Jono, Ben & Megan - The Podcast - We talk to Eric Bana!

Episode Date: February 12, 2024

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The Hits, with the Jono and Ben podcast. Thanks to Challenge, putting the service back into service stations. New movie out at the moment, it's called Force of Nature, The Dry 2. It stars Hollywood superstar Eric Banner. None of you have been honest with me about what happened out there. It's a whodunit set in the Australian bush. It's the sequel to the first movie, The Dry 1. And it's starring, of course, Eric Banner,

who joins us right now. Good morning. Thanks for having me on. Hey, well, it's good for us to talk to Empire Magazine's 61st sexiest movie star in 2007. That was you. 61st? Wait till I tell Mum.

She's going to be devastated. Still top 100. Still top 100, though. If you say so. Hey, congratulations on this movie uh force of nature the dry too it's very cool it's a very cool whodunit series you've done so you've got such a huge body of work and you've been making movies for so long do you still enjoy it as much as you did when you first started oh yeah i mean in some ways even more because you just realize how

how lucky you are and and i love working with different people and i love being on location yeah you sort of have a have a different appreciation for different parts of it as you get older as well i think and i love working with young actors that are just starting out that's always really exciting and they're annoyingly bloody good all the time and i can't give them any tips because i feel like they're better um so no it's it's great well this one though was filmed in the bush, which looked a little bit like New Zealand. I'm suspicious it actually was New Zealand.

But anyway, we'll go with Australia. But weren't there leeches, hypothermia? There was a whole lot for you to have to deal with. There was, yeah, but it was also really beautiful. I didn't get any leeches. I don't know if they're, like, blood-type sensitive, but I got really lucky but our director caught one up the nose actually one day and what do you do then what do you do with

the leech up your nose how do you get rid of that get a zippo and light it and stick it up there um how did you manage to get hugh jackman's ex-wife deborah lee furnish she hasn't done any acting for like 10 years and you managed to get her onto this. What was the drawcard for her? Deb and I have been friends forever. So I met Deb through my wife, you know, close to 30 years ago. Deb was the first person recommended and we just thought, oh my God, she'll be perfect,

but will she do it? So it was just all out of salt by myself and the director, Rob. We just, you you know emailed her called her and said Deb you got to read this and she read it and was in straight away you pulled out the 30-year friendship card did you oh yeah absolutely whatever it takes because I knew it wasn't going to be a comfortable shoe I just didn't tell her what's the return of your character as well because obviously in the first movie now for the role of Chopper there's a story going around that when you play chopper you had to eat junk food for four weeks to put on like 30 pounds did you have to do anything like this for this character or is it a bit easy in comparison

no no no not nothing at all for this character other than try and stay warm and dry up which i managed to do for most of the film but i don't want to give give too much away did you actually cut your ears off for the role of Chopper? Yeah, they've grown back which no one said they would but here they are today. How do you, you know, you're a massive deal especially for Aussie in New Zealand. How do you stay grounded?

Do you find the Aussies bring you back down to earth? I don't think about it too much. I've always lived here so I don't really, I can't really compare it to another culture. But I've always had a really easy time here, to be honest. And when you're here all the time, you're not much of a novelty. So I don't really feel it in the same way that probably some other people do when they sort of come and go and people get excited.

Like people are dead sick of seeing me at the supermarket, you know? Dave Chappelle says fame disappears with familiarity. Oh, that's great. That is so true. That is absolutely true. I definitely agree with that. Eric Banner's buddy at meat week again at the supermarket. We've got Eric Banner with us.

He is in the movies right now. Force of Nature, The Dry 2. Eric, you've done so many amazing movies. We wanted to put you quickly on the spot with a character assassination game. Can you remember the names of the characters you played in a couple of the movies? Your character name. Can we throw out special correspondence with Ricky Gervais? What was your character's name?

Oh, what was his first name? Was it, oh my God. You've got me. Straight away. You've got me straight away you've got me you can't even yeah frank frank you played frank frank yeah you're a friend yes a character that'll live on your heart forever it was a great movie that one okay lucky you with drew barrymore yes huck yeah okay the time traveler's wife with rachel mcadams. Henry de Tambo. Yeah. Funny People with Adam Sandler. It was Clark. Yeah, well done.

You played alongside Brad Pitt and Troy. Hector. Yeah. You voiced the character in Finding Nemo. Yes, I'm the Hammerhead Shark anchor. Yeah, well done. Nice. I feel like, am I going for like 10 grand here?

Is the amount of money going up for every time I get this right? Who wants to be a Banyanier? Yeah, you got the first one wrong. So unfortunately, these don't count for anything. Let's go two more. The Castle. Con, the kickboxing account. Yeah, and finally, Force of Nature, the dry two.

You should get this one right. Ooh, what if I got that wrong? Imagine that. Aaron Ford. Eric Banner, thank you so much for your time. Lovely meeting you and is this your email address

is the final that we've joined in here on the Zoom link I don't know I'd say it's probably someone from roadshows but you can send

Stan to them go for it