The Ben Mulroney Show - Peter Howell on the death of Chuck Norris

Episode Date: March 25, 2026

GUEST: Peter Howell / Toronto Star Film critic If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://link.chtbl.com/bms⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Also, on youtube -- ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/@BenMulroneyShow⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Insta: ⁠⁠⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠⁠⁠ Twitter: ⁠⁠⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠⁠⁠ TikTok: ⁠⁠⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠⁠⁠ Executive Producer:  Mike Drolet Reach out to Mike with story ideas or tips at [e-mail] Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Anyone can call or text for free confidential support from a train responder any time. 988 suicide crisis helpline is funded by the government in Canada. You're listening to the Ben Mulrooney show. Yes, you are. Welcome back. And a lot of really interesting stories out of Hollywood today. And I thought, who better to speak with? On the end, it's Friday. This is typically the day that you talk about new movies coming out.

I know we did that on E-Talk back in the day. So let's welcome to the show, Peter Howell, Toronto Star, movie critic. Peter, thank you so much for joining us. Happy Friday. Happy Friday, Ben, nice to talk to you. Okay, so you know what, before we get into the serious stuff, let's talk about the movies. I went to see Project Hail Mary yesterday. I assume you've seen it.

What did you think? I've seen it. I saw it last week, yep. And your thoughts? I thought it was a lot of fun. I mean, I was expecting, well, I mean, we're considering the directors, Lord of Miller, they, they tend to be on the humorous side. So I wasn't expecting a really serious thing.

But the comparison I used was like interstellar meets fragal rock. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. It was, I was curious to see how much DNA it would share with the Martian because the source material comes from the same author. Exactly. And someone referred to it as resourcefulness porn, like this idea that someone is trapped in a pickle and by way of MacGyvering the situation, they find their way out. And that was definitely part of it. And I will say this, the trailer, Peter,

hooked me, but it did not give me anything about the story. I mean, I learned so much about why I was in the movie theater in the movie theater, which it means it's a very good trailer. Yeah, I think there's a bit of a, there might be a spoiler there. I don't know how much we can talk about another character that's in the film, but I mean, there's, there's a potentially a spoiler. But I mean, it doesn't seem to bother most people. People I've talked to who have seen the movie and who know the book, like my brother, for example, and her brother John absolutely loves the book and he loves the movie. So it's like, he wasn't. He wasn't. He wasn't It doesn't bother by that at all.

It's got to be nice, though, you know, you, you sit through all the movies, and you sit through the recycled movies and the recycled ideas and the rehashed ideas and the sequels and the thirds and the fourths and the spinoffs and the reboots and the remakes. And this is a big bold, big budget original movie, original idea at the end, you know, early on in the year. This could bode well for the future. I don't know. It could. It's a great start. I mean, like Ryan Gosling, is a fabulous actor. We've got fellow Canadian. And, you know, he carries a lot of this movie on his shoulders. I mean, Sandra Hewler's character is wonderful.

It's wonderful. Most of it's carried by Brian Gosley, and he does a fantastic job. And the last thing I'll say is, a couple of days ago, to fall asleep, I was watching the Fall Guy and his thing about the Thumbs Up as the Fall Guy is very funny. Thumbs Up comes back in this movie, too. Yeah, that's right. There's a little bit of a call back there. Yeah, he's a real guy, real talent to watch.

I love watching any movie with Ryan Gosling is going to be a good movie. Peter Howell, talk to my listeners who may know Chuck Norris from Chuck Norris jokes, but really don't know why he was famous or what he got famous for and the movies he made. Tell people if they were going to go home tonight and say, you know, I've got two hours and I want to learn a little bit about this Mr. Norris. What movie should they watch? Well, in many ways he was the action guy, the 80s. I mean, I don't know whether he'd call the 1980s a more innocent time or a more insensitive time. But it was a particular kind of movie that should have been playing at drive-ins and a lot of these were.

But I'll just give you some titles, and they basically tell you what kind of movies they were. Missing in Action, Lone Wolf McQuaid, Invasion USA, Code of Silence, the Delta Force. These are all about one man taking on an army in almost every one. And then one of these movies, Lone Wolf McQuaid from 83, he plays a Texas Ranger who takes on an arms dealer. That led to the TV series Walker, Texas Ranger, that for many of the movies. people is they know him best to the TV series. So it's funny. They're movie fans of Chuck Norse and there's TV fans. But he was one of those, those, you know, cross-medium talents that critics often didn't give him his due, but he really knew what he was doing.

Yeah. And I'll never forget in the movie Talladega Nights, the legend of Ricky Bobby. He had two sons. One was named Walker and the other was Texas Ranger. Yeah. The one movie that I think the critics sort of gave him some props for A Cod of Silence here is that great line. where he tells a guy, if I want your opinion, I'll beat it out of you. Maybe that's where the genesis of the, of the Chuck Norris joke came from. Could be.

Yeah. Well, you know, he, he didn't like having much dialogue. He actually told screenwriters not to write him too much dialogue because it was all about in the way the looks and the moves more than what he said. But he was authentic, right? Like this was, he wasn't a,

he wasn't a Stephen Seagal kind of guy who sort of pretended to be an action star. And so he actually wasn't. I mean, he was, he was an Air Force guy who was a, was a real, it was like, I don't know if he was a black belt, but he was his first movie was with Bruce Lee, the way of a dragon, his friend Bruce Lee. He was really good in martial arts. So he actually did have the skills, the skills to pay the bills.

Well, we got two, two very short clips to play of Chuck Norris. This is him and the expendables two. I heard another rumor that you were bitten by a king cobra. Yeah, I was. But after five days of agonizing pain, the cobra died. Okay. So that's where this, comes from. He was leaning into it there. Absolutely. And here's Chuck Norris telling the world about his favorite Chuck Norris fact. They wanted to put Chuck Norris' face on Mount Rushmore, but the granite wasn't hard enough for his beard. I love it. I love it. All right, let's move on to, I think, the most interesting story of the day, because I suspect we'll be talking about this more and more often, Peter. There is a new movie coming out that starring Val Kilmer.

that Val Kilmer, him personally isn't actually in. There's an AI avatar of him. And I think a lot of people will immediately get their backup and think something's wrong here. Why don't you like give us the nuance of the story? I believe the movie's called as deep as the grave. He plays a Catholic priest. And he'd agreed to do it.

And this is what I understand. He'd be agreed to do it before he died very untimely last year at age 65. And so I guess his family and the filmmakers decided to use AI to resurrect him. which on the face of it is not a great development, but I'm sure, you know, it all depends how you look at it. I mean, in the case of Val Kilmer, he couldn't talk because of his illness,

because of what he had. So a chance to come back and be in a performance, you can make an argument for that. But I'd have to say it's an unusual situation, but it does not bode well for the future in many ways. Well, you know, and I agree with you. There's some concerning stuff, but the director said he was the only guy he wanted to play him

because of his, you know, he's got a Native American heritage, which really was one of the reasons Val gravitated to the role. And so this guy really wanted to see his vision come to life. And as the director, if he got the permission from, I don't know if he got the permission from Val, but he certainly got it from his estate. You know, it could allow for those missed opportunities to be given a second chance.

And I know for, you know, for example, Peter, there was, what was it called? Oh, James Earl Jones, right? He's already said, he's told Disney that if they want to, they're paying him now for his likeness and his voice if they ever want to bring back Darth Vader. And I think that's, I mean, I kind of like actors taking control over their likeness and their person and their voice. Matthew McConaughey suggested as much to Timothy Shalome, when they were sitting down for

that long-ranging conversation where Timothy. he decided to take shots at ballet and opera. Yeah, I know. Yeah, I mean, you know, the situation here is, it's kind of like also with John Lennon, you know, he didn't get permission for the various songs to be used by the other Beatles. But I think there was so much of kind of a family involvement there. And, you know, as Paul said, you know, I felt John was giving us the song. It's hard to argue with that, right?

But I guess if you get a feeling that there's permission and there's involvement, then the use of the AI can be justified. but it would be difficult to see that people were like resurrecting Humphrey Bogart or Maryland Monroe. No, I agree. I agree. But, you know, if an actor wants to take control over their likeness and they, a lot of these guys have a lot of money, if Matthew McConaughey wanted to, he could take every single one of his performances, every one of his interviews, every one of his live performances. And he could train an AI model on just being Matthew McConaughey. and if he wanted to, he could then leverage that for the rest of his career in perpetuity.

I'm not saying it would be a great thing for Hollywood, but it would be a great thing for his family. And if he spent a lifetime building the brand of Matthew McConaughey, who's to say he's not allowed leveraging it after his death? It's true. Although you remember what Jeff Golems says in Jurassic Park, you know, just because you can do it, nobody bothered to stop and ask whether you should. My friend, I'm so glad you managed to shoehorn in some Jurassic World. By the way, is there a new Jurassic World on the horizon? I hear they're rebooting it after this last one. They didn't like how...

Yeah, I believe there is like the one with Scarlet Johansson did so well last summer that I think they're doing another one. Don't hold me to it, but I'm pretty sure there is another one. Another one in the works. All right. Well, you know what? If you put some dinosaurs on an island and some people are trying to do some stuff they're not supposed to, I will show up.

Peter Howell, the Toronto Star. Thank you very much. Please come back soon. Firefighters miss their lives every single day. Fridays on Global. We're going to get you out of here, bud. This is the greatest job in the world. An all new fire country.

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