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Mickey Rourke, star of "The Wrestler" appeared as a guest on last night's episode of Late Night with David Letterman to discuss the film's release.
Rourke noted he was having a "Merry Christmas" after Letterman noted he was nominated for a Golden Globe. Rourke and Letterman discussed his love of dogs and how he rescues and cares for dogs. Letterman asked him where his love of dogs come from. He said that when he first came to New York City to Miami, he did a number of different jobs, including washing dishes for the Circle Line cruise line that circles the Island of Manhattan and in a massage parlor/whore house overseeing those who would hand out flyers for the establishments and protecting them from pimps who would try to stop them from advertising. He never got back to why he started caring for dogs.
Letterman noted the film reflects Rourke's his own life and comeback, which Letterman complimented him on. Letterman said it was a simple story but with a lot of facets, "much like life." Letterman asked him if it was really him doing the in-ring wrestling stunts. He said it was "really me" and as he started to talk about director Darren Aronofsky, he was cut off to go to commercial.
When they returned, Letterman noted that Rourke looked like a real wrestler. Rourke said he had to put on 35 lbs. of muscle over several months. Letterman asked how he does that. Rourke responded, "It's really hard, brother." He said that he had a really great trainer in Miami, who was an Israeli, ex-commando cage fighter. Rourke said on some nights, he was out partying a little too late and the trainer would show up and refuse to leave. He would force Rourke to get up. He said they were on a diet where he was eating 6-7 times a day, doing heavy lifting and drinking lots of protein shakes.
Letterman asked Rourke if he knew about wrestling and how to do the in-ring work. Rourke said he knew nothing about it and credited Darren Aronofsky for hiring the right people to be around, including stunt coordinator Doug Crosby. He said that he was trained by "one of the Wild Samoans, who was the uncle of Dwayne Johnson, the Rock." He said they broke him for several months and he needed several MRIs over those months. You could hear some laughter in the crowd because they couldn't take it seriously. Rourke said that he didn't understand about the business in that it was entertainment but when someone 250 lbs. throws you down, "something is going to shake, rattle and roll."
Letterman asked if it was always the plan for Mickey to star in the movie. Rourke said that Aronofsky had the movie in development for 10 years and he came up with the idea of it being Rourke. Rourke said when he met Aronofsky, he came highly recommended to him and compared him to Francis Ford Coppola in regard to his work ethic and working a "certain way." He said Darren had a lot of integrity in what he does and taking the story to a greater level because of his intelligence. He said the first time they met, Darren called him "Dude" and that drove him crazy because an assistant used to do that and it "made him short circuit." He
Rourke said when they met, Aronofsky told him he had ruined his career for the last 15 years and he could have been "this person or that person, but instead I can't even raise the money because of your name and I want you to star in this movie, so now how am I going to do that?" Rourke said, "You're supposed to figure this out, not me." He said Aronofsky told him, "If you do this movie, you are going to do everything I say. You're going to do everything I tell you and you're never going to disrespect me in front of the crew....and I can't pay you." Letterman joked, "Did you hear that Paul?" to his band leader, Paul Schaeffer.
Letterman said it was a small film but one that teaches true life lessons and has performances larger than life. They went to a "film clip", which was an old black and white comedy wrestling bit. They joked then went to footage of Rourke as Randy the Ram wrestling at an WXW show. Rourke commented, "Real blood", although Letterman didn't respond.
Letterman noted that Rourke was nominated for a Golden Globe award. Rourke said he was and told the story of how Bruce Springsteen wrote a song for the film. He said that he wrote Bruce, who he had known for years, a letter telling him it was the best film he's ever done and had a lot of parallels to his own life. He said Springsteen took the time to write a "very beautiful song called The Wrestler" while he was busy with a tour of Europe. Rourke said he couldn't be more proud of that.
Letterman plugged the movie and thanked Rourke for coming.
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