LOS ANGELES \u2013 It is often said Hollywood does not produce movie stars any more. <\/p>\n
So when someone with a square jaw and loads of charisma like Glen Powell is cast in Arnold Schwarzenegger\u2019s role for a reboot of the 1987 dystopian action film The Running Man, people get excited.<\/p>\n
But Powell, an unfailingly courteous Texan who quit the Los Angeles life and moved home to Austin as his fame grew, is having none of it.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t find myself to be exceptional,\u201d said the 37-year-old American actor.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat era of action stars and movie stars? You can\u2019t really compare apples to oranges.\u201d <\/p>\n
Powell\u2019s role in the new The Running Man, which opens in Singapore cinemas on Nov 13, is a far cry from the indestructible bluster of Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone and Mel Gibson\u2019s 20th-century action heroes, who were usually soldiers, cops and trained fighters.<\/p>\n
Powell\u2019s protagonist Ben Richards is an everyman with no special skills beyond a rugged toughness and a very short fuse.<\/p>\n
He reluctantly enters a deadly game show in which the entire world is trying to kill him: He needs to survive long enough to win prize money and buy life-saving medicine for his daughter. The film also stars Josh Brolin, Colman Domingo, William H. Macy, Lee Pace and Michael Cera.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve always identified myself as an underdog,\u201d Powell said.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome of my favourite movies are ordinary people against extraordinary odds. And you don\u2019t get more ordinary than Ben.\u201d<\/p>\n
The movie sees Powell\u2019s hero bashed and bruised, blown off a bridge and abseiling down the side of a building in only a bath towel to escape from hoodlums.<\/p>\n
Glen Powell in the action thriller The Running Man. <\/p>\n
PHOTO: UIP<\/p>\n
The night before this interview, Powell and English director Edgar Wright (Last Night In Soho, 2022; Baby Driver, 2017) screened the movie for Schwarzenegger.<\/p>\n
The 78-year-old Austrian-American actor\u2019s response? \u201cOh, I feel so bad for you. It must have hurt,\u201d Powell recalled.<\/p>\n
\u201cArnold knows the pain that it takes to do an action movie properly. It was pretty bad-a** to get his blessing.\u201d <\/p>\n
The film hews more closely to the original Stephen King novel than its 1987 big-screen predecessor.<\/p>\n
Powell\u2019s hero is pursued from city to city by professional killers, and the contest\u2019s producers are rigging each moment for maximum TV ratings.<\/p>\n
Eerily, King set his novel in the United States of 2025, a then-futuristic vision of divisive autocrats, deepfake videos and a healthcare crisis that drives everyday people to extremes.<\/p>\n
Was it a stretch for Powell to imagine today\u2019s public enjoying mayhem and slaughter, some of it fake and generated by artificial intelligence, on their screens?<\/p>\n
Glen Powell in the action thriller The Running Man. <\/p>\n
PHOTO: UIP<\/p>\n
\u201cWe do live in this TikTok universe,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are seeing carnage and yet, we\u2019re sort of away from it. You don\u2019t engage with it as a human any more.\u201d<\/p>\n
Powell said he is regularly sent deepfake videos by people who have not questioned the veracity or source of the content.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s a really fun thing that we get to play with in this movie. \u2018Where do you get the news from, and who is controlling information?\u2019\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
Though he has been acting for years, Powell shot to prominence only as cocky fighter pilot Hangman in Top Gun: Maverick (2022).<\/p>\n
In a remarkable streak since, he appeared opposite American actress Sydney Sweeney in romcom Anyone But You (2023), chased deadly storms in disaster flick Twisters (2024), and co-wrote and starred in crime comedy Hit Man (2023).<\/p>\n
US actor Glen Powell attends the New York premiere of The Running Man in New York City on Nov 9. <\/p>\n
PHOTO: AFP<\/p>\n
Up next, he will lead a new fantasy film from Lost (2004 to 2010) creator and American film-maker J.J. Abrams. Powell\u2019s production company has a deal with Universal Pictures. <\/p>\n
Those ventures into writing and producing are reminiscent of another classic Hollywood action star, Stallone, who famously penned sports drama Rocky (1976) and insisted on being cast as the lead.<\/p>\n
\u201cI really didn\u2019t ever want to wait for the phone to ring. Because I realised it never will, at least not with the calls you want,\u201d Powell said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s sort of how I\u2019ve moved through this town, trying to do it with a sense of initiative. Hollywood, it\u2019s the Wild West right now,\u201d he added. \u201cI can\u2019t really look backwards.\u201d AFP<\/p>\n<\/div>\n