George Romero is very good at doing press tours. Plenty of websites have claim to "exclusive" interviews, but his message is usually the same. So here's a few tidbits from several sites that perhaps will be new to some or at least are covered in every single interview out there.
Romero told Icon vs. Icon about what it's like on the Survival set.
It was great man. Everybody came to play. I’m not a tyrant. I’m not a dictator. I prefer collaboration. This film was really a collaborative effort on everybody’s part. It was just wonderful. The cast was great. We had terrible conditions. This was the second time that this happened to me. I did a film called Knightriders and we were supposed to shoot for sixty days or something like that. Because of weather… We had a tornado that tore the set apart. Everything happened that could possibly happen. The whole cast and crew was just pulling for the goal post. Everybody stuck with it. Nobody complained. This film was exactly the same way. We had unbelievably bad weather and it seemed like everything was against us, but everybody on the whole cast and crew said, “We’ve got to get this done,” and we did somehow. That’s a wonderful thing. It’s really great. It brings a tear to your eye. [laughs]
Romero also talked about using unknown actors.
Listen, when I made Land of The Dead, it was made by an independent producer but Universal got involved way at the beginning. The insisted on stars because the budget was bigger. I don’t think it was necessary because I think that it is more interesting and adds a little more tension when you don’t know the stars and they don’t bring any baggage with them. Kenneth Welsh who plays Patrick O’Flynn in this films has a very recognizable face. He has been around for ever and has done a lot of American film and television but he is not a household name and isn’t currently in the press. He is no Brad Pitt in that regard! [laughs] I think baggage comes when you have that celebrity. It was a great honor to work with Dennis Hopper and John Leguizamo. It was a great personal pleasure but I don’t think that celebrity is necessary in a zombie film.
Romero talked about running zombies to New York Magazine.
I think the idea of speed comes from video games. I’ve seen it in the Blade movies with vampires, and certainly Zack [Snyder]’s remake. I just did a talk show about Left for Dead 2, the video game, and they’re just coming at you like mosquitoes; it’s crazy. But I guess the gamer mentality is that it’s not threatening unless they’re all over you and you don’t have time to react. I think the films that are using that are responding to or copying those video games. And I’ve seen zombies in this game where they were bouncing around and crawling on the ceiling. I mean, is this supernatural suddenly? Give me a break. That’s just not my kind of zombie. If they tried to move that quickly their ankles would snap.
Romero also discussed whether he would ever have zombie animals.
I actually did write a sequence [with zombie rats] for Land of the Dead, which we abandoned because it became too expensive. But I don’t know. [Laughs.] I’m thinking about it.
Romero talked about why he works in Canada to Black Book.
I didn’t do it to be an ex-patriot. Some people think I did it to run away from the Bush administration. I wish I could say it was political but it wasn’t. I made all my early films in Pittsburgh with friends and people we all grew up together with. We all worked on Mr. Rogers. I was just used to that semi sort of casual relationship with real collaborators. Then all of a sudden in Pittsburgh, more and more films started to shoot there. There was one 400 million dollar year, and then Hollywood moved on and discovered St. Louis or something. Many of my buddies left, they followed the money to L.A., New York, Chicago, wherever it was happening. And we went to Toronto. It’s a long story.
Romero also talked a bit more about the rumors that he will direct a remake of Dario Argento's Deep Red.
I don’t know how these things get out. How do you leak this? I thought it was private conversations because it all has been since now. Somebody’s leaked this. We’re talking about it.
Dario basically was one of the producers on Dawn of the Dead, he was the first money in on it and then we did a film called Two Evil Eyes where he did a one-hour thing and I did a one-hour thing. They were two Poe stories that we updated. I’ve known him for years. His daughter was in Land of the Dead, so we’ve done a lot of hanging out. It’s been fun, but I don’t know if this is going to happen, it’s a little premature.
Argento mentioned at the Weekend of Horrors that it wasn't happening. To read more from Romero, head here, here, and here.
Survival of the is currently playing in limited release and will debut on DVD August 24.
