challenge - i had been fortunate enough to write scripts, make films etc. before so i had a good idea of what is needed in improvisation to ensure that you are improvising around the main issues/beats in the scene. neill and i would start by essentially saying "WHY IS THE SCENE IN THE FILM?" usually there are 2-4 fundamental reasons why the scene is important to the film and to driving the story forward and i would focus the improv around those.

;) what about wikus, wikus is sooooooo sexy.... hahahahahha

no. doesn't appear to be common name anywhere. if you track it down please let me know... my mom heard it on a british radio play when she was pregnant with me.

it was a very surreal moment when neill offered me the lead in D9. i was meant to produce that film and i only did a little test to show peter jackson what a stereotypically "afrikaans bureaucrat" was. the phone call where neill offered me the role will be etched into my mind for ever. it may sound strange but i knew my life would change. it was one of those moments where you feel the stars have lined up...

fokken prawns!

a woman on the street once stopped me out of the blue - she didn't even say excuse me, or hi or anything... she grabbed my shoulder and said... "call me a fokken prawn." hahah i still think it's odd

billytheinvisibledog, i'm gonna put more murdock up just cause you have that name. so awesome.

wikus was more enjoyable as a character but the schedule on d9 was insane - i worked everyday, often only sleeping 3 hours a night so i pushed myself mentally and physically as much as i could. kruger was a supporting character and i didn't have to work all the time so the schedule was easier on me.