The Ricochet Podcast - CPAC #21: Kevin "Hercules" Sorbo

Episode Date: February 28, 2015

Our final podcast and the highlight of CPAC: National Review’s Jim Geraghty talks to actor Kevin Sorbo about his new film “Caged” about human trafficking, last year’s surprise hit “God’s Not Dead“, and the real most important question at CPAC: In a fight between Hercules and Xena, who would win? Source

This is Jim Garrity of National Review with the National Review Ricochet Podcast, our last one of Friday, with the famous actor Kevin Sorbo, who, actually, when most people hear and see this, they leave popping in their mind, Hercules, Legendary Journeys. I will do my best to- Or- Yeah. Dylan Hunt from, Captain Dylan Hunt from Andromeda. Oh, of course.

Five years on a Gene Roddenberry show. You've got to give me credit there. The king of syndication. That's right. So I'm going to try to put aside my inner geek and all my pop culture references and talk about your two most interesting recent projects. The one coming out, which I'm now looking at this and wondering whether your new film Paged, which is about human trafficking, just before we started taping, you mentioned that Governor Bobby Jindal plays himself.

How did he do, and how did he get into the part? He's like a prima donna now. He wants the SAG Screen Actors Guild card. He wants everything. No, he was great, and it was written for him to be himself. Okay, good. Because it just deals with him addressing an audience of people, dealing with the subject, and bringing more awareness to human trafficking.

So what made you decide to do a film on a topic like this? I just thought it was a great script and a great part to play. I played two parts, actually, twin brothers, good and bad. So I got the evil and the good guy on the other shoulder. It was wonderful written. It was from the co-producers of God's Not Dead, so I have a tie-in with them already. And it's a three-part movie.

We're shooting a second one later this year, and a third one next year. Wow, okay. And it really shows, I think everybody knows of human trafficking. They've heard of it. They don't realize how violent and disgusting it is, and they don't realize that it's in our backyard

right here in the States. It's not just somewhere happening over in Thailand or over in Greece. It's happening right here in our backyard. I was going to say both. I'm going to guess in terms of news coverage of a topic like this and also in terms of making a fictional but obviously very realistic presentation of it.

There's a reticence on the part of the audience. It's so horrible we want to turn away. How do you overcome that? How do you get people to suck them into something that they might just it might be too scary or too grim a topic to dive into for a two-hour film. Well, because I think it's in a movie,

and it's a well-done movie, and I think movies reach, you've got to admit, media, television, movies, reach a lot of people, influence a lot of people. I think they influence Washington, D.C. So there's a lot of power between Hollywood and D.C., obviously. They've had a lot of collaboration around for decades,

but this is a movie that I think will really bring far more awareness to the problem than just being on the street corner and yelling out to ten people. I was doing research for a story on the Oscars. I'm talking about American Sniper. I'm going down the list. It was the one very high

grossing, very popular film in the Best Picture. But as I was going down that list, I saw God's Not Dead fairly high on the list of highest grossing, or higher film in the best picture. But as I was going down that list, I saw God's Not Dead fairly high on the list of highest grossing, or higher than I might have expected on the 2014 ones. Yes. Dollar for dollar, we were the highest grossing. So, first of all,

congratulations, and then secondly, what do you attribute that to? Did it kind of just hit something that was just an audience need that wasn't being met? I think you just hit it right in the nail right there. Because we didn't have, it was only a $2 million budget, made over $100 million worldwide box office. I think it just, it was well written,

it was well shot, it was well acted, it was well directed. It just, it's a movie that spoke to the flyover states, as Hollywood likes to call them, the ones that they don't want to pay attention to. And there's a huge audience out there that wants product that teaches values, teaches morals, and can also pass it on to their kids.

So families went to it and they just passed it on. It was all word of mouth. Now, in that one you're playing, villain of the story might be kind of oversimplifying it, but certainly the skeptic, the atheist, the one who is challenging it. What makes you take a part like that? Is this something- This is fun. Okay. I was going to say, to bring life to something that's not what you think.

I'm a little presumptuous here. I'm a Christian. How did you get into the head of an atheist to make that argument? I've got atheist friends. We have good debates. They believe what I want to. I believe what I want to. I don't try to change their minds.

I don't think we're trying to change mine. We put up our own little reasons why we're at. But I base it off these guys I see on Fox and CNN, these guys who actually have atheist clubs. They spend money and time and put energy into trying to make everybody else not believe in God. I find that amazingly funny

because why do they have so much hate for something they don't believe in? I don't believe in broccoli. Knock yourself out. Have all the broccoli. They're not nearly as passionate about the tooth fairy. Yeah, they should get that way about Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny. It's amazing to me. So to me, I think there must be some kind of belief factor in them.

They just hate the fact that somebody's judging the way they live their lives. Now, obviously, you're one... We joke about the rare Hollywood conservative. I guess they're maybe a little less rare than they used to be. Since you've become a little more outspoken or more public in that stuff, any blacklisting? any nudges to you? You'll never work in this town again.

You hear those stories, and I think there's certainly truth to those stories. But I don't know. I'm not behind closed doors, so I don't know what Hollywood is thinking. But knock on wood, I'm still working. I'm certainly not getting called in for any television new series or any major motion pictures, but the independent world is still reaching out to me. Has anyone ever said to you,

we're not hiring you because you've said such and such? I've heard rumors, so to speak, yes. I have had, through my manager, saying that I haven't done myself any favors. And I always tell her, I said, look, come on, they're liberals. The definition of a liberal is everybody's point of view is supposed to be okay. So I'm sure that they don't feel that way towards me. Interesting. Well, first of all, congratulations on this movie and the upcoming parts of Caged and this other thing. And finally, okay, so did Hercules and Xena ever, actually, did

they ever really settle who was the more powerful between the two? Well, Hercules was half God. Xena was a mortal woman, so she wouldn't stand a chance. Xena was our lesbian spinoff series. Oh, very blunt there. Pretty much what they played, so let's be truthful about it. But that was our third-year spinoff show, and it was a fifth-year series called Young Hercules,

played by Ron Gosling. And that got canned after a year. Whatever happened to that guy? I know. Nothing. He was so disappointed. You'll never come to anything. But no.

We started filming way back in 1993 for seven years and Xena started in 95. I was going to say, I'm sure now there's going to be a lot of feminist criticism

for your claim that Hercules could beat Xena. There wouldn't be a chance. We actually fought once, and I was just basically toying with her until I just finally flipped her over. She wouldn't stand a chance against him. Let's be honest here. Is she tough? Yeah, her character

was definitely tough. It would take more than Xena to take Hercules down. Lucy Laws could kick my butt, Kevin. I was wondering about that. If you want to do the real battle there. I was going to say, working on fascinating and important topics like human trafficking and kind of the struggle for faith in a college campus.

And I just want to thank you. That's a question I really wanted to ask. And I'm sure you think, exactly, I'm sitting down for an interview at National Review. That's exactly the topic that would come up there. Mr. Sorbo, thank you very much for your time. And my next movie coming out is called Hope Bridge as well, and that deals with teen suicides. I'm touching some very serious stuff. There you go.

Excellent. Thanks very much. All right. Thanks a lot. Ricochet. Join the conversation.