5 questions with 'RoboCop' actor Peter Weller ahead of Steel City Con in Monroeville
Peter Weller wants people to know that he’s more than just RoboCop — a lot more.
Weller, who has appeared in over 70 movies including “RoboCop” and “RoboCop 2” in which he played the title character and earned much acclaim, is scheduled to appear at this weekend’s Steel City Con at the Monroeville Convention Center. The three-day event gets underway Friday. Weller is scheduled to appear Saturday and Sunday.
Though the original “RoboCop” premiered nearly 35 years ago, its popularity endures and Weller will likely be showered with praise and peppered by his fans with more than a few questions about the film.
Set in the future, the science fiction story is about a police officer played by Weller who is murdered by a gang of criminals and subsequently brought back to life as a cyborg law enforcer. It’s an extremely violent, compelling and philosophical film.
In addition to being a stage and screen actor and director, Weller is a musician (trumpet) and jazz aficionado, documentary filmmaker, art historian, and athlete who finished the 1986 New York Marathon in three hours and 40 minutes.
Weller discussed some of this in a phone interview with the Tribune-Review. The conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Question: You’ve done a wide variety of film work but I’m guessing your fans this weekend most identify with you as the actor who played “RoboCop.” It was a groundbreaking film in many ways with its mix of cerebral content and violence. How did you get cast as the title character and what did you think of the script when you were going for the part?
Answer: I didn’t read the script. That’s not how I got hired. I heard that (director) Paul Verhoeven was doing a movie about futuristic robots and I’d seen every movie that he made. I just went in and told Paul Verhoeven that I loved all of his movies and I got hired. I didn’t see a script until after I did a deal.
Q: What did you think of the script when you finally read it?
A: I dug it but without Paul it wouldn’t be the movie it was because it wouldn’t have these things about resurrection and identity loss and all that.
Q: We live in a very violent society and people, in some ways, seem to have become desensitized to violence and killings. RoboCop has a message that, I think, still resonates today. Do you feel that way?
A: I can only say that what resonates with RoboCop today is the lie of trickle down economics and privatization and identity theft and resurrection. The themes in RoboCop are themes today because they live forever – not about any particular violent time of this society or another. We always have lived in a violence society. You’re talking about senators walking in and caning each other that led to the Civil War. That’s pretty damn violent man. I’m a glass half full kind of guy. Things are a hell of a lot better than they were a hundred and fifty years ago.
Q: Our interview got pushed back because you are currently involved with doing a film. Can you tell us what it’s about?
A: I’m doing a documentary on a great jazz producer, a white guy in a Black musical world in the 60s named Bob Thiele. He’s the guy who essentially put John Coltrane on the map and other people like Gil Scott-Heron. He also wrote the song “What a Wonderful World” (recorded by Louis Armstrong) and what inspired him to write it is essentially what you were referring to - all the chaos going on in the 60s. And that chaos is still penetrating now except that now it’s a better deal. It’s about his obsession with Black music and what he did for it and how that resonates today.
Q: What is the title of your documentary?
A: Right now it could be “What a Wonderful World,” it could be “Bob Thiele,” it could be “Flying Dutchman.” It’s like most documentaries, you don’t always know what the title is. But it’s about Bob Thiele and the propulsion of a white producer through game-changing Black music in the 60s.
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