CraveOnline: I realize this might seem more like a Chris Morgan question, but you have to tell the story. It’s interesting that you chose not to involve Statham more directly with Djimon Hounsou so that the emotional crux follows through. I feel like we didn’t really get to know Djimon Hounsou’s character as well as I would have liked.
James Wan: Yeah, it’s a tricky one obviously. […] Needless to say, the movie is the way it is for very specific reasons. That’s my most P.C. way of answering your question.
I can absolutely respect that. Let me ask about about the elephant in the room. I’d be remiss if I didn’t cover and I know it sounds tactless, but obviously the death of Paul Walker seriously affected the production. What sort of conversations did you have about how you effect his exit from the franchise? Can you tell me a little bit about what the major concern was in how to dramatically handle that in a story?
Well, I mean, geez… When I found out what happened, like everyone else I was beyond shocked. I went many days shellshocked and not believing that that actually happened. Because it was right smack in the middle of… we came back from shooting, it was during the Thanksgiving break that we took. At that point we’d been working relentlessly, trying to meet the deadline of the release that was supposed to come out summer of last year. So that break was something that I really looked forward to, that I know all of us were looking forward to, and then to get this news in the middle of that was really shattering. It was so heartbreaking and it was one of those, I think, for me at that moment… finishing the movie, believe it or not was the furthest thing from my mind at that point.
“He freakin’ hated Hollywood. He was so un-Hollywood! And I loved him for that.”
I believe you.
I was still trying to come to terms with what happened. I’m sure you’ve heard it from everyone what a great guy Paul Walker was. Seriously, you know how you hear Hollywood stories about someone who’s a dick and sooner or later you go, “Oh, maybe that is kind of true?” Paul was the opposite. I always hear great stories about this guy, and he is as great if not better than all of the stories I’ve heard about him. So I feel very fortunate to have had the chance to meet the guy, to have worked with him and to have seen what an amazing human being he was.
I think the thing I love about him the most, and why I really respected him, was here he is: a movie star in his own right, in the one of the biggest franchises that Hollywood has ever put out there, and yet he could not be less Hollywood. He freakin’ hated Hollywood. He was so un-Hollywood! And I loved him for that. I love how he could not care less about this world, he could not care less about the celebrity lifestyle. He just did not care about any of that stuff and I love the guy for that.
So yes, in the passing days after the accident it slowly became very clear to all of us that we had to finish the movie, and obviously no longer from a financial standpoint. We had to finish the movie to honor Paul, to honor the memories and the legacy of Paul, and that became pretty much all of our number one prerogative, to move ahead.
Then, I think this was during the period between Christmas to New Year, when pretty much myself and my crew – my editorial post-staff – literally, we didn’t take any holidays, we literally poured over thousands of hours of footage that we have shot not just of Furious 7 but of the previous Fast & Furious films, just to see what we have of Paul, to see what wasn’t used or what was used, and basically start to fabricate a plan on how we could finish this movie. Because moving forward, the initial ending that we had was no longer relevant. So we threw all of that out.
