Albert Hughes “doesn’t want to disrespect” anyone with the new ‘John Wick’ series.
The 51-year-old director is at the helm of ‘The Continental: From the World of John Wick’ – which serves as a spin-off to the action movie series – and insisted that he never wanted to “copy” the films in the franchise as he insisted that was not what he was hired for in the first place.
He told MovieWeb: “I would never want to disrespect by copying, and that’s not who I am. They didn’t hire me for that. There are plenty of no-talent directors that, if they wanted to push around, they could do that. The truth is there is not enough talent to go around. If they wanted, the copy would have done that. They told me from the start, which I really love, that it was filmmaker-driven! I come from the school of loving Sergio Leone films where it is all about the tension and the build-up and a quick release of violence. I needed to have the happy medium.
I said, ‘Oh my god, this is perfect. I get to have fun. I know it is stressful, too, but we made it and did have fun. It was pure escapism. I wanted that for the audience, too. If I’m having fun, the audience will have fun too.”
In this iteration of the franchise, the role of Winston Scott is now played by Colin Woodell following on from Ian McShane and Keanu Reeves and Albert explained that his casting came about at the insistence of the producer.
He said: “[Producer] Basil [Iwankye] was a big champion of Colin; I have to give him credit for that.
“He had the movie star looks, but I didn’t see what he saw until [Colin] showed up. He is a very smart actor with these old throwback movie star looks. He looks a bit like Ian McShane in his younger years, but he is deeply talented.”