While many other sites like to say they were the only ones there when posting an interview, let me be very clear…this interview was conducted with around 12 or 15 other online journalists. So if you see this interview on other sites….that’s the reason. Sorry, it's a major pet peeve of mine when sites like to say they're the only ones there.

And about the interview...remember, this was conducted before any trailer was online and before Comic-Con. This was before anyone knew if the movie would be good or bad. As you read the interview or listen to the audio, you can hear a quiet confidence. It’s a great interview. Enjoy.

Jon Favreau: This is like an Austin Powers plot.  Now that I have you all in one room I’m going to seal the doors and keep everything a secret.

Question: It’s kind of ironic that you’re shooting in Howard Hughes’ old plant.

Jon Favreau: I know. I know. That wasn’t lost on me.  We figured we’d get some of the good spirit from the Hughes legacy here.   Gather around.  Get close.

Question: There was a mask on your blog yesterday that Iron Man is going to be PG-13?

Jon Favreau: A lot of times people say I make announcements, I’ll jump on the Iron Man movie group and if I see people talking about something or they have a question or they’re speculating I’ll clarify as best I could with pertinent information but I don’t really make announcements like that like here’s the big announcement the movie’s going to be PG-13. You don’t know but that’s what we’re all shooting for.  So when people are speculating I think when Fantastic Four 2 was given a PG and people were surprised and wondering what we’d be I said I thought we’d be PG-13. 

Question: What’s the reason for that?

Jon Favreau: Because you want it to be entertaining for everybody. You want it to be appropriate for kids but not geared towards kids and I think PG-13 is that good balance where you could have violence, you could have real life or death stakes, but yet it’s something that I’d feel comfortable bringing a younger than 13 year old kid to, but it’s tough.  These types of movies, you want it to be good for the whole audience, for everybody, and if you skew too young you sometimes disappoint adults and if you make it too dark and too violent or too much explicit language or sexuality to it there’s a lot of kids out there that want to see this thing.  I have a 6 year old who’s like dying to see the movie and I don’t want to see anything in there that’s going to make me as a responsible parent uncomfortable that he’s going to be repeating something in school or seeing something that’s going to freak him out too much.

Q: Is that why kept the alcoholism story out of the 1st one?

Jon Favreau: Me, honestly I’m sort of trying to really be dictated of the story of the books and so the demon in the bottle happened when…in the 80’s? It was much later and it started off in the 60’s so what you’re really grasp for it seems in success if you’re lucky enough to make more than 1 of these movies is what happens to the character, how does it change so it doesn’t feel like a serialized hero that goes through …fights different bad guys, how does he progress through each story?  The good part about an origin story is you have the whole Joseph Campbell journey that the guy goes through in becoming a hero.  The problem is you have so much story to tell that it starts to get clogged up with too much stuff and then you end up rushing through beats or  villains or things. The problems with the 2nd and 3rd ones are you have great villains. Everybody knows who the guy is but how is he different from the endings—the beginnings and endings of the movie and for me as a film maker and a story teller I really look for that whole progression and character as the…what’s the mythology of this movie?  What’s the myth that you’re telling and that’s what makes it entertaining I think.

What are the fights going to be like with that big iron suit?  How does that change the way you film the big fights?

Jon Favreau: Well, as far as the technology you use, it’s pretty…you know, we really have all the options.  We have ILM and after seeing the last Pirates movie I really feel quite comfortable that they could make it look good, you know.  Then you have the Sam Winston suit that you have that to make it feel real and connect things and I think you have to do a bit of a shell game with the audience.  Showing real in one shot, fake another shot and not let them know where one shot becomes real and digital until their left brain is so locked up worrying about it that their right brain can enjoy the movie.

I guess I mean a movie fight when he knocks the guy into a wall. How is that with the armor?

Jon Favreau: I think you always have to look for fancy things to do. I think you have to innovative in the action.  There’s a lot of movies I saw and enjoyed where I couldn’t follow the story and didn’t give a damn about the story but because the action was so innovative it entertained me. I was excited by it.  Honestly, these types of films you’re working on the action long before you’re working on the dialogue.  You’re working with story board artists, with writers, with actors, producers, studios.  Can we see if we can keep everybody quite over there who’s close by?

You mentioned that Iron Man is a unique hero in a way because he’s kind of a guy like Batman in a way but who creates himself, creates his own superpowers. Can you talk about what the story is about for you and the character?

Jon Favreau: Well, the story for me is about a guy who’s…I think in every movie there’s something rotten in Denmark.  You know, you have to sort of start off with something’s out of balance in the world.  In Marvel movies especially you look at the personal life of the character in the microcosm and then you sort of look at the macrocosm of the climate of the world.  There’s a super villain doing something. There is a problem in the world that has to be fixed otherwise life as we know it will not exist.  But then also in the character’s personal life, there is that sort of thing that happens too and what’s nice about Tony Stark is that he’s a guy that you have all the flash and glamour of Tony Stark, billionaire, inventor, genius and playboy and you get to play the fun of that but then you also get to explore what that might leave to be desired.  How is he flawed?  How does he grow and change through his captivity and when he comes back, how does he become Iron Man?  What are those steps in the journey that gets us to the point where we understand who he is, what he stands for and how he’s changed?

Hey, Jon, can you tell us what the set is and what you’ve shot here already?

Jon Favreau: This is his…this is the beginnings and his workshop and the beginnings of what will be the hall of armor.  This is below his house. We built a house that sits on the bluffs overlooking the Pacific up in Malibu, Point Dune and we have another set that we’re shooting on today that sort of sits above this sort of an architectural  high tech home and this is his sub-basement, so out those windows you would see  the Pacific Ocean.  That’s a driveway up to the outside of his house. He has all of his…just these awesome cars, everything from a ’32 Ford Roadster all the way through a Tesla Electric Car.  We have everything here lined up—a Selene super car.  Just great, great cars.  Shelby Cobra. Then over here is the remnants of what was a really well …everything you could possibly need for fabrication, design. You could build anything in here and this is area was more of a living area so this is just sort of where he would seclude himself and we sort of suggest that all of the innovations and inventions that come out of Stark’s mind usually start alone here as opposed to…you know he’s got his office—Stark Industries but this is probably where most of his work happens at 4 in the morning.

Can you talk about Obidiah Stane the casting of Jeff Bridges?  It looks great, it’s pretty cool but do we see Iron Monger?  Is he Iron Monger?

Jon Favreau: You’re going to wear that shirt and ask me  if we see Iron Monger?  You’re not getting enough information, is that the problem?  You need just a little more to go on? 

Jeff says that the relationship…he says the relationship is of a mentor. And  we’re not going to be talking about this for a while as we’re under embargo …

Jon Favreau: Oh, you are?  Here’s the bottom line—we’re making a Marvel movie and this is the first time Marvel is making it’s own movie.  And so I feel also as a filmmaker I like to…I have a certain…I want to stay true to the books.  But with these movies everybody’s watching for…I’ve been working on this thing for a year. It’s going to be another year before it’s out and if everybody figures everything out along the way, it gets to be…by the time you see the movie, you feel you saw  the movie already. So, we try to put enough twists and turns and things in there to keep you guys…have something that you guys don’t know as we go forward.  But by the same token because it’s Marvel, I want to stay as true to what the broad strokes of the comic books are.  So is he a mentor to Tony Stark, yeah that’s sort of the relationship we found between Jeff Bridges and Robert Downey, that would be good.  Is it still Obadiah Stane?  Yes, it is.  Are there certain expectations people might have that have read the comic books for several decades based on who it is? Are they going to be waiting for another shoe to fall?  I think they probably will.  And I think that we’re not going to change the universe so much that to the purist it will seem like we’ve betrayed the underlying truths of it… so if you’ve done your homework on the books it’s going to serve you well when you go into the movie because we’re doing it too.

Can you talk about the undertaking for you in terms of taking on all this action sequence which is a little different for you?

Jon Favreau: It is and we have a great 2nd unit.  There’s a guy named Phil Neilson who’s directing 2nd unit probably as we speak.  If you hear something blow up he’s probably on the other set blowing things up.  We’ve been very, very lucky to have a group of people that are very good at developing and calling the action.  I don’t want to sit here and pretend that I have a huge action experience.  I think I can tell a good story.  I think cinematically I can make something compelling.  Matty Libatique is a great director of photography, but what I’m bringing to the table is more the humanity of the story.  Enforcing rules on the story as well that where it doesn’t feel like 2 completely different films. There is the possibility that it goes from swingers to Power Rangers and everybody like what am I watching?  The trick is to sort of bring up the human story to a world where it feels like it’s a comic book—it fits into the genre.  And then keeping the action aspect of it, I wouldn’t say restrained but hold it up to a certain standard of reality that you have a broadness that you expect in a comic book movie but it’s not like just do whatever the hell you want because it’s a movie and everybody just wants to eat popcorn. So I have a certain…I think in my body of work I’ve held it to a certain standard.  Now in making something that has to be appealing to a much larger audience then I’ve really hit before I want to make sure we’re giving everybody what they want and making it fun and exciting but also making it something I can be proud of.

Can you talk about what Robert Downey Jr. brings to it?  He’s an unusual…

Jon Favreau: When we cast Robert, when he was approved and we got him to be in the movie and Marvel gave it it’s ok, it completely freed me because I knew that I was half-way there to having a movie that I could be proud of.  I can’t think of anybody better than him.  He brings a reality, a humor, a panache, you know, a life of experience where he really feels like what he’s brining to the table.  There’s a lot of Tony Stark in him and it’s so much better than trying to teach somebody to pretend that they are funny or pretend they are smart, or pretend they are talented, or pretend that they’ve lived with fame and lived with all the challenges and benefits of it.

Jon, you yourself look a lot different than we saw you last.  Has the job been that stressful? 

Jon Favreau: Let’s put it this way.  I’ve wanted to lose some weight for a role, yeah.

So it would be acting, not directing?

Jon Favreau: Yes, it’s for life and I just turned 40 and I just had a baby less than a year ago and I did the math and I said I’d better take care of myself because I want to be around.

You look great.

Jon Favreau: Thank you very much.

Can you talk a little bit about the fans?  Are you hearing from them?  Are they giving you notes?

Jon Favreau: Yeah, the fans are great. 

Did they like the picture when they saw the picture?

Jon Favreau: They’ve been great about everything. They really have.  It’s almost like…you almost want something to be a little … you want them to have a problem with something early on to get it out of the way.  Fans for any movie is important.  For this particular type of movie, that’s the nucleus of your audience.  I don’t know if the Internet is something that could be seen as dictating the marketplace.  I don’t understand how that works yet.  I know that as a filmmaker I get the fans of this particular genre are very smart and know more in certain cases than the people that are working on the movie as far as how much and specific their information is.  So I like to go there and get the menuche of the detail in certain cases because it’s a great…it’s like Wikipedia, you know, it’s a collection of information from a lot of people that tends to bear out in a very cogent way.  There are certain people that are idiots but they’re not…they don’t tend to be drawn to this material that much.  They tend to give a damn and most of the stuff I see is thank you for caring so much about it.  I’ve been waiting for this movie for 20 years.  I’ve been waiting for 10 years since I heard they were going to first make this.  This was my particular favorite superhero and its nice to see it’s getting this type of treatment and this type of cast and when they first hear it’s made they get excited then they hear who you’re casting and they so oh, this might actually be one of those types of superhero movies not the other kind of superhero movie, you know.

In terms of telling stories, what lessons did you take from not just Marvel movies, but comic book movies in general?

Jon Favreau: I think Nolan is just really…reinvented the genre yet again. I really liked the first Batman movie—the Tim Burton one was very exciting but the caliber of cast he was able to get, the level of storytelling and acting and the sense of fun that was maintained with a character that I thought was completely picked over by the time they did their last movie before that.  They were able to hit reset and come with that and make it fresh again excited me because it said that it sort of said to me that there’s…the sky’s the limit for who you could get and a filmmaker with that background it’s nice to have all these guys come out of independent films who are finding a way—who don’t resent big movies—it’s not like the 70’s where it’s like the system is keeping us down.  We’re people who grew up loving movies and the reason we’re doing small movies is we don’t know any better or have the resources.  So as you see Peter Jackson or Chris Nolan or you see Brian Singer—finding a way to bring integrity and a sense of fun to these big movies where you feel like you’re watching a good movie and it’s not one where the director is doing apologetically, they’re doing it because they love it and they’re excited by it.  Then I get to play with all the toys, build the suits, do the CG, build all these great sets. For me that’s what it’s all about and I think it’s kind of the indy background where all you have is character. That’s your car chase.  Your car chase is a funny scene, you car chase, your big explosion is 2 people having a conversation that’s interesting.  It’s sort of sharpens those tools so by the time you have all these great story board artists and designers and CGI wizards coming in you’re not relying on that and you’re not just hammocking between those set pieces, you’re able to actually bring the same…when I’m here with Gwyneth and Robert I would be working with them the same way if I had written the spec script and was shooting it for a million bucks.  You bring that same sensibility to it and hopefully, I don’t want to lie to you, like I know, I hope it all comes together in a way where it feels of one movie but yet it’s not insulting the smart people and it’s not inappropriate for me to bring my kids to as well.

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