Screenwriter, Producer, and Director, David S. Goyer talks about helming BLADE: TRINITY, the third installment in the franchise.

Reported by Joseph B. Mauceri

David S. Goyer, the screenwriter for all three Blade films that are based on the Marvel Comics character also directs BLADE: TRINITY.

The vampire leaders have awakened Drake (PURCELL), the legend behind Dracula, and the horrific creature that spawned their race. Blade (SNIPES) has no choice but to team up with the Nightstalkers, a group of human vampire hunters led by Whistler’s (KRISTOFFERSON) daughter, Abigail (BIEL), and the wisecracking Hannibal King (REYNOLDS). Blade finds himself taking on the greatest vampire of all time, as his own fate and that of humanity hang in the balance.

David S. Goyer is known in Hollywood as a fan of the comic book genre and has earned a reputation for adapting superheroes and fantastical characters such as the Blade, “Crow:  City of Angels,” and Alex Proyas’ “Dark City.”

Goyer grew up in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and wanted to write comic books, which eventually lead him to screenwriting. Goyer sold his first action script at the age of 22 while still at USC, which became the Jean Claude Van Damme thriller “Death Warrant.”  He moved into horror for Charles Band’s “Puppetmasters,” but made his big breakout with Blade, based on the Marvel Comic about a legendary vampire hunter, it became one of Hollywood’s most successful superhero movies ever.  “Blade 2,” also written by Goyer, was directed by Guillermo Del Toro. 

Before taking the helm of BALDE: TRINITY, Goyer co-wrote “Batman Begins” with director Christopher Nolan, which explores the origins of the Batman legend and the Dark Knight’s emergence.  Goyer recently signed a one-year first-look writing, producing and directing deal with Warner Bros.  His other projects include an adaptation of Jeffrey Long’s “Descent” at DreamWorks, producing the ghost story “Alone” for New Line, and the Vertigo comic “Y: The Last Man,” also for New Line, which he is producing with Benderspink. Goyer is also working on a television series for CBS, serving as Executive Producer, on the tentatively titled “Threshold.” Just recently announced, the pilot will be an hour-long contemporary sci-fi drama about the government’s response to an alien threat. Goyer is attached to direct the pilot.

W.O.F.: You’ve written many screenplays and made your directorial debut with “Zigzag,” a small non-genre picture. Your second film, BLADE TRINITY, is a significantly large budget action. How big a leap is that transition?

David S. Goyer: I don’t think it was as hard as it might have been for someone that hadn’t been “me.” I was intricately associated with the Blade films and I knew the basic vocabulary and had been on set for the other movies. I had an idea of what worked and what didn’t, as apposed to somebody just coming into the franchise completely new. I think that gave me an advantage.

I think the special effects were the biggest change. I didn’t have any in “Zigzag” and we have over 500 in this film. I think the other thing is the physical endurance. I remember both Guillermo and Norrington saying that it was the hardest thing on a movie of that scale. “Zigzag,” which I did in 26-days, is comparatively easy.

W.O.F.: For BLADE TRINITY you wore three hats, writer, producer, and director. We do all three for this film?

David S. Goyer: I think it’s a natural progression, moving from writing to directing. I started getting involved with producing just as a way to prepare myself for directing. Becoming a producer on “Blade II” gave me more of an excuse to be in the editing room. I got to ask Guillermo even more questions. It’s much more fun to direct you own script than to have someone else do it.

W.O.F.: What’s on the printed page never fully ends up on screen. As the writer and director do those choices get any easier, or are there still those days when you have to take out the roll of Rolaids because you have to me some tough choices?

David S. Goyer: I remember talking to David Fincher after “Seven” – a lot of people don’t know that he was going to direct the first “Blade” and I even developed the script with him – and he said that he thought only 13% of “Seven” was what he intended to et on the screen. I think he was his highest was 30% on “Panic Room.” That seems a little ridiculous. Making a movie is a whole series of compromises because there are so many different things that are out of your control. There are days I took out the Rolaids, but in the end I’m really happy with BLADE TRINITY because this film is about 80% of what I wanted to do with this film. Then that’s about what I’m happy with the first two films as well. I think when you get into it you say, “I’m directing it now so I’m going to be happy with 100% of it.” However, sometimes you lose a location or it rains, or sometimes you have two hours to shoot a scene instead of ten. There are all kinds of things that can happen.

W.O.F.: BLADE TRINITY has a bit more humor. Why did you feel this third installment need it?

David S. Goyer: I always wanted to inject a bit more humor into the first two Blade films. There was a bit more in “Blade,” but it’s not something that comes immediately to Norrington or Del Toro. I just decided that it was the third time out and if we did the same old thing we would just get the die-hard fans and no one else. It just seem that this third time out we could be a bit more subversive and self-reflective. So, yeah, I wrote a pretty funny script, at least the studio and the cast members thought so. When Ryan Reynolds came on board we really bonded - about 70% of that was scripted and the rest improvised – we had a lot of late night drinking sessions and we kept on embellishing. We did much more improvisation on this film, more so than the other films. I really like to improvise, and did it a lot on “Zigzag.” I deliberately cast a lot of actors out of the independent film world to do that and surround Wesley.

Wesley, at least on the Blade films, has never really improvised very much. I kind of force him to a little more on this one.

W.O.F.: Wesely is a method actor. Was it easy for him to improvise?

David S. Goyer: I think this cast gave him a run for his money, which was good!

W.O.F.: When you look at films like “Evil Dead 2,” “House,” and “Shaun of the Dead,” do you think there is a unique relationship between comedy and horror?

David S. Goyer: Absolutely! I think some of the funniest scenes in this film work because they come on the heels of more grueling scenes. The scene everybody seems to love is with the vampire Pomeranian, which is a funny scene in and of its self. I think it’s even funnier because it comes after ten-minutes of Ryan’s character getting pummeled.

Comedy is hard! It’s hard target to hit, and I think it’s harder than even horror.

W.O.F.: When they were talking about a sequel to the “The Crow: City of Angels,” which you wrote, you mentioned you wanted to do a “gaslight” Crow with one of Jack The Ripper’s victims being the Crow. After “Blade 2, “ you mentioned that you wanted to write this apocalypse type story set some 50-years in the future. Another great idea, so changed your mind?

David S. Goyer: I went back and forth, and I’m still intrigued with that idea. Then a good friend of mine, Mark Protosevich, wrote the script for “I Am Legend,” which is what “Omega Man” was based on. So on one hand, he is still trying to get that film made and I didn’t want to rain on his parade. On the other hand, I sort of feel that one of the reasons why the Blade movies are popular is that they nominally take place in our world. If it didn’t take place now it wouldn’t really be our world any more. I didn’t feel that it would be a Blade film any more. There certainly wouldn’t be any opportunities for humor or anything like that. We are talking about a “Blade 4” now, and it’s quite possible, because I don’t have any ideas, that we would do that.

W.O.F.: Would you ever return to comics with a mini-series or something?

David S. Goyer: They keep trying to get me to write a Blade comic, but I feel like the Blade comics a cursed. They never do well.

W.O.F.: Why is that?

David S. Goyer: I don’t know. They’ve never been able to get the tone right. If I do comics I’m more tempted to go for the marquee characters.

W.O.F.: How difficult was it to come up with this new take on the Dracula mythology?

David S. Goyer: The whole point of the Blade films is that it is a new take on vampirism. So if you are going to introduce Dracula he can’t be Bela Lugosi or Frank Langella. That’s why we call him Drake in our film. If anything, he is more the genesis of myths of Satan, and things like that. He’s not really Dracula.

W.O.F.: I sat through the credits because I friend of mine had work on this shot of a werewolf that you filmed for the end. We did you pick the shot of Blade in his car instead?

David S. Goyer: The shot at the end is kind of an “Easter Egg.” It’s Blade in his Charger, on the freeway, in kind of this Mad Max moment. I thought it was kind of cool that it said that he was still out there somewhere.

We filmed an ending with what is actually a were-hyena, if you want to get technical. It was just lame, and I had a cameo in it as well. So you know it must have been lame for me to cut myself out of the film. I do a stunt where Ryan Reynolds punches me in the face and flips me over onto a roulette table. We did it 10 times and I was really hurting, but… It’s on the DVD. Sometimes you do a scene and it just doesn’t jell and it’s bad. Since that scene was very modular we didn’t need it to tell the story I just said screw it!

There was a scene in the first Blade film that I got to do a goof version of it, the Body Farm. A lot of people asked, “If Deacon Frost turned everybody into vampires how are they going to feed? Goyer screw up!” There was a scene that I scripted, that I they did film, that addressed that. Again, it’s on the deleted scenes on the first DVD, it’s just bad! Sometimes it’s just a sucky scene. It happens sometimes.

W.O.F.: You also worked on “Batman Begins.” How did you become involved in that project?

David S. Goyer: The easiest way possible! Christopher Nolan called and asked me to do it. I didn’t try out for it! I knew him a bit, I was on preproduction for Blade already, and he called me up to tell me he was doing Batman. I said, “Really?” They’d been trying for so long to get this going. He said, “Really! I think it’s going to get made. I want you to do it.” At the time I said I couldn’t, but I talk to him for an hour and told him some of my ideas. I told him he could have my ideas for free! He called me back a week later and said we got to figure out away to do it. I told him I had 7-weeks before I had to go up to Vancouver for Blade, so I can write for 7-weeks. I ended up doing a draft and a half of the script. After that, I told Chris he would have to do any revision on his own, and he agreed. He did have a starting point, he didn’t have the villains, and we didn’t decide to do an origin story or anything.

W.O.F.: Do you know how much of the final film is your version?

David S. Goyer: About 75%. The entire story, every single character and set piece, is exactly from my script. I’d worked it out with Chris, but there are some portions where he moved some scenes around. They’re the same basic scenes but they’re in different order, or he changed some dialogue.

W.O.F.: Would you be involved with those sequels?

David S. Goyer: I laid out a loose road map. Chris and I certainly talked about things, and there are pieces in place for them to do things for the next 2 to 3 films. Warner Bros. Said they would be calling me to do another one, but right now every wants to do another one but he isn’t saying boo. Until he finishes his cut he won’t say. In away, he doesn’t need to do another one, and I wouldn’t do another if Chris doesn’t.

W.O.F.: The Internet plays a big part in marketing films like Blade and Batman. When something like the “Batman Begins” script gets leaked on the Internet how, as a screenwriter, how does it affect you?

David S. Goyer: In the case of that leak, again it was an early draft; the response was so good that it didn’t matter. Warner Bros. Wasn’t happy that it leaked, but they were happy that the response was so good. It was kind of the polar opposite as to when the Superman script leaked. If it leaks and people generally say it’s great then fine.

I think there are pros and cons to what is happening with the Internet. The fan response on the Internet definitely helped pushed Warner Bros to make good decisions about Batman and Superman. There was so much outrage about how things were being developed that they felt needed to go with amore credible director and a fan creditable writer, at least fro Batman. Then the general response was so good that made Warner Bros. go for Bryan Singer, even though it was a painful decision for them. They were really far down the line with McG. So it does have an affect.

It can also be detrimental. There is no accountability on the Internet and there is no way to verify if people are telling the truth or not. Sometimes people lie. There are positive plants when people review scripts, and there are negative ones as well. Various people are trying trash you because they are competitors. It’s a weird process.

W.O.F.: Once a studio launches a sit and beings to load shots from the set you are going to get feedback from the fans. Does that come into play when you’re shooting the film?

David S. Goyer: You can’t because you’ll just go insane. The problem with the Internet is that while the people who are posting are often very rabid, and they’re very smart, are a very small portion of the audience. They’re very vocal, but they’re not representative of the broader audience.

I think that any time you try to carter to any audience, at the end of the day you have to make the best film you can and see if it gains approval with an audience or not.

W.O.F.: I understand that you’ve also been working on the screen adaptation of “Y: The Last Man.”

David S. Goyer: There is a first draft. Bryan K. Vaughan has been involved at meetings and we consult with him. Jeff Vintar, who did the early adaptations of “I, Robot”, is adapting it. It loosely follows the first 20 issues of the comic or so. It’s a really good first draft and New Line is interested in making it a big movie form them, and we’ll see. We have to get another draft in.

W.O.F.: I know you’re involved in a few other superhero projects.

David S. Goyer: There is a draft of “Dr. Strange” that is languishing over at Sony. I did a draft of “Ghost Rider’ when Stephen Norrington and Nicholas Cage were attached to it. There are small bits that will show up in Mark Steven Johnson’s film. There are a couple of things I’m working on, and I don’t want to do just comics. But, I made a writing, producing, directing deal with Warner Bros. They’re obviously interested in doing other DC Comic properties. I’m having a big meeting with Paul Levitz next week to talk about which ones.

W.O.F.: I understand that you love “The Flash”