Interview with Jeremy Renner & Elizabeth Olsen about Captain America Civil War

In honor of our Captain America Civil War interviews, our group of 25 bloggers divided into two teams – #TeamCap and #TeamIronMan. We had shirts made with these on them and a lot of us wore them to the interviews. When Elizabeth and Jeremy walked in to the interview, they looked us over and Elizabeth said “A lot of Stark shirts in the audience” and Jeremy added “We’re gonna have a problem.” Since they are both on #TeamCap this really made us all laugh. No one would want to go up against these two in character – because they rock! Scarlet Witch and Hawkeye are two of the favs and so this was a fun interview. I am a huge fan of Jeremy Renner and have been for many many years. It was fabulous meeting him in real life and hearing him talk about Captain America and the Marvel super hero world. Elizabeth Olsen is so sweet and happy, and it was perfect to interview these two together about the movie.

Jeremy asked us if we had seen the movie. Of course we were able to see a pre-screening of it before the interviews, and I still can’t get over how good it is (like 3 weeks later). We told him we had seen it and he told us that he hadn’t seen it yet! They joked around saying something about how they guess they didn’t get cut from the film if they made it this far. 🙂 They later mentioned that they would see it at the London or New York premiers. Then they jokingly say that they will be done with the press by the time they actually see it.

Since Marvel has changed things up from the comics and done their own interpretation of the characters, we wanted to know what Jeremy thought about the difference in his character on screen as opposed to the comic books. One of the biggest things is that Hawkeye is mostly deaf in the comic books. We asked him how he would feel about them introducing that into the Marvel cinematic Universe? Jeremy answered “I keep hearing about that, you know. It isn’t really kinda played out at this point, and not unless we say he’s got an amazing hearing aid or something…” (this said with a smile). Elizabeth chimes in with “Right. Or maybe, like, you get to- explosion.” Jeremy continues with “It wasn’t part of the conversation. We were focused much more on the alternate sort version of not the big purple mask sort of guy, you know. So he’s much of the utility sort of guy. So yeah they talked about that, but I don’t think it’s gonna play anytime- things are a little late.”

The Captain America: Civil War movie is packed with action from beginning to end. In fact, there is so much action that we wanted to know how much was the actors and how much was stuntmen. We asked them if they could tell us about the stunts and how much they did. Elizabeth told us “I think we do as many stunts as we can, and then they, a lot of times, take a second crew out, or they’ll film things when we’ve already been wrapped from the movie, when they’re in Germany, and they might do stuff then. But, but when we’re there, we do everything.” This blew me away. So many of the things that happen in the movie just leaves me in awe that they actors do that. You can tell because they are so much more invested in their character. Jeremy adds “Yeah, we just do it all. It’s almost just practical stuff. I don’t do CGI. It happens outside the arrows, you know, [when I] fire an arrow because it’s gotta go somewhere, right?” We were all laughing at this picturing the arrows he shoots going wild, and he adds “You know, into the cameraman.” We all busted up. What a funny thing to say, when it was what we were all probably picturing! He has a great sense of humor. Jeremy finishes up by saying “yeah, it’s all- I’ll give you most- ninety-nine percent of the script.”

As if that wasn’t enough, he goes on to tell us “This is fun- if I couldn’t, then the odd part- this would be a boring job.” I can imagine Jeremy who does so well with the action character would get a little board if he couldn’t do his own stunts and get into the character that way. Elizabeth adds “Also, I don’t like having a stunt person do what I do, anyway. If they have to mesh, like, a move because it’s not like a roll, or a fall.”

Jeremy told us “There’s one flip or something  and I couldn’t do it, so my stunt double did – he’s badass.” I imagine that anyone doing a double for Jeremy would have to be to match his personality and on screen presence. Elizabeth finishes by telling us “Yeah. I need to get better at wirework, I think, for the next one, and flying.”. This personally leaves me super excited for “the next one”. I love the Marvel movies and also am happy that they are something I can share with my kids. We also love sitting down together watching them.

Elizabeth Olsen does a fantastic job as Scarlet Witch. She stepped into the Marvel world – into a relatively big role, and is filling it perfectly. We wanted to know a little more about her back story and what inspired her to do the role of the Scarlet Witch. Elizabeth tells us “A few things. I was already a fan of Ironman and Avengers. I saw it with my dad when I working in Servia; it was about the second time seeing it, and it was just came to Servia, and I loved it. And then when I told my older brother who loves comics and knows- Z’s the person who can guess where everything’s going, and he’s right, somehow. I told him I was meeting with Joss, but I didn’t know what character it was gonna be, and Joss started explaining to me who the Scarlet Witch was, and he also said, when you look at the comics, just know you will not look like that. I will not put you in a leotard, and cape, and a head cast.” This made us all laugh. I personally am glad that they didn’t because it makes her more identifiable to my kids, like someone they can relate to as a real person struggling with this. Elizabeth continues “And then I started reading more about her journey, and I found the fact that her mind is the only thing that limits her and the ever possibility of this kind of insanity and being able to manipulate reality- that it even throws- that she can manipulate her own reality, those kinds of things, to me, really cool. I didn’t know when they would come into play, or if they will, and I still hope we play around more with that part of her. I just think she’s a really cool character, and it’s a lot of opportunity for storytelling.”

We couldn’t agree more. Scarlet Witch plays a big part in the comics because of her powers and I think Elizabeth Olsen rocks the part.

I love the way they have developed Hawkeye’s character and I think Jeremy Renner is the perfect fit for it. He does such a great job. In fact he is such a natural with the bow and that wondered if he was a bow hunter “in real life” and what experience he has with them? Does he have to train? Jeremy told us “I do not. I didn’t do any extra training. Every time, it’s a different sort of setup, with the bow and what’s happening with the tech and stuff. On this one, the quiver’s different. Sometimes they could snap out and they put a different tip on the bottom. The same gear- different tips.”

I love being able to be part of these interviews. It is so fun to get to know the people who play the characters as well as learn about what it was like behind the scenes. Even thought there is a lot of action in the movie, there is also a lot of humor, and I wanted to know if they were able to improv, or was that just something they wrote into the script?

Jeremy told us (but he looked at me for a lot of his answer…yum….since I asked the question) “Yeah, yeah, the Russo brothers were great. They’d always have, like, alt lines for certain things and these sort of one-liners, and then they just let you kind of run with a bunch of different things, so I have no idea what makes a cut, even when we did ADR, I can’t remember…you still did alt lines. Yeah, we’re always- and then they’ll pull it back, like, right, let’s just go- role this series and they just wanna have options, for tone and then pace and that sort of thing. Yeah, that was probably the funnest part of the job was- improvising- that was fun, you know.”

I can imagine getting this cast together and letting them have some freedom to the script for improv. I am sure they had so much fun! I would love to see some of the footage from that!

Because the movie is so intense, the question of whether or not there was any real-life tension between the actors? Elizabeth and Jeremy told us there was not. They said there was a lot of laughing (which I can totally see), and that there was a lot of jokes and inappropriate humor. Jeremy added “Yeah, everyone’s got a good attitude about it when we’re doing [the movie]”. Elizabeth went on to tell us “I mean, like, Paul Bettany who is in such an uncomfortable costume and he’s sweating through these prosthetic’s, and he can’t take them off, and he’s so miserable, and he is still one of the funniest people on set. I think everyone just has a good attitude. No one- we don’t really, like, if we complain, we complain and laugh about it, and move on because it’s- you can’t complain about it. It’s a really awesome job.” I have to second that! What a great job. And they do an amazing job at it!

After hearing them talk about how great it was to film to movie and how much fun they had, we wanted to hear a funny story or something that happened on set while they were working together. Elizabeth tells us “One of my favorites is you, me, and Paul filming that sequence just because it was so funny.” as she points to Jeremy. He then clarifies by asking “Oh, when you sent him down into the earth?” Elizabeth continues with “Yeah. Because that’s really odd to film when you have two not so practical powers of actors, and you had Jeremy who’s a practical fighter as what- for his hero.”

Jeremy then makes a hand motion similar to the one of Elizabeth in the picture above and says “I’m watching you, like, do this…” and him and Elizabeth play back and forth with this for a minute, and then she adds “Yeah. And Paul’s sent, like” and she does another funny pose. This was fun to watch and see them kind of reenacting what happened in the movie. They told us it was four in the morning when they were filming that scene. Elizabeth adds “And I’m, like, as sincerely and genuinely as possible trying to make him, a thousand tons, you know? And shove him down to the center of the Earth.” Jeremy told us “We cut, and we had to start laughing.”

Because the Scarlet Witch’s powers are more “CGI” than something she can physically do, we wanted to know if it is hard for her to translate those on screen? Elizabeth tells us “It’s weird. Yeah. It’s definitely weird. I love it. I grew up dancing, so for me, this is, like, some weird choreography that I get to meet with someone who’s actually a very talented dancer and choreography, and she and I have become good friends. And we actually geek out over it, and we’ll, like, send each other videos of- oh, you know, that bit where you have to, like, throw debris at this person? Like, maybe we can get debris from here and swing it this way, and we just think of all these different ways of how to use the movement. And we hope that it all, like, continues to evolve and grow as she does and understands her powers more. But I love it. I look like an idiot on set, but in my mind, I feel cool” We all laughed – since we know she looks AMAZING in the movies. She finishes by telling us “Hopefully, it looks like I’m doing something”.

Jeremy Renner is so funny. It was fun interviewing him about #CaptainAmericaCivilWar. #TeamCap #captainamericaevent #jeremyrenner #superhero #heroes #family #fun #marvel #marvelcomics #ironman #captainamerica #travel #interview #hawkeye #captainamerica #smile #happy

A photo posted by Coralie Seright (@coralieseright) on Apr 11, 2016 at 5:20pm PDT

I personally love Hawkeye (and it is also really cool that my hubby’s name is Clint and loves to bow hunt 😉 ) and would love to hear his back story and learn more about him. We asked him how he would feel if they came out with a movie just about Hawkeye?

Jeremy answered us with a smart aleck remark saying “That’s above my paygrade. For me, I think there’s a lot to explore. To go back a bit and learn about the circus and all that sort of thing and understand, like, how or why and what- just the, the reason to do it. There’s gotta be a reason- not just throw it out there. But yeah, I do, I love the character. I’m always willing to do it- explore it more, until they kill me.” In the comics, Hawkeye is killed off and brought back a few times, so if they do kill him off, they have to bring him back! 🙂

Elizabeth adds “Or until you’re fifty and tired.”
Jeremy responds with “Until I’m fifty, yeah. Don’t wait too long, man. No one wants to see that. Old man in tights.”
As we are all laughing at this funny back and forth, Elizabeth chimes in again with “That’s what he’d keep saying all day. He’s old in tights. It worked well for Mel Brooks and everyone in that movie.”

These two are so funny together! I am glad they have screen time together in Civil War. They are part of a great team!

As we are waiting for the next Marvel movie to come out, we wanted to know what Jeremy and Elizabeth are working on in the meantime. Elizabeth told us they are filming a movie together right now. After a little digging I found out the name of the movie is called Wind River and will be released next year. They are filming the movie in Park City, Utah right now. (this is cool for me since I live in Salt Lake City – about 20 miles away). She said “Yeah, we’re chasing the snow up there because, it takes place on an Indian reservation that is in Wyoming- the elements and the weather is kind of the antagonist in this story. So we were just chasing blizzards and snow, and we have two more weeks left.” Jeremy added “Like, we were twelve thousand feet two days ago.” That is crazy to think of.  Elizabeth continues “Yeah. It’s a fun job, and it’s fun to get to work with each other in a totally different way.”

It was then asked if Jeremy had ever been offered a role and turned it down, and then ended up regretting it. I LOVE what his reply was…

“Never. Never. Yeah. I’m always happy with the decisions I’m making, so yeah, no regrets, ever, with anything in life- even when I make a mistake- do something wrong. As long as you learn and grow from it- that’s all that matters.” – Jeremy Renner

Without giving to much away, I am sure you have noticed that Black Widow is on Iron Man’s Team, and Hawkeye is on Captain America’s team. We wanted to know if it was difficult to change the dynamic that you have with Black Widow from the previous movie to this movie?

Jeremy told us “Yeah, I suppose there’s always different things that they serve up from the first time we’re together. Because there’s a lot of history with those characters, so I guess I can kinda go off and do whatever but I like working with Scarlett [Johansson] and I love that character of Widow. She’s a badass and her character and herself. I just wish there was more. I love working with that character. I think they have a really good history together and a lot of secrets. And it’s a good family, sort of familial thing, and then it’s kinda happening with Scarlett Witch, as well, and a sort of familial kind of a thing.

We were able to take a photo with Jeremy and Elizabeth. They are so nice and it was a great experience! If you haven’t seen the trailer yet (or if you have it’s always worth watching again) – check it out below…

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CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR OPENS IN THEATERS EVERYWHERE ON MAY 6TH!

This trip is sponsored by Marvel, Disney Channel & ABC. This does not affect my opinions and they are 100% my own