EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: Talking about ANT-MAN with Corey Stoll AKA Yellow Jacket

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Disclosure: This event and trip to LA was an all expense paid journey sponsored by Disney. All thoughts, experiences, opinions and character crushes are 100% my own!

Talking about ANT-MAN with Corey Stoll

Last month, I travelled to LA to attend a press junket with 24 other bloggers for the film ANT-MAN. This included a press screening of the film, and a sit down interview with cast members. Last week, I shared my interview with ANT-MAN stars Paul Rudd & Evangeline Lilly along with my interview with Michael Douglas. Just a few days ago, I shared my interview with the “ANTourage” threesome of Michael Pena, T.I. and David Dastmalchian.

Today, I am bringing you my interview with Corey Stoll. Corey plays Darren Cross (aka Yellowjacket) and he is the guy that you will love to dis-like in this film. Corey is probably most known for his role U.S. Representative Peter Russo in the first season of the drama series House of Cards. Corey is a big guy. He definitely catches your attention when he walks into a room, and he will certainly catch your attention with his villain-y antics in ANT-MAN.

How was it playing this villain? 

Corey: It was not hard at all.  My first day of shooting was sort of a microcosm of what the whole shoot would be: where in the morning we did motion capture, totally abstract, just stunts and you know, it was like being in a silent film where you run this way and then duck and then pick up a toy train and throw it and it was just, you know, pure play.  That was really fun and then the afternoon there was a very quiet scene with Michael Douglas where I show up at his house unannounced and it’s our really most sort of intense scene.

It was just such a great way to start because there are these two extremes of what this role would be. It was just fun. I think as we went on, there was a lot of work with Peyton trying to calibrate. I want to make sure this character is scary but I also love what a Loser he was. He’s the least cool guy in the World. He wants to be Tony Stark. He wants to be the coolest guy in the world. He’s puffing himself up with these Tom Ford Suits and driving an Aston Martin… but he knows that he’s not that guy. That’s the irony, he’s trying to buff himself up in the end to impress this father figure and it’s exactly the opposite of what a father figure wants. I mean I think the script was really smart about giving very real, playable motivations.

Were you always a Comic Book Fan?

Corey: I was really into Comic Books, starting with the real Super Hero Marvel Comic Books and then getting into some sort of darker stuff but, I mean Spiderman, X-Men and all that stuff.

Who’s your favorite?

Corey: You know, he really bounced around but I would definitely say this about Spiderman. He was just the guy that I think that as a High School Student that you could identify with the most. Um, and just, then also just the New Yorkness. You know, I never really, you know, I liked Batman and I mean, and Superman but they were all in these sort of fictional Cities and uh, Spiderman was New York. You know, as a kid from Queens, the idea, you know, that fantasy of being able to swing through the – the buildings that I see every day was really cool.

Let’s talk about the suit

Corey: I did two separate trips down to Atlanta just to try on different versions of the suit and it just never looked right. And I remember the first time I tried it on, everybody was trying to convince themselves that it looked cool. It’s gonna be great, just a little computer generated imagery here and there, it’s going to look great. And in the end, I just felt like a Power Ranger. So and luckily, you know, smarter heads prevailed and they just did it with computer generated imagery instead.

How do you feel about it now?

Corey: I think it’s awesome. I’m so excited about the way it works. I was there, I know I wasn’t wearing something but you look at it, it really looks real. It’s really amazing.

And the big sort of climax scene in the Feature’s Vaults, where I have sort of lured Hank Penn and Hope in order to deliver my big villain monologue and all that. I would say it was several days, maybe 3 days shooting that scene. It was an endurance feat because there were so many people in that scene. We really felt like we were sort of trapped in that room for a long time. But, it was just really fun to have that license to just be that big sort of Bond villain, you know?

Is there something good in Yellow Jacket that you relate to?

You know, when he is first selling the Yellow Jacket and this technology, we sort of brainstormed about what would be the beneficial applications of this technology and you realize that this actually could save the world. You know, there’s so many things you could do: you could ship — you could get a shipping container down to the side of a Volkswagen Bug, you know, and shipping cost would be like nothing.

Carbon emissions could become a smaller, or you could maybe like shrink smoke as it comes out of a coal powered planet or you could shrink down a surgeon and do micro-surgery. It really is like this incredibly utopian thing. I think there is that element in Darrin that’s like he wants to change the world for the better. It’s just that this military application has to be the most lucrative, you know?

He just made the wrong choice. Having Michael Douglas be the person playing the father figure, that was very easy to sort of identify with wanting to get this approval. And as a younger actor, I would like his approval.

Corey on wanting to play a character in a MARVEL film:

I had a general meeting with the Executives at Marvel years ago. That was the first thing I said: I want to play a Villain.

Make sure to go see ANT-MAN when it hits theaters July 17th!!

Check out this exclusive ANT-MAN sneak peek:

Make sure to follow all of the ANT-MAN excitement in social media:

ANT-MAN Website and Mobile site

Like ANT-MAN on Facebook

Follow ANT-MAN on Twitter

AND … a very, very special thank you to the folks at Disney for this wonderful and once in a life time opportunity that I will NEVER forget!