BY DAVID SERVER | I had the chance to sit down with Big Red himself, aka Ron 'Hellboy' Perlman here on the Prague set of Guillermo del Toro's currently filming 'Hellboy' flick. I interviewed Perlman while he was still in make-up as HB (which is, by the way, absolutely stunning to behold), so try to imagine these answers coming from not just Ron but Hellboy himself, because that was how I got them!

CD: How is production coming so far from your standpoint?

Ron Perlman: Real smooth. Really smooth. It's a lot of people who've worked together before, because Guillermo directed Blade II here [in Prague] two years ago, and it was superb people on that show, he got as many of them back as he could, so it was already a prefabricated family. And this is kind of a labor of love on Guillermo's part, and his enthusiasm and his passion has filtered into pretty much every facet of production, even though it's a very hard, grueling schedule, people's joy and desire to break their asses and get it the way he wants has never really flagged. They've gotten tired, but everybody feels like it's a very worthwhile endeavor.

CD: Now that you've been doing it for a while, how is it working under the heavy Hellboy make-up?

Perlman: This is about my 12th job in a four hour make-up kind of thing, so there were no real surprises, it's just that I'm working with the very, very best, so the process was a little bit more meticulous than anything I had worked on. The process was a little more time consuming, and then you look at it on camera, and you realize why so much care has to go into it, because it's almost alchemy, what the people at Rick Baker's are able to accomplish. This is a very inanimate piece of polyester that covers me, head to toe, and on camera it has a life, there are no adjustments that I have to make because I'm wearing a mask, it mirrors my emotions, even if I'm just feeling it, perfectly. It's expressive, it's fierce, it's powerful, it's sexy, it's gorgeous. And it's as alive as any makeup I've ever worn. Which makes my job so much easier, all I have to do is just play it the way I would play anything else, and I know it's coming through. From the very first time I saw it on camera, I realized that, 'I don't even have to think about this, all I have to do is wait for four hours while it goes on, and someday says action and somebody says cut.'

CD: Is this the first time that you've been working with a tail?

Perlman: To my knowledge? Yes. Do you mean have I ever had any tail?

CD: Yeah...I mean no! No, that's not what I meant...

Perlman: Heh heh, but yeah, I've never worked with a tail, that I can remember. But there's so much I can't remember...[laughs]

CD: How is it like working with Hellboy's massive stone hand, the Right Hand of Doom?

Perlman: It's cool, man! The boys from Cinnovations [Rick Baker's Effects company] said 'gee, we're really grateful for how much care you take with the mechanical hand', which is very expensive, a very sophisticated piece of equipment, and I said 'Dude, that's my right hand!' I mean, it's such a privilege to be the guy playing Hellboy, and everything about it is cool, so it's the gratefulness that basically leads me through every day, and it's not hard cause he's just really cool! He has a granite hand! He's a bad ass dude!

CD: Heh, well said. Can you tell us a little bit about working with Doug Jones, who plays Abe Sapien in the film?

Perlman: Doug is like one of those guys that's kind of too good to be true, he's that nice. He's that self-effacing, he's that unpretentious. He's a total craftsman, which you have to admire, all wrapped up in a guy who has as few rough edges as anybody I've ever met, and he was working under much more difficult conditions than me on my worse day on this picture, and he did it with so much integrity, so much nobility, and so much enthusiasm, and *never* ever complained, I mean he's just a total pro, and a really nice man, and gave what I think is a performance that is gonna make all the Abe Sapien fans out there really be delighted.

CD: How was it working with Selma Blair?

Perlman: Well, she's Liz Sherman! Like, one of those things where Guillermo made something jump off the page seamlessly, and have three dimensions. And she's also a really cool chick, Selma. You don't know what to expect because she's pretty hot in her career right now and yet she's your average joe, y'know, fun to be around, doesn't take herself seriously at all, very dedicated to the work. And a lot of laughs.

:::At this point, Ron briefly but politely put the interview on pause to go and give his stunt double Todd Bryant some tips on how Hellboy is supposed to move. After some helpful pointers and some time in front of the playback monitor with Guillermo, Perlman returned to continue the interview:::

CD: So as Hellboy, you get to use and wear a lot of neat prosthetics, costumes, props...do you have a favorite?

Perlman: My favorite prop, that I've ever used in my *life* that I used on this movie, was the horn-shaver [Ed. Note: Hellboy uses a buffer-like 'horn-shaver' to file down his forehead horns to stubs]. Unbelievable. It was an amazing little piece of technology, just a throw-away gag, it's in the movie for like 10 seconds maybe. But it was an amazing prop, just amazing. I could go as far with it as I wanted to and it was totally safe. Plus it looked bitchin'.

CD: Do you have a favorite set?

Perlman: Well, Hellboy's den of course. I mean, that's it. I love my bed, it's the back of a pick-up truck...

CD: Seriously?

Perlman: Oh yeah.

CD: Could you talk a little about the prosthetics they put on you when you're Hellboy bare-chested?

Perlman: Well, first of all, it's really, really gorgeous to look at...very sexy, anatomically, like Leonardo da Vinci in terms of its accuracy. The things that are amazing about Rick Baker's work is that it serves all masters. It's very comic book, yet incredibly life-like and just never calls attention to itself. And it enables me, and I have pretty lousy posture, I'm an older guy, I'm not like a 23 year old hunk, that it enables me to stand naturally, and I'm just gonna look perfect, no matter what I do. And it goes for the body as well as the face. If I overact, the mask takes the stink off. If I under act, the mask takes the stink off. There's a truthfulness about it, and I don't know how they achieve that, but I do know that whenever I look at any kind of playback, I think 'Man, I really thought I went way too far on that', but the mask neutralizes the bad choices, and it enhances the weak ones. So it's just nice to be able to have that much less to worry about when I'm, playing the part.

CD: Have you been pleased with the dailies that have been coming out so far?

Perlman: Well, I haven't looked at dailies, I watch a lot of playbacks just to make sure that it's looking like it's feeling, but I've never worked with a anybody in 30 years who I trust more than Guillermo. I'd rather not look at the dailies, because if I get over analytical about what I'm doing, as he puts it, I'm driving the car while I'm thinking about driving. So, he'll tell me if there's a problem, and we haven't had any real problems so far, we haven't had to reshoot anything so far. So if he digs it, I'm, happy.

CD: Do you have any specific message for all the Hellboy fans eagerly counting down the days until Memorial Day weekend, 2004?

Perlman: I think you're all gonna be really really jazzed. I hope you are, but I really suspect you will be.

And with that, Ron (or should I say Hellboy) had to return to his duties as a demon battling member of the BPRD and resumed shooting. Look for more Hellboy set coverage here at CountingDown, including a full 4 day run down of the time I spent in Prague on the set!