The Running Man star Colman Domingo reveals Jerry Springer inspired his game show host
Colman Domingo has revealed his villainous game show host in 'The Running Man' was based on the late Jerry Springer.
Colman Domingo’s villainous game show host in ‘The Running Man’ was inspired by Jerry Springer.
The 55-year-old actor portrays ‘The Running Man’ presenter Bobby Thompson in director Edgar Wright’s upcoming thriller movie, and Domingo has revealed he based the character on the controversial late talk show host.
Speaking with Fandango, he said: "Edgar and I were talking about all the differences of game show hosts and TV hosts, period, of different shows … I remember the documentary [‘Jerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action’] just landed and I thought, ‘This is interesting.’
"Someone who was just a guy with a role, and then he started to take off and started to feed into it as well and sort of bring out the worst in people in many ways. But also felt like he was not complicit at the same time."
The ‘Sing Sing’ actor didn’t just take inspiration from Springer, even if a lot of the late host's characteristics were incorporated into Bobby Thompson.
Domingo continued: "That’s interesting how he plays with the audience, how he gets the audience in the palm of his hand to the point, you know, yelling out ‘Jerry, Jerry, Jerry.’
"Someone who wasn’t very well known but then made everyone believe he was, which was interesting.
"So there is a lot of inspiration, but there are a lot of hosts in Bobby."
‘The Running Man’ - which is an adaptation of author Stephen King’s 1982 dystopian thriller novel of the same name - follows the desperate Ben Richards (Glen Powell) who signs on to participate in the TV game show ‘The Running Man’, where enemies of the state have to evade death at the hands of the game's stalkers to try and win their freedom.
‘The Running Man’ - which also stars Katy O’Brian, Emilia Jones, Michael Cera and Josh Brolin - will be the second cinematic adaptation of King’s book, with the first ‘Running Man’ flick hitting the screen in 1987 and seeing Arnold Schwarzenegger portray Ben Richards.
Recently, Powell revealed ‘The Terminator’ icon gave him his blessing for ‘The Running Man’ remake.
The ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ star told People: "Arnold gave us his blessing. Patrick Schwarzenegger is a great friend of mine and I asked Patrick if I could talk to Arnold and I hadn't seen Arnold since we shot ‘Expendables’ in Bulgaria.
"Arnold gave us his full blessing and we get to give Arnold a very specific fun gift from the movie in a couple of weeks here. So I'm very excited to see him."
Meanwhile, Wright said his version of ‘The Running Man’ would be a closer adaptation of the book than the 1987 flick, and vowed his film would be a "very intense, dangerous movie".
Speaking with Empire magazine, the ‘Baby Driver’ director explained: "One of the things about the book that I loved was the fact that Ben Richards is out in the world on his own, so it’s like the deadliest game of hide and seek.
"It does feel like making a road movie in a lot of ways: a very intense, dangerous road movie. Ben is moving through different environments and meeting different people as he tries to survive 30 days out in the wild."
