The Paranormal Activity movies have proven to be a successful scream fest. People love to get scared, and not being able to sleep soundly the whole night through! At a round table interview, I was able to speak to Jorge Diaz and Andrew Jacobs, the actors in the latest Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones. Like any budding young actors, they were eager, excited and just lovely! Check out our interview after the jump.
Artists On Demand: Were you ever actually scared while filming?
Andrew Jacobs: Not really scared how people think we may have been. We just got a lot of weird vibes in certain places. In the film, we go to a Botanica and it’s a real one. There’s a really weird room that we go into and there were some serious energy to it.
Jorge Diaz: It’s really creepy and a lot of the places we filmed at had their own specific energy to it. The basement, was super run down and had crazy history. I doubt anyone had been in that basement recently. In that sense, you could feel a presence in some places.
FilmThrasher.com : Were any of you fans of the films before you filmed this movie?
Andrew: I saw the first one. Not right away, but a while after and it was definitely scary. I was convinced it was real. Then I ended up seeing the fourth one when it came out in theaters…
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Jorge: We actually saw that one together!
Andrew: Yeah. We all saw it together with Gabrielle (Walsh) after even meeting with Chris (director, Christopher Landon) and getting our scripts and everything.
Jorge: It happened to be released while we were filming this one, so we just walked over and saw it.
Andrew: By that time I had already caught up with all of them.
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Jorge: I had seen all of them, but one in theaters. I saw the second on DVD. It’s definitely a different experience seeing it in a packed theater. It’s a lot of fun!
The Examiner: While you were shooting the film, was there a specific technique Christopher taught you in order to hold the camera correctly to get specific shots he wanted?
Andrew: Well, most of the time Christopher would go up to Jorge and tell him “this is what I want” mainly because they need to get the energy behind the camera. We’d have to synchronize people jumping and screaming on screen.
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Jorge: Most of the stunts were done by Gonzalo, the DP, but every other thing was done by Andrew. It was a skill that you really had to develop. You have to think about how millions of people are going to watch what I’m looking at on this little screen, and while I’m filming I also have to stay in character and do the acting thing. Hit certain lines and stay in the moment and be able to improvise, because we were able to do that.
The Examiner: Did you get to improvise a lot?
Andrew: The film kept evolving and we were always down to do whatever. We ended up having a lot of fun really, especially the first half hour.
FilmThrasher.com: Was it intimidating working with someone like Chris who has and endgame already in his mind?
Andrew: I was intimidated by everybody. This is my first thing ever, really. I’ve never done anything. Jorge has already done a few things: commercials, TV shows… Working with Christopher Landon was just an honor to me. He was so nice and cool. He wasn’t like an ass hole.
Jorge: Christopher just made us feel really welcomed from the beginning. He made us feel like we were friends for years.
Andrew: He took us through the process, step by step and a deep trust was established between the director and actors…
TheYoungFolks.com: How did you guys become attached to this project in the first place?
Andrew: We auditioned and didn’t even know it was Paranormal Activity when we did.
Jorge: We both got called in. a Mix and matching between actors and coincidentally, the first mix and match was with him [Andrew] and as soon as we went in, Chris said, according to an interview I saw the other day, that he looked at the casting director and said “we’re done, this is it”. At the end of the day we ended up getting put together.
The Examiner: It looks like you guys are all pretty close, did you guys do something outside of filming to establish that chemistry, either through rehearsals or just hanging out?
Andrew: Not really rehearsals. We just liked to hang out and we still do to this day. We would watch movies, hang out on birthdays. We’re still close so that chemistry was visible on screen.
Florida Atlantic University: Was there anything you liked to do between takes, like jokes and stuff?
Jorge: There were a lot of jokes and stuff that didn’t make the final cut [laughs]. We had fun with the stunts, even just watching this guy do his stunts was fun for me.
Andrew: There are a lot of stunts I did that didn’t end up making it to the final cut of the film. Like hanging from a crane, dropping from 20 feet.
Jorge: The wheels on my skateboard kept getting stuck, so they had to keep filming that, I remember.
Artists on Demand: Like you just mentioned, you had a lot of stunts. Which scenes would you say were the most difficult to film? The scenes were you were doing stunts or the scenes where you were more serious and dealing with the more dramatic parts?
Andrew: I they were fairly the same. I would say they’re equal in difficulty. One isn’t really more difficult than the other, they’re just very different. I was having a great time throughout the whole thing. I’m a lot more serious in real life, very to myself.
Jorge: I would say, the more serious stuff was difficult for me. I felt like there was a certain pressure to do it right and realistic. I’m very critical when it comes to myself, so I have to believe it in order to feel good about it. If I don’t believe it, how will the audience believe it? There are some crazy things that happen in the movie, so we’d have to make sure to believe we were freaked out.
Florida Atlantic University: If this were to happen to you guys in real life, what would you do?
Andrew: RUN! Maybe kill myself?
Jorge: I wouldn’t know what to do. If I was getting possessed? Shit, I don’t know. It’s almost like fighting the flu. I don’t know, I’ve never been possessed. There’s no control. It might be more stressful for the people around you.
The Examiner: What did you guys think of the last act of the movie? That twist? What was your reaction?
Jorge: It came out of left field for me. I was like “WHAT?!”
Andrew: That didn’t come up until a lot after, because the script was constantly developing.
Jorge: I kept saying that it had to be done really well, because I didn’t want people to be taken out of it and think it wasn’t realistic. But I feel that for the fans it’s such an awesome surprise. They were probably like “OH MY GOD!” and it opens up so many possibilities for the future. There are so many things to discover in the supernatural world, especially in the Hispanic world with mysticism, superstitions, brujeria, santeria and other things that would just be great to learn more about.
FilmThrasher.com: Will you guys come back in the future?
Jorge: Well, you’ll just have to wait and see, we don’t know!
The interview took about 11 minutes since Jorge and Andrew had to do phoners before catching their flight to Houston. Luckily for us, we ran into Jorge outside of the interview room where we asked him a couple more questions, and he was nice enough to answer them!
TheYoungFolks.com: How does it feel being in an all Hispanic cast for a major studio movie?
Jorge: I think it’s beautiful because it shows other studios that you can tell universal stories with any ethnicity, and that everyone can relate to it. This is the first all Latino cast in a movie that gets distributed worldwide. So, it’s an honor and I feel so proud to be somewhat part of history.
TheYoungFolks.com: Do you have any upcoming projects?
Jorge: Yes, there is! I can’t announce it, and I just found out yesterday that I booked a role in a really awesome movie that’s coming out very soon. It’s one of the most anticipated movies in 2014.
Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones is now playing in theaters!
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