By George & Josh Bate
Bob Odenkirk, John Wick creator Derek Kolstad, and Nobody producer Marc Provissiero team up again for an action-packed and darkly humorous neo-Western making its midwest premiere at Beyond Chicago.
From director Ben Wheatley (Free Fire, Meg 2: The Trench), Normal stars Odenkirk as Ulysses, a lawman with a troubled past who takes on the role of substitute sheriff of a small, sleepy town following the death of the previous sheriff. Ulysses is only beginning to grow accustomed to the quaint town when a botched bank robbery accidentally exposes the community’s dark secret and pits the interim sheriff against the people he’s been tasked with protecting.
The HoloFiles recently had the opportunity to interview Bob Odenkirk and Derek Kolstad about their new film, its deliberately slower pace, why Odenkirk found it easier to play Ulysses than Saul Goodman, how he embraced his inner Clint Eastwood for the role, and more.
Blending elements of High Noon, Hot Fuzz, and John Wick, Odenkirk and Kolstad’s latest collaboration brings the Western genre into the 21st century, with a healthy dose of surreal humor and bloodshed. “This is what Ben Wheatley, the director, said numerous times,” Odenkirk remarked. “‘This is my western,’ he said. He’s made many films, as you know. He does horror and comedy and action and everything. But he said, ‘This is my western.’”
Indeed, Normal represents a decidedly different effort from English filmmaker Ben Wheatley, who most recently helmed the Jason Statham action flick Meg 2: The Trench and whose filmography also includes a remake of Alfred Hitchcock’s Rebecca and the acclaimed action comedy Free Fire. But while embracing a different genre than his previous efforts, Normal retains the brutal violence, dark humor, and rising tension audiences have come to admire Wheatley for.
Consistent with the pacing of a classic Hollywood Western, Normal proves unafraid to take its time building tension and carefully setting the stage for the chaos that eventually ensues. Screenwriter Derek Kolstad likened the deliberately slower paced first act, which is followed by a bloodthirsty and kinetic second act, to the pace of the Nobody movies, also starring Bob Odenkirk. “When it comes to pacing, we did that on the first Nobody as well by having the longer first act, because see the wick being lit, right?” Kolstad explained. “It’s going towards that dynamite in the distance.”
Odenkirk also found the film’s pacing to be similar to John Wick, the 2014 action movie that has since launched a massively successful franchise. “[Derek Kolstad] wrote John Wick,” said Odenkirk. “People often say John Wick is just action from beginning to end, but it’s got a long first act…It takes a while before shit goes south. But once it goes, you’re into it.”
With a pace that mirrors some of the most beloved action movies of the century, Normal’s narrative harkens back to one of the Western genre’s greatest films. “Another movie I talked about with this movie is High Plains Drifter, the Clint Eastwood film,” Odenkirk stated. “I don’t know if you’ve seen it recently, but it’s funny. That whole town kind of hates him and then they need his help. Then he has to use them so they have to play their part. There was a moment or two in the movie Normal where I was doing my lines and Ben [Wheatley] just came up besides and said, ‘Just do Clint Eastwood.’”
Embracing his inner Clint Eastwood meant that Odenkirk took on a more understated and reserved role, one that required him to express his inner turmoil more subtly. This in stark contrast to Odenkirk’s work as Saul Goodman, the scheming and charismatic lawyer is widely regarded as one of television’s most compelling characters of all time. “I probably find Ulysses more like me [than Saul], so he’s easier to play,” Odenkirk reflected. “He’s a guy who’s seen a lot of life. He’s kind of back on his heels. He’s unsure of himself, and he’s just watching people and trying to make the right choice. In the case of Ulysses, people often learn the wrong lesson or they overlean a lesson. In his case, he’s overlearned skepticism of his own instincts. So in this town Normal, he’s seeing all these clues that don’t add up, but he’s just turning away from all of them. Then circumstances put him right smack in the middle of what’s wrong in this town. And it’s too late to have a graceful maneuver out of it. So I relate to him. I relate to how he talks to people. I relate to how he looks at the world. I like this guy. I like everything about him.”
Due to Odenkirk’s dramatic range and ability to convey vulnerability and moral ambiguity so subtly, Kolstad ended up removing lines of dialogue during the course of filming, relying instead on conveying emotion or tone through a look, a wink, a nod, or a smirk. “On the day of, Bob and I have a shorthand where I’ll get notes from him 15 minutes before shooting,” Kolstad described. “Everyone panics, but we know what we’re doing. And then during the scene, Bob will chuckle going, ‘Hey, I want to do it this way.’ And then Ben [Wheatley] says, ‘Why don’t you do this way?’ And I go, ‘Oh.’ And then we’re just kind of drafting off trying to find the best idea.”
Kolstad elaborated on the unique dynamic on set that allowed him and Odenkirk to subtract, rather than add, dialogue as production progressed. “Then you go through the script, you take out this quip, you take out that quip,” Kolstad said. “But then it becomes, instead of a line, a humorous look. That’s what we understood. Instead of saying that line, give that look or do that thing. Because we’re both fans of the Buster Keatons of the world, right? The Harold Lloyds. That speaks volumes.”
While interim sheriff Ulysses serves as the protagonist of Normal, Odenkirk’s character is surrounded by an array of idiosyncratic townsfolk, played by the likes of Henry Winkler, Lena Headey, and Jess McLeod. “Working on this with Bob is realizing that it’s not just Ulysses’ story,” Kolstad said. “You could argue that [Billy MacLellan’s Deputy] Mike might think he’s the main character. The mayor [played by Henry Winkler] thinks he’s the main character. And we wanted to give each of them flesh on the bone so that, when things go south, you feel, even when you’re chuckling at certain characters’ demise, that there are real stakes in this world and that it’s grounded in that 15% surreal, which is a joy to create and a joy to watch.”
Having a collective of interesting, fleshed-out supporting characters to follow appealed to Odenkirk as it reminded him of the classic 1974 chrome thriller The Talking of Pelham One Two Three, which Odenkirk is showing as part of Beyond Chicago. “I’m showing Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 and one of the reasons this struck me is there’s something about the rewarding value of that story – how rewarding it is to an audience and I feel [Normal] has that,” Odenkirk acknowledged. “But additionally, not many films have this many character parts that all have an operative part of the story. So all the people in town that you meet make choices. They’re characters that are secondary characters. You wouldn’t usually give them that kind of agency within a story, but that’s true in Pelham and it’s true in this film.”
In evoking iconic films like The Taking of Pelham One Two Three and High Plains Drifter and featuring kinetic action that would not be out of place in a John Wick movie, Normal blends sensibilities of classic and contemporary cinema. With neo-Western, high-octane action, and absurdist humor all fused together, Odenkirk and Kolstad demonstrate that their partnership fosters movies that linger long after the credits roll and, despite the title suggesting an average moviegoing experience, are far from normal.
Watch our full interview with Bob Odenkirk and Derek Kolstad below….
