Tyrese Gibson isn't shy about taking credit for Death Race's summer release date. "While we were filming this, they said this film is coming out in September. I said, 'September? Why? Why? This has all the elements of a summer smash. Kids want to come out while they're off from summer school and whatever else, and go see some crazy rock star boys toys craziness. This is it.' Then we found out the film was moved up to August 22 and they kept on saying to me, 'You kept saying this needs to be a summer movie and it happened. You kept saying it.' So I kind of predicted this."
Gibson plays Machine Gun Joe, a character he describes as totally crazy, in the action thriller Death Race directed by Paul W.S. Anderson and starring Jason Statham (Crank, Transporter). Not your parents' Death Race, this new version finds Statham as a speedway champion framed for murder whose only shot at getting out of jail is to survive a horrific death race. "Machine Gun Joe is nuts," said Gibson. "He's one of those people that kind of look forward to getting out of jail but at the same time, this is like a big playland for him. So he's not in jail because he was singing too high in the choir."
Gibson's training for 2 Fast 2 Furious came in handy for Death Race, although he believes this film takes racing to a whole other level. "A lot of the stuntmen got busy on this one. I was pissed," admitted Gibson who was aching to do more of his own driving. "But the cars in itself was just so hard to drive because they have so much metal on them so the maneuvering of them is so much more complex because you're turning the wheel of so many tons of metal, so we did a little driving but nowhere near as much as what I wanted. I filled out a formal complaint and sent it to the studio so we'll see how that works out for the sequel…"
Looking back on how he got involved in Death Race, Gibson recalls he had a pretty good idea he'd landed a role in the film during his initial meeting with director Anderson. "Paul reached out and said that he kind of had me in mind for it, but he didn't give me the part. What ended up happening is we met up at a hotel, and he ended up slipping and giving me the part without knowing. So my people said, 'Tyrese, the director wants to meet you but he hasn't determined if he wants to go with you or not. So he'll let us know a couple days after the meeting if he's going to go with you or not.' So at the whole dinner, I'm on edge. You're trying to put the good impression and all that. 'Yeah, man, you know how this'll be great. I'd love to be a part of this…'"
"But where he slipped up at is he pulled his laptop out and while he was talking to me, he said, 'You know, so these are the areas that we're going to be filming at.' So I'm like, 'Oh, sh-t. You said 'we'.' Then he said, 'This is the car that I have you in mind to drive in.' And I'm like, 'Oh sh-t, well I'm not going to point that out.' So as soon as I got into my car, I called my people and I was like, 'Yo, man, I don't know if he gave me the part or not but he did say this is the car he wants me to drive and this is the location we're supposed to be filming in.' But it worked out."
And now Gibson's excited about the prospect of returning to the world of Death Race at least one more time. He's currently involved in the sequel to Transformers – Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen - and would relish the opportunity to be a part of Death Race 2. "I think whatever wasn't done on the first one, will definitely be happening on the second one because we are really anticipating a sequel. Me and Paul were just riding over here in my truck watching some clips that are going to be released on Cinemax, etcetera. I was just saying that this film has the formula."
Even during filming Gibson was convinced there would be a sequel. "It just felt like it. Then of course, they used to shoot the whole movie and go do all the editing afterwards. Now the new formula, of course, is to do all the special effects and do all the editing while you're still filming. So while we're on the set still filming, they're sending him DVDs and he's showing us all of these edits of all of these action sequences that they're doing now," said Gibson. "It was just like it gets everybody more fired up to just keep going because you've got like a month and a half left or whatever and it's just special. It just felt right."
"I feel like the sequel has been set up nicely," added Gibson. "And for me, just in general, I like doing one-ofs, films that feel like there's only going to be one, but I'm more excited about franchise. I love the idea that we're doing something so special that the audiences want to go and see another one and another one."
