Due Justice Interview: Jeff Fahey On Playing A Jolly Villain & Valuing Hollywood Friendships

Alongside Kellan Lutz and Efren Ramirez, Jeff Fahey stars in Due Justice, a new action thriller from writer/director Javier Reyna. Lutz stars as Max, a former marine who becomes a vigilante after his family is brutally attacked by a gang of organ traffickers. Fahey plays Ellis, the leader of the gang, and a man for whom human life has almost no meaning beyond immediate dollar value. Finally, Ramirez plays Detective Santiago, the cop trying to pursue justice the old-fashioned way, by the book, without breaking the law.

Jeff Fahey has been a significant part of Hollywood for decades, having made his film debut in the iconic 1985 Western, Silverado. His breakout role came in the 1992 sci-fi horror film, The Lawnmower Man, though younger audiences surely know him best from his role as Frank Lapidus on the final three seasons of Lost, or perhaps his numerous collaborations with Robert Rodriguez, including – hopefully – the upcoming Alita: Battle Angel sequel.

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Screen Rant interviewed Jeff Fahey about his role in Due Justice and his ongoing friendship with various film collaborators over the years. He spoke about striking up a friendship with Don Johnson when guest-starring on an episode of Miami Vice, which led directly to his starring role in The Marshal. As he puts it, “If you stick around long enough, and you make a few friends, you’ll end up working forever.”

Jeff Fahey Talks Due Justice and His Decades-Long Hollywood Odyssey

Screen Rant: I’ve been a huge fan of yours for a long time. You get to have some fun in Due Justice! You get to be a bad guy, but you get to be one of those delicious bad guys.

Jeff Fahey: Yeah. A bit sophisticated! Against the grain of what he’s doing, actually, which I enjoy. First of all, it’s always fun to be the antagonist. You know, because you’ve got a lot more freedom in so many ways. Especially… What they write, but then what you can bring to it, which is always fun.

Screen Rant: How much of that jolliness was baked into the script, and how much did you get to bring to it? I’m thinking about how Kellan has to be this deadly serious bullet because his story is so serious, but you’re so flippant about human life, and you get to have fun with it.

Jeff Fahey: Javier had it written in there. The lines are there. I’m sure we moved and grooved with some of this stuff, but I think, if I remember correctly, because it was a while ago, but, first of all, it’s a joy to work with Javier. And it’s always a joy to work with a writer who is now directing. It’s their story. It’s their words.

It would be comparable to rehearsing a new play, where you have the luxury of developing during that period. But when you have a writer/director on a film, you don’t have the time to change things or move and groove things. Let’s say we were in Seattle, but if the writer was in Los Angeles, we’d have to get on the phone to talk to him. But it was a joy to have Javier be the writer and director.

And to your question, I think we worked very well together and just put a little humor; a little edge on something that was already there. I don’t want to take anything away from what he had written. I just jumped in and added a few things as it were, yeah.

Screen Rant: When you finally have that scene of all three of you together at the end, it’s like, “Ooh, I’ve been waiting for this!” Good stuff.

Jeff Fahey: You won’t spoil it by saying there’s a baseball bat involved. But you’re just not saying who had it! (Laughs)

Screen Rant: It’s always a big deal for me, personally, when I get to talk to someone who was on my favorite show of all time. You got to blow up the car in Miami Vice!

Jeff Fahey: Oh my God, yes. Do you remember the line I said to Don Johnson after I blew up the car, and I turned to him? “I guess I’m gonna have to give you boys a ride back to town!” (Laughs)

Screen Rant: Where were you in your career when you did that, and what was it like?

Jeff Fahey: I can tell you exactly where I was. I had just finished, I was in a very good place, because before that, I had done a couple of films, Silverado and I don’t know if I had done Psycho 3 at that point, I think I did. But what happened was, before that, I was in London, on the West End, doing a play called Orphans, a very successful play, written by Lyle Kessler, directed by Gary Sinese. It had come out of Steppenwolf (in Chicago) and they did it in New York, and then when they took it over to The West End in London, it was Albert Finney, and myself, and Kevin Anderson, directed by Gary Sinese. We had, maybe, five months of a great run on a very successful show. And I was asked by that group to come and do the show in Miami, so I literally got off a plane and went to the set.

I’d been on stage for five months. It’s always a great joy to go from theater to film, or to TV after theater, because it’s just a different beast and you have a lot more fun. It’s wonderful! To answer your question, it was fantastic! Just like this film, Due Justice, working with Elias, the producer, and Al, I think this is my sixth film with Elias, my fourth with Al, the producers, and it’s my second with Javier. He wrote Black Warrant, and it’s my first time working with him as a director. It was like going back to the family. They called me up and asked me to do it. I didn’t even read it. I said, “For you guys? Anything. I’m in.” Then I read it and thought, “Yeah, I’ll have some fun with this!”

Screen Rant: I always get the impression that if you work with someone multiple times, it means they want to have you back.

Jeff Fahey: It’s like working with Robert Rodriguez. I think we’ve worked together now seven times. And we’ll be working together again, hopefully in the summer. Fingers crossed that we’re going into Alita: Battle Angel 2.

It’s great, as I said. I’m looking forward to working with Javier again. Also, I don’t know how many films I’ve done that Saban has distributed. It’s really, as you say, it’s good when that phone rings and they say, “Can you come back?” It’s always a great joy.

Screen Rant: It was quite a few years apart, but going from Miami Vice to The Marshal, which Don Johnson produced. Was that a case of him remembering you, or were you buddies?

Jeff Fahey: It was, exactly. Don and I remained friends. We met on that, and we remained friends. He picked up the phone. He said, “Jeff,” and I remember, I was at the gym, it was a Friday evening, around five or six o’clock, he said, “Jeff, can you meet me over at ABC, at their executive offices over in Century City? I’ve got a show, it’s a great show, I want you to be the lead. Let’s go in and talk to the president of the network!” And that’s how it happened. It happened just like that, in a day. Boom. Next thing you know, we walked out of the office with a green light. That was Don picking up the phone, going back to Miami Vice.

Screen Rant: Did you bring him into Machete?

Jeff Fahey: No, no. It’s a wonderful thing, one of the many wonderful things about Robert Rodriguez, he’s a big fan, as Tarantino is, of a lot of the cats that they grew up watching. And that’s the case with Don, with Robert, and with Quentin. It’s the same with me and Robert. He was watching my films when he was a teenager. And that’s how he hired me. I guess the moral of the story is, if you stick around long enough, and you make a few friends, you’ll end up working forever. If you stick around long enough.

Screen Rant: You’ve had such an illustrious career, you’ve been in so much stuff. Is there anything in particular, that you felt so proud of, but maybe it didn’t get the attention it deserved, it kinda came and went, and you thought, “Oh, that’s too bad, I really liked that one.” Anything you want to shout out for the Screen Rant audience?

Jeff Fahey: Hmm, no, actually! Going on 48 years in the business, you just show up and deliver and do the best you can, and you know it’s in the hands of the gods, as it were, and if it hits the bullseye and it has a life, that’s fantastic. And if it doesn’t, you’ve always walked away with a new group of friends, with a new experience. You can be doing this for ten years or fifty years to sixty years, but you always walk out of a project knowing more than you did when you walked in. To answer your question, I don’t think about that. I just do the best I can, have a good time, and roll on down the road.

About Due Justice

In the heart-pounding thriller, DUE JUSTICE, former marine Max (Kellan Lutz) experiences a devastating loss when his beloved wife is murdered and his daughter kidnapped in a cold-blooded act of violence. Consumed by grief and driven by revenge, Max embarks on a relentless mission to hunt down those responsible.

Check out our other interviews here:

• Kellan Lutz
• Efren Ramirez
• Javier Reyna