Vin Diesel on mo-cap stilts promises to “take Andy Serkis to a whole new level”

Here’s Vin Diesel in a video recently posted to his INCREDIBLE Facebook page, during some down time on the set of Fast 7, practicing walking on giant stilts. Or as Tom Cruise calls them, shoes. The stilt practice is for Diesel’s upcoming role in Guardians of the Galaxy as Groot, a seven-foot tall tree. VD only has one line in the film, but as he says:

My father taught me there are no small roles, only small actors. I have one line in the movie, but that doesn’t mean anything. I’m still going to make it the best thing I possibly can. Even if it means taking Andy Serkis to a whole other level. Which is what we wanna do with our motion capture.

Aw, did your dad have a book of famous quotes too? That’s neat. Anyway, when he said “taking Andy Serkis to another level,” all I could think about was Vin Diesel walking around on stilts pretending to be a talking tree while Andy Serkis sits up on his shoulders pretending to be a monkey, hooting and throwing turds at passersby. For the love of God, someone needs to come up with a fake motion capture movie and just film Vin and Andy shooting it.

I love how he can instantly summon an army of like 15 people just to watch him walk around on stilts and tell him how good he is at it. “Hey, everyone! Come see how good I look!” “That’s great, Vin! Lookin’ good, buddy, haha!”

It’s a wonder anyone this famous is the least bit sane. If you’ll notice, in the video, he’s also wearing a shirt from his own movie, with his character’s name on the front. Oh, Vin Diesel, don’t ever change.

“People say this is a mean breed, but look at him: isn’t he just a big ol’ softy? Yes, he’s my sweet boy. He’s great with kids, too. I named him ‘Hellbeast the Babyslayer.'”

[source = Vin Diesel’s Facebook page; hat tip to i09 for the transcription]

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