{"id":335426,"date":"2025-12-08T18:19:17","date_gmt":"2025-12-08T18:19:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/335426\/"},"modified":"2025-12-08T18:19:17","modified_gmt":"2025-12-08T18:19:17","slug":"dwayne-johnson-and-brendan-fraser-on-the-mummy-friendship-and-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/335426\/","title":{"rendered":"Dwayne Johnson and Brendan Fraser on ‘The Mummy’ Friendship and More"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tDwayne Johnson<\/a> and Brendan Fraser<\/a> first met making \u201cThe Mummy Returns.\u201d The 2001 sequel continued Fraser\u2019s burgeoning leading-man career, but it was the first ever film role for Johnson, then better known as WWE\u2019s The Rock. In recent years, both actors have enjoyed festival acclaim (and lengthy standing ovations). \u201cRental Family,\u201d Fraser\u2019s first leading role after winning an Oscar for \u201cThe Whale\u201d in 2023, tasks the star with playing an actor in Tokyo helping people to feel human connection, and drew tears at its Toronto premiere. And \u201cThe Smashing Machine,\u201d starring Johnson as real-life MMA athlete Mark Kerr, earned tearful rounds of applause at Venice and Toronto.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tAlexi Lubomirski for Variety<\/p>\n

\n\tBrendan Fraser: Hi, Dwayne.<\/p>\n

\n\tDwayne Johnson: Good to see you, brother. I\u2019d love to start off our conversation by giving you flowers. OK? I\u2019m going to deliver a lot of flowers to your doorstep right now. You and I first connected on \u201cThe Mummy Returns.\u201d That was one of the biggest franchises in the world at that time. I was ready to make my transition into Hollywood. And there was a moment where you could have said, \u201cThis guy, Dwayne Johnson, he\u2019s never acted before; he\u2019s in pro wrestling.\u201d The word I got back was, \u201cBrendan loves the idea. He welcomed you with open arms.\u201d It meant something to me, because you took a risk on me, and years later, you and I are sitting here. I want to thank you for really changing my life.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: You\u2019re too kind, Dwayne. You were always the right guy for the job. When I was told that you were a possibility for it, forgive me, but I didn\u2019t know you from the wrestling world. And when I was shown, I said, \u201cThat is inspired casting. We\u2019d be lucky to get the guy.\u201d You need a stadium persona to play a villain you love to hate. It\u2019s going to take a lot of confidence and belief. In the wrestling world, you were painting with a 10-inch brush \u2014 you need to have big energy.<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd your paintings are getting better all the time. I\u2019ve seen \u201cThe Smashing Machine.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: I know. Thank you for all the support. This was my first foray into this level of drama, and I was running toward this opportunity. I get to the Toronto Film Festival and the film ends and the audience is clapping, and we\u2019re getting whisked onstage. Who was right there, and actually stepped in the line of traffic to stop me? It was you, with the biggest smile and the biggest hug.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: You nailed it, dude. You got me in the feels. Not only the physical pain, which was formidable \u2014 and I know Dwayne\u2019s a big, strong guy, but hard knocks hurt \u2014 but that\u2019s not the real pain that you had in that role.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: That\u2019s right.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: That guy was accustomed to getting hurt. It\u2019s what he did for a living, right? But the real pain was the emotional stuff.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: The insides.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: Do you ever feel like, \u201cIt\u2019s OK, you can throw me off the back of a moving vehicle or light me on fire or knock the crap out of me all afternoon; just don\u2019t say anything mean to me, because that\u2019ll really hurt.\u201d That\u2019s the vulnerability. I understand what it\u2019s like to be the guy who\u2019s not allowed to show that pain.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: You do know that.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: To a lesser degree, I\u2019m sure, than yourself. But look, we\u2019re human. And at the end of the day, you\u2019re going to need an ice bag, maybe a cup of chamomile tea and someone to kiss you on the forehead and say it\u2019s going to be OK.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: Brendan, you\u2019re a big guy. You\u2019re a very big man. And there\u2019s a big presence to you, where for years, you weren\u2019t allowed to reveal it. When was the turning point where you went, \u201cYou know what? I want to perform now for an audience of one \u2014 for me.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: There comes a point where you fall apart. And I guess around 2007 or \u201908 or \u201909, around there, I was doing a movie in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario \u2014 it was a low-budget thing, and we were rolling around in streams and off of mountains, making stuff up as we go along. And I was playing hurt but pretending that I wasn\u2019t. The movie ended and I thought, \u201cI\u2019m getting too old for this shit. It\u2019s starting to catch up with me. If I\u2019m going to continue, I have to have a real reckoning with myself about why I am getting banged around and bruised.\u201d I had to actually ask myself a serious question that I\u2019d been avoiding: Why am I doing this? I had to take ownership of the reason, and that was [that] I was trying too hard.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: Yes.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: I was feeling like, unless it hurts, then I\u2019m not earning my keep. That idea is what I saw in your work in \u201cThe Smashing Machine,\u201d because we feel for the supposedly invulnerable titan. But how do you bring them down with just a minor injury that takes them apart? Not allowing oneself to be vulnerable publicly \u2014 the stoicism seems harder than the loss. That was when I went, \u201cOh, man, Dwayne, you\u2019ve done it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: There\u2019s this great quote from Floyd Patterson, who was this heavyweight. I\u2019m paraphrasing here, but he says, \u201cWhen you win, what a walk going back to the locker room! You take it all in. But if you lose,\u201d he goes, \u201cMan, I wish there was a trap door in the ring, where I could just fall into the earth and disappear and never have to do that again.\u201d There was a connection to my life \u2014 things could be so loud and noisy in our world, but at the same time, we can feel lonely. We can feel alone.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: Loneliness is a public health concern, I believe. In \u201cRental Family\u201d \u2026<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: You deal with that, right? With loneliness?<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: The character, Philip, does deal with that. He\u2019s got such solitude in such a busy, populous place. You\u2019ve been to Tokyo, and you know it\u2019s a beehive of activity. But the instances of suicides and people bereft of connection are too high. And that\u2019s why a \u201crental family\u201d agency exists and did since the 1980s. Seriously \u2014 there\u2019s like 300 agencies. People feel a need for connection in a meaningful way, even if it\u2019s make-believe. Even if it\u2019s only for a little while and you\u2019re paying for it. Loneliness seems like a simple enough thing to ameliorate, but until you really feel it, you\u2019re not going to know exactly what it can do to you.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tAlexi Lubomirski for Variety<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: You just have to feel it and experience it. Right. You provided peace \u2014 that peace is something we all look for. One of the moments that rocked me was Kikuo, the character in the film, an older gentleman\u2014<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: Akira Emoto-san is [the actor\u2019s] name.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: He\u2019s a legend.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: He\u2019s like the Japanese Ian McKellen.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: How is he to work with?<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: Incredible. He has his own theater, a black-box theater in Tokyo, and he lives on the floor above. Every morning at eight a.m., he has a free performance that he gives \u2014 of anything. He\u2019ll read something from a play, or some piece of obscure text. One morning I went, he was reading this 15th-century shogun\u2019s shopping list.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: Wow.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: A certain amount of bushels of wheat, and the peasants are acting up again \u2014 and he\u2019s performing it in this classical form of Japanese that even Japanese people are going, \u201cWhat did he say?\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: Was there a different tone and intonation?<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: I don\u2019t know enough about the language, but it\u2019s the difference between you and I speaking right now and \u201cHenry V.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: You feel his power onscreen. I loved the relationship between you two. And I\u2019m dealing with dementia in our family, so I loved this idea that you want to create this moment for him, even if he\u2019s going to forget it, to give him this peace, take him home. What you say to him rocked me, because it\u2019s what I said to my dad. It\u2019s your version of \u201cI\u2019ll see you again, my friend.\u201d It just moved me. I was getting emotional \u2014 I was crying! And I loved the relationship you had with the little girl.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: Shannon [Mahina] Gorman is her name. Her mother is Japanese, her father is Irish. And that\u2019s the dynamic of who she is written to be \u2014 because she\u2019s the daughter of a single mother. Whoever her father is, he\u2019s just not in the picture. But he was Caucasian. So she feels trapped between worlds.<\/p>\n

\n\tShannon showed up to the rehearsal with an explanation of what it felt like to be made to feel other. She said, \u201cI\u2019ve been bullied.\u201d And that can be biting, because you\u2019re not \u201cJapanese enough.\u201d Or you\u2019re not \u201cwhite enough.\u201d She showed up at this movie with all of this emotional bandwidth. It was so available, that we had to stop rehearsing, because we didn\u2019t want to play our game in the locker room.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: Yes. Go out on the field.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: \u201cJust point the camera at the kid and we\u2019re good! Just give Brendan a Red Bull.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: The movie\u2019s amazing, but the conceit of it is so unique and different. How did the script come to you?<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tAlexi Lubomirski for Variety<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: I was just looking for a job, man. It\u2019s all in the title: \u201cRental Family\u201d? Insert pejorative, cheeky joke here. But it piques your interest. And that\u2019s what this director, Hikari, embraces. She goes toward the prickly side of what that could mean, along with the softer side. The movie lives in between \u2014 it\u2019s not cynical. I needed to find something like that.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: Why did you need something like that? I\u2019m curious.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: It was before the Oscars. I saw the script first before the Oscars. Not that that changed \u2014 believe me, it doesn\u2019t change much of anything.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: You still would\u2019ve done it, right?<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: Yes, absolutely. But I\u2019m still the same guy. I was looking for a job, and I wanted something that was out of the ordinary. I wanted to not jump into something splashy and huge. I wanted to be challenged by working with what I\u2019ve got.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: After your Oscar win, did you feel anything shift? Did it allow you to look at things maybe a little deeper, or look at material differently? Did it give you a different kind of desire to challenge yourself?<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: I think of it two ways. On the one hand, \u201cYou better earn this. You got the brass ring but be worthy of it going forward. Uphold the standard if you can.\u201d But also, I felt like I don\u2019t have anything to prove. But that doesn\u2019t mean I\u2019m going to just coast.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: It\u2019s not like you\u2019re not hungry.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: If anything, I feel like I have to work.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: Hungrier. When I saw you win \u2014 and I\u2019ve known you a long time \u2014 I thought, \u201cOh, if you think he\u2019s not going to be hungry anymore, that is not him. You\u2019ve made him hungrier.\u201d And then, the idea of, \u201cHey, you\u2019ve got to be worthy of this.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: Like you, I\u2019m in it for the long haul. Most actors, the secret is, we would be doing this whether they paid us or not. I love it. And you have to take ownership of who you are, what you\u2019re capable of, and have the courage to continue.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: You brought up the idea of \u201cI felt like I didn\u2019t need to prove anything anymore\u201d? Had you felt that before \u2014<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: I had everything to prove. I knew I was a capable actor, and I had plenty of bumps in the road along the way, but that\u2019s just the way it goes. And maybe it was a perfect storm of when \u201cThe Whale\u201d was shot: It was during COVID. It was one room. It was a man encumbered by a health condition that caused his body to be so overweight that he was confined to a single place. What Darren Aronofsky directed was a movie that made us all feel \u2014 because it was when we were all locked down \u2014 that we were all under existential threat. This might be the last time we ever get to do this.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: So it had that energy.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: \u201cIf I\u2019m going to do this, I\u2019m going to go down swinging. I\u2019m going to give it everything I\u2019ve got.\u201d When I finished, I felt like, \u201cWell, I am all out of moves. If it doesn\u2019t land, I guess I\u2019ll crack open the Yellow Pages and go look for a marketing job or something. I really don\u2019t know what the hell I\u2019m doing.\u201d And that was the first time in my career that I felt like I left it all out there.<\/p>\n

\n\tI owe you a debt of gratitude because when I took \u201cThe Whale\u201d with Darren and the crew to Venice, and they applauded for a very long time and stayed on their feet \u2014 I\u2019d never been there before. I didn\u2019t know the whole ritual of it.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: I was in tears when I watched you.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: I know! And you put your shoulder into that by showing your support through Twitter. Dwayne, you\u2019re a godfather of sorts of the success of that project. Thank you for that.<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: Look, I\u2019m happy to support you. But also, that moment rocked me and it moved me. I had not experienced Venice until \u201cSmashing Machine.\u201d I\u2019ve watched it from afar. And then I see this long applause for you. You\u2019re emotional; I\u2019m emotional watching you get emotional. But I felt such joy for you because I felt like that\u2019s what you work for. The other stuff that comes our way \u2014 if it does well, great. If it flops, OK, we move on. But that ceremonial applause for something that you ripped yourself open and you went elsewhere \u2014 I was so happy for my friend and even more inspired. I want to do that. I want to find that role.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: I felt like I was in an out-of-body experience. It felt like the fulfillment of a dream I would never have admitted to having. What happened when the shoe was on the other foot with the reception for \u201cThe Smashing Machine\u201d? Where did it take you?<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: I was living my dream; not others\u2019 dreams. These other projects, which I love doing, there\u2019s a lot of other entities connected to them. \u201cSmashing Machine\u201d was just me, Benny Safdie and Emily Blunt. That was my exhale. I felt like I\u2019d never exhaled like that in my career. Like, Wow. We did it.<\/p>\n

\n\tFraser: Did you compare it to everything you\u2019ve done prior? I found myself thinking, \u201cAll right, for all these movies I made, some might\u2019ve been crap, some were good, [but] all of them brought you to this point.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tJohnson: That\u2019s right. Every single thing I\u2019ve done has led to this moment.<\/p>\n

\n\tThis is a conversation from Variety and CNN\u2019s Actors on Actors<\/a>. To watch the full video, go to\u00a0CNN\u2019s streaming platform<\/a>\u00a0now. Or check out Variety\u2019s YouTube page at 3 p.m. ET today.<\/p>\n

\t\tProduction: Emily Ullrich; Agency: Nevermind Agency\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dwayne Johnson and Brendan Fraser first met making \u201cThe Mummy Returns.\u201d The 2001 sequel continued Fraser\u2019s burgeoning leading-man…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":335427,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[187065,64,63,40395,77084,134,344],"class_list":{"0":"post-335426","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-actors-on-actors","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-brendan-fraser","12":"tag-dwayne-johnson","13":"tag-entertainment","14":"tag-movies"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=335426"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335426\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/335427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=335426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=335426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=335426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}