On Landing the Role of Kaylo in Crank: “I think it was my fortune. Here’s the funny thing: when I went into the office to meet up with them, they didn’t have sides for Kaylo. They had sides for another character named Orlando who’s African-American, the leader of a motorcycle gang. So I go in and I’ve got like 10 pages. I’m like, ‘All right, guys. I’m African American, the leader of a motorcycle gang. Sure, I’ll do it.’ And they look at me like, ‘Okay, let’s read it, sure.’ So after we did the entire scene, they’re going, ‘You know what? You might be right for this other character.’ ‘Sure, what is it?’ ‘He’s a transvestite.’ ‘Sure, why not? Bring it on.’ They go, ‘Do you need time?’ I go, ‘No guys, right now, just tell me exactly the circumstances, what’s going on, what the character’s about.’ So they quickly explain it to me and I said, ‘All right, fine, great, I have to do a death scene. Sure, why not?’
We end up doing the scene and everybody was quiet. When you have those quiet moments, you go, ‘Okay, I either was great or they think I’m completely weird.’ I’m like, ‘All right, thank you very much guys. Good night.’ So about two weeks later, they end up calling my agent, my manager and the whole team. They say, ‘Well, we want to offer him the role of Kaylo,’ and I thought, ‘All right, cool, let me get the script.’ But the things that happen with my character throughout the entire script… I went, ‘Oh my God.’”
Preparing to Play a Transvestite: “When I got the role, I would actually go to a bunch of gay clubs in Los Angeles, one of them is called The Abbey. I was looking for the character and could not find them. And I work as a DJ all around the world, celebrity DJs, and I actually got offered to work as a DJ at a strip club in Detroit. … When I was DJing, there was a girl named Danielle. I don't think that’s her real name, but she was so erotic, so elegant and so beautiful. And I said, ‘Well, let me emulate her.’
I sat, had coffee with her, we talked. She was telling me that no one knows that she’s actually a stripper. She has a totally different day life as opposed to her night life. And that’s exactly like Kaylo. In Kaylo’s life, he has two different lives. During the day, no one knows, especially because he lives in the ‘hood, no one knows he likes to dress up as a transvestite… At night, he likes to go to clubs and he has his happy friends, you know? But the thing about it is we all know that when someone lives two different lives, they tend to bleed into each other. And that’s what happened in the film with Crank, where Chev Chelios begins to question the fact of how he dresses and his nails, and just the way he looks and his manner of behavior.
I think that’s where the comedy lies. Sometimes in action films, everything’s about just the action, the whole drama. That’s fine, but as we all know, in drama there’s always comedy and in comedy there’s always drama. As an actor and as an artist, you need to find that and I think that’s important to be told.”
Figuring Out What Motivates His Character: “As an actor, you want to create secrets and I thank all my teachers… You’re able to create secrets in character and one of my secrets that I created for Kaylo is the fact that not only am I in love with Chev Chelios, but I’m in love with his girlfriend. So people go, ‘Is your character gay or is he straight?’ I’m like, ‘You know what? How come he can’t love everyone?’ And besides, Amy Smart, she’s hot. I’ll build her a cake any time she wants.”
