After appearing in Paul Haggis’ Oscar-winning drama Crash and television dramas like The Shield, actor Michael Pena clearly was set to have a successful career as a dramatic actor, but when he showed up in Jody Hill’s Observe and Report, more people started realizing how funny he was, which is why it’s great to see him back doing comedy in Ruben Fleischer’s 30 Minutes or Less.
In the action comedy, Pena plays a hired killer dubbed “Chango,” hired by Danny McBride’s Dwayne to kill his father (Fred Ward), which starts the ball rolling on a series of hijinks when Dwayne straps a bomb to a pizza delivery guy (Jesse Eisenberg) and forces him to rob a bank to get money to pay Chango. It is by far Pena’s wildest and craziest character to date, one with quirks and idiosyncrasies that are hard to explain, but he does tend to steal the movie from comedians like Aziz Ansari and Nick Swardson, who play Eisenberg and McBride’s best friends, respectively.
ComingSoon.net really wanted to talk to Pena to find out where Chango came from, so we sat down with the actor for a quick chat at this year’s Comic-Con, which you can watch below. (We also talked very briefly about his next comedy Tower Heist with Ben Stiller and Eddie Murphy.
30 Minutes or Less opens on August 12. Look for our interviews with director Ruben Fleischer and the rest of the cast closer to that date.
