Dayo Okeniyi plays Danny Dyson in “Terminator Genisys” out Wednesday.
Read what he had to say about the mega blockbuster below:
Q: Can you talk a little bit about the process of getting involved with the movie?
Okeniyi: It was a very straightforward process. I met with Ronna Kress, who was casting the project and she’s been an awesome casting director, been such a great champion in my career. She brought me in and said, “We’re doing this Terminator franchise. There’s a character in there for you and it’s the Danny Dyson character from Judgment Day.” She basically said he’s a lot older now and he has taken over the company from his father so they’re looking for somebody young and vibrant and someone who feels like a Steve Jobs, kind of intellect. I said, “You’re saying all the things I love. Let’s get this tape done, get me in there before anyone else can smell this role and start vying for it.” So I went in and it was such a great, collaborative audition process which I always love and I don’t know why more casting directors don’t go that route but two-three weeks later I get a call from [producer] Dana Goldberg and I got the part.
Q: It kind of sounds like once you heard about it you knew it had to be you.
Okeniyi: I just knew I could do it. I have a history with technology. I went to college for graphic design and advertising, you know. I know CSS, I know HTML, I know what it takes to build an app, you know what I mean? That tech world — I get that. A lot of the dialogue, you know they wanted to know if someone could come in and deliver that kind of nerd dialogue very convincingly and I was like, “Yes, me please. Yes, I got this.” There’s a very strong father-son relationship, you know. Danny really wants to please his father, he really wants to step into those big boy shoes. I feel the same way, I mean my dad’s shadow, what he’s accomplished in life looms over me. This guy came from nothing, straight poverty in Africa and Nigeria. And he didn’t have a pair of shoes until he was 17 years old. He went on to be a self-made man and put all his kids through school and put all his kids through college in America. Where I come from, Nigeria, that’s crazy. Everything I do, I want him to be proud of. There were so many parallels with Danny and myself. He’s the most like me of any character that I’ve played.
Q: That sounds pretty inspiring. I guess you basically saw yourself as a real life version of Danny Dyson.
Okeniyi: Yeah, just not a billionaire! Danny Dyson is a gazillionaire so…in spirit, yeah.
Q: How familiar are you with the previous Terminator films?
Okeniyi: Extremely familiar. I was a huge fan growing up, I mean, who wasn’t? Fans of the original movies are definitely going to watch this movie and see a lot of things that they can relate to and that they can remember. We pay so much respect to the originals and they’re great homages and great winks at the universe of the first two movies. I love the first two movies.
Q: You mention the first two movies. It kind of sounds like, with this movie, those two are the ones that matter and Rise of the Machines and Salvation, they may not play as much of a role in the chronology of the universe. Is that accurate?
Okeniyi: Yes. We’re really following after movie two, after movie one and Judgment Day, our movie is really inserting itself in there. And it’s not that it’s necessarily throwing away three and four, basically what it’s saying is that with this new time jump, it has erased that future, you know. It’s almost a reboot. I would akin it to something like the Star Trek franchise where, with that event that happens where Spock goes back in time. It’s not saying that it’s throwing all of that, Next Generation, into the trash. It’s just saying that now destinies have changed, and so the things that have happened in three and possibly Salvation, they still might happen but they may happen in different ways. The time continuum has completely changed. So anything is possible now. The future is completely re-written so that’s where our movie is going.
Q: It basically opens up a whole other universe where you could create multiple movies based on the ideas now.
Okeniyi: For sure, for sure.
Q: Which Terminator film would you say was your favorite growing up?
Okeniyi: My favorite growing up…I mean, the first one terrified me. The first Terminator as a kid was terrifying. So I enjoyed it but it was almost in a masochistic kind of way. It terrified me, it gave me nightmares, but it was still kind of cool, you know? But then the second movie was just pure fun, I mean…Judgment Day was one of the greatest Summer blockbuster movies with heart and characters you love that’s ever been made. Cameron did his thing. I loved them both but for completely different reasons.
Q: Yeah, I get that. So, Alan Taylor, the director, he’s obviously worked on some big projects. He’s been a part of Game of Thrones, Thor: The Dark World, can you talk about the experience of working with him on the movie?
Okeniyi: Awesome. Awesome, he’s the nicest person you could ever work with in your life. He never speaks above this volume, he’s always like this (speaking low), “Dayo, what do you want to do? Do you want to do your close-up first or the wide?,” and he’ll ask you questions…like, I’m just playing this little guy in this big movie, just a small cog in this machine and you’re asking me how you want to run the day? Do you want to do the close-up? He’s that collaborative. At the end of the day I just went, “Oh no no no! Whatever you want to do! Let’s just do that, I’m not a diva.” He was just the nicest guy, a super sweet guy. I admire him for that and I respect him for that. When people are juggling huge franchises with huge goals and a lot of money involved egos will flare and people start screaming on set, and people get uncomfortable. He was never like that, not with me at least. He’s a very great and very sweet guy to work with.
Q: Looking at the cast it’s amazing. You have Emilia Clarke, Jason Clarke, and then you have the original Terminator himself with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Did you get to act alongside them much?
Okeniyi: Well, here’s the deal. We’re doing…the idea, the dream is to do multiple movies. And it’s very hard to talk about my role because there’s a lot of spoilers involved in the part my character plays. That’s why you’re not gonna see a whole lot of him in the promotional material. Because any scene you see him in, he’s giving away so much plot so I can’t really talk to who I worked with because that’s a spoiler in itself. But I would say that in the first movie, he’s very small and he is setting up for a lot to come. And, you know, knock on wood, it all goes well, we get to see what it is he’s setting up for. So, yeah, it was very great. It’s very tough to talk about.
Q: With the script, what was the reaction after reading it? How did you feel about it?
Okeniyi: It was kinetic. That’s the only way I can put it. Usually what happens is I get the script and it’ll usually take two to three days to get through the whole thing. I’ll read a little bit today, put it to the side, read a bit the next day, until I get to the end. I was on a plane from L.A. to London and I had to read the script on the plane. And I read it all at once, beginning to the end because it moves. There’s a kinetic energy. I remember when it started I was like, “Whoa. This is Terminator 1.” I remember Terminator 1 so well that it’s almost beat for beat the first movie. And then something happens and then it completely just…goes in a completely different direction. And then you’re like, “Well, now I have to know.” And I remember I just read through the whole thing and I was like, “Yo, they have balls! They have balls! This is what they want to do?! Oh my God.” And I was down with it, I really was. Then I got on the phone with Dana Goldberg and they basically told me this is how it’s gonna go for the first movie and we really want it to be a self-contained great first movie and it expands and if we get a chance to make more this is what we want to do with the character’s story. And I was like, “Wow, wow, wow. That’s really, really cool.” So I was very game to come on board and facilitate a lot of set up, so to speak.
Q: Obviously, the Terminator franchise is kind of a big deal as far as franchises go in the world. Can you talk about what it means to now be a part of that franchise?
Okeniyi: It’s huge, it’s huge. I just want to speak to…it’s a great franchise. And in my opinion it never got the culminating end that it deserved. You look at The Lord of the Rings, you look at Return of the King, you look at The Hobbit, you look at The Battle of Five Armies, you look at Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, they’ve got such a great–you know, even the Ocean’s Eleven trilogy with Ocean’s Thirteen. They got the chance to come back and give it that finale that it needed. I just feel like Terminator never really got that. So I’m just happy to be a part of that with people who love the franchise and who love the story and are doing the best they can to wake up this franchise and then give it that culmination, that affirmation kind of a thing, that closure, is what I’m excited about.
Q: You’ve only really been doing the whole Hollywood thing for a few years now but within those few years, you’ve been a part The Hunger Games, Terminator, you’ve acted in movies alongside Justin Timberlake, Ben Affleck, Miles Teller, Shailene Woodley, Jennifer Lawrence. How does it feel to kind of just see everything coming together like it is?
Okeniyi: It’s amazing…it’s amazing. It’s kind of…it humbles you because you’re so close to the situation that you never really get the chance to step back and think, “Oh wow, I really am blessed and thank God.” And so when somebody like you says something like that it makes you think, “Oh damn. I only really have been out here for five years and done all that in a short period of time.” It’s crazy. At times you’re like, “I’m not doing enough, I should be doing more,” and it’s just like, “Shut up. Take your time, be patient.” I feel like I come from a generation that just wants it all and wants it right away. My dad says it all the time, “Young people don’t want to work for anything anymore. When we were coming up we thought to ourselves, ‘When I’m 50, I’ll be comfortable.’” They looked down the line to where they wanted to be later in life. My generation right now, it’s racks on racks, we want to go to the club, you know what it’s like? 21 years old…take your time. It’s like, nobodies patient anymore, everybody just wants it right away. So I definitely, I find myself thinking about times when I gotta step back and remember I’m blessed.
