With a worldwide press tour about to happen for the stars the only press day they had for the Los Angeles press was yesterday. So even though we hadn’t seen the final movie, a number of journalists sat outside near the Van Nuys airport and asked Justin Long, Bruce Willis and Len Wiseman a bunch of questions on the challenges of making the movie and why bring back “Die Hard” now.

It’s an extremely candid interview about making this movie and it’s definitely worth your time. And when you read it below you’ll see a lot of mentioning about planes and noise, as I already said the interview was done outside by an airport… let’s just say it was an interesting place to hold a press conference.

If you’d like to listen to the interview as an MP3 you can click here to download it.

Also, in case you missed it, I interviewed Bruce Willis and Justin Long right after this press conference and already posted it. So if you’d rather watch a video interview just click here. A lot more is covered with Justin and it’s definitely worth your time.

“Live Free or Die Hard” arrives on June 29^th

Bruce Willis: All three of us are going to talk to you at the same time. [sounds of jets flying overhead and beeping of truck as it backs up] You couldn’t have picked a quieter place. Right? Unbelievable! [to Justin Long] Justin, c’mon buddy, double time. Hop on over. Quit flirting!  Here you go! [to Len Wiseman as Justin runs over to join them at press table] Runs like a chicken! C’mon buddy! Get in there! We gotta get Len back to the editing room so he can actually finish the movie. I’m Bruce Willis from RC Cola [holds up can of RC Cola]. We’ve got to play to the microphone [rearranges microphones]. How you doing? How’s everybody doing? You guys aren’t smoking weed out there, are you?

Unidentified Journalist: I’m smoking weed.

Bruce Willis: Nice. Well then, there goes my second question.

Question: In the first three Die Hards, it seemed like John McClane was a reluctant hero who didn’t really want to be in this situation. In the footage we saw last night, it seems like he’s kind of embraced his role as the action hero.

Bruce Willis: Really?

Q: Is that the case?

Bruce Willis: No, that’s not the case. All through it I’m reluctant. Now I’m extra reluctant.

Len Wiseman: I’m just curious. As we’re still making the movie, what made you think that he was not as reluctant?

Q: He really took charge in the shootout and just his reactions.

Len Wiseman: Oh well, when the man is pushed in the corner...

Bruce Willis: No, no. One of the things that a friend of ours said early on is – a kid named Jason Smilovic who wrote Lucky Number Slevin came up with the idea that the phrase ‘the mythology of Die Hard’ – and part of the mythology of Die Hard is that John McClane loves his country, loves his family, that he’s not going to let anybody hurt anyone that can’t really defend themselves which is I think the situation that you’re talking about in Matt’s apartment. [referring to jet heard overhead] That jet may be landing right here. Harrier jet. [shouting above sound of jet] I think given a choice being able to not have to do what I do in this film or in any of the Die Hard films, I wouldn’t do it.

Q: Bruce, part of what we saw last night was your character being a very protective, if not overprotective, father and I’m just wondering for yourself if you can relate to that aspect of his personality?

Bruce Willis: I can relate to it but that’s just kind of overly dramatized in the film. My relationship with my daughters is a lot more upfront than that. What we’ve done as parents is to try to send the girls out into the world with as much information about what those 16 and 18-year-old boys are thinking. We asked Justin…

Justin Long: And 28.

Bruce Willis: And 28 year old boys and 52 year olds boys are thinking and hopefully [shouting to jet overhead] that’ll keep them safe. But, yeah, it’s just dramatized in the film and actually the character of Lucy McClane was not in the original draft of this film. It was an idea that kind of came to us as we went along and Mary Elizabeth Winstead really did a great job in this film and brought a lot of her own kind of McClanisms to the film and helps out in a way towards the end of the film that is both funny and is a McClanism.

Len Wiseman: Where did the footage stop that you guys saw?

Bruce Willis: Right after, I think when he says, ‘You’re the criminal. You tell me.’

Len Wiseman: Oh, okay.

Justin Long: Right before our love scene.

Len Wiseman:  Before that.

Bruce Willis: Right before they first kiss.

Justin Long: I didn’t know how that was going to go down.

Q: Are you as involved in your own daughter’s life?

Bruce Willis: No, not at all. I just tell them I want to meet them. That’s the only thing that I ask for. I just give them that look, that little look, and you know what? I always put one of them in charge. If they bring a little group of guys over to the house, they have a pool party or whatever, I’ll just say ‘Dude, what’s your name?’ and he says, ‘Sinjin,’ and I say, ‘Sinjin, you’re in charge. If anything happens to one of my daughters, I’m coming to you first and then I’m going to kill all your friends right in front of you and you’ll be last.’ Yeah, so Sinjin generally is…

Len Wiseman: Sinjin

Bruce Willis: Sinjin, if you’re listening to this…  That’s the guy’s name.

Len Wiseman: Oh really. [Laughs]

Bruce Willis: That’s his real name. These kookie names they come up with.

Justin Long: I gotta say I had the good fortune of meeting them. They’re all very smart. They’re very elevated and very aware and wise. They both made fun of us.

Len Wiseman: They really did.

Justin Long: [to Len] Who was teasing you about that ring [referring to ring on his hand]?

Len Wiseman: Scout was and Rumor. They were making fun of my wedding ring.

Justin Long: But in a very witty, mature way. They were all very funny. They very aware and smart.

Len Wiseman: They are.

Justin Long: So someone did a good job.

Bruce Willis: Are all of you with the press corps or are just some of you out here having a picnic and you thought you’d sit in today? [Laughs]

Justin Long: They want to watch the dog fight?

Q: A two-part question. Bruce, could you tell us how you hooked up with Len, how he came to your attention, and Len, what was the most challenging thing for you directing a film like this compared to any of your previous ones? Was there anything surprising?

Justin Long: I’ll field that one.

Len Wiseman: Yeah, if you could handle that for both of us.

Bruce Willis: I don’t know. I can’t really remember what I was doing last week so to answer a question about something that happened a year ago. I’m just kidding. I remember. You know what? I just sat down with him and my daughter, Scout, actually told me that even before I met Len, before we sat down to talk about doing the film, my daughter, Scout, turned me on to Underworld and we sat up one night watching it and I thought it was great. It just so happened that a couple weeks later Fox asked me to sit down with him and it was a pretty easy choice to make. We both had similar ideas about and similar goals as to the kind of Die Hard we wanted to make. It’s really easy to sit here and talk about the film now because it really did turn out great. Unfortunately you guys only saw 20 minutes of it, but the film rocks. It’s actually one of my favorite Die Hards.

Justin Long: You mean you’re fourth or fifth. [Laughs]

Bruce Willis: [Laughs] The weakest link really was Justin.

Len Wiseman: [Laughs] I’ll second that. Genuinely.

Bruce Willis: But we both wanted to make a – to stay away from the CG aspects which would have been a real easy thing to do with a film like this – to try to compete with every other CG film that’s out this summer. And what was the second part of your question.

Len Wiseman: I can’t remember a thing.

Bruce Willis: For Len.

Q: What was the most challenging thing about this type of large scale action film?

LW: The scale of it wasn’t so much the problem. I found that it was honestly more fun to have the ability and the toys to use to do the action the proper way and all that so that was fun for me. I guess the most challenging would be because it is part of a trilogy and one that I’m very close to and the biggest challenge I would say is that I kind of have two responsibilities, I thought. One is to direct the film, the other is to watch it as the fan that I am. So I’d always look at it that way as that’s my biggest challenge when I’m in meetings, when I’m talking about the script, in every aspect of it, is this going to be the movie that I want to see because I’m only doing it because I’m a fan. Honestly, that was the biggest challenge. The other stuff was just – you know there can be headaches and they can be challenging but for the most part it’s fun to blow shit up and have the…

Bruce Willis: It’s the most fun.

Len Wiseman: It’s the most fun. It really is fun. That’s fun. So that was the biggest challenge for me.

Bruce Willis: It was a tough shooting schedule too. It was a really bizarre shooting schedule.

Len Wiseman: It’s still happening.

Bruce Willis: That’s okay.

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