We've already seen Hideo Kojima and Mads Mikkelsen having a good time out on the town in Tokyo, but now it's time to get down to Death Stranding business. The actor appeared on the latest HideoTube, a semi-regular talk show co-hosted by Kojima and fellow KojiPro person Kenji Yano. The three discussed how Mikkelsen got involved with the production and the creative approach that he's bringing to his first video game project. Kojima also fanboyed out super hard.
Kojima is very serious about establishing his nerd cred. Anyway, here are the main points from the interview.
On meeting Kojima
"[M]y son knew him, knew his games. And when I told him I was gonna meet you he was like, 'Oh! I have to come with you!' But obviously he's a brilliant man and very, very nice, and it's just an honor to be part of this. It's something that I've never done before, and to do it straight in the super league is fantastic."
On being an actor without a set
"I've done scannings before, for Doctor Strange and the big films that will use 3D. But obviously not on this scale, not where everything is created by you guys. We are there as a base, but everything else will be created. So obviously we have to trust you a lot because we have no idea what it's gonna be, we can only imagine it. But it's very interesting that we only have our imagination to work with, and no set, no nothing. Very, very interesting."
On improvising
Kojima mentioned that Mikkelsen "did some things that were different from what I instructed" during his performance. But when Kojima went back to start fixing them, they actually looked good.
"It's always the thing," Mikkelsen explained. "We will have to do what the director tell us, but sometimes we also do something else. And then we can work together and create something completely different. Two imaginations are not always a better thing. But sometimes it is. But you are the boss!"
On the differences of acting for a game
"As I said before, it's a very interesting universe. It's not story driven in the sense that we go from A to Z, like we do in a film. We can make up the background, but we don't necessarily have to, because it is out of time, out of space. It is in the moment. So I think the opportunity of doing things we've never done before, as you say, that is not necessarily linked to a psychological base, but it's based to the moment. It could be very interesting, which we normally don't do when we do characters.
On waiting for the translator
Seen something newsworthy? Tell us!
5 years after Avengers, 2 years after its last layoffs, and who knows how long before Perfect Dark and Tomb Raider return, Crystal Dynamics announces another round of layoffs
Getting Assassin's Creed Shadows on PS5 and Xbox Series X was all about adding "dynamism" to the open world, but the devs seem most proud about the trees
