X2 JUNKET: ANNA PAQUIN (ROGUE), SHAWN ASHMORE (ICEMAN), AARON STANFORD (PYRO)

QUESTION: Anna, was it like a family reunion for you? And for Shawn and Aaron did you have to find your place in the family?

STANFORD: For me, these guys were in the first film and I came into it fresh, but I feel like I settled into the fold. Absolutely we were a family. I mean, we spent six months together. Everyone formed their own life there; their own routines, their own relationships. Yeah it was a big, big family.

PAQUIN: Family reunion, yeah.

QUESTION: Like you never left the other set?

PAQUIN: In like a really eerie way. Because these movies go on forever and after the first couple of days it felt like we hadn't really left. And it was also a lot of the same crew, because we're up in Canada again. A lot, in terms of the behind the scenes production end, a lot of the same, creative people. It was actually really nice. It was really great.

QUESTION: It was good to see the X-Men kids' powers come up. Can you talk about the individual powers that each of you have?

STANFORD: I play Pyro and he's got the power to manipulate fire. He can make it burn with any intensity or size that he wants to, or any direction, but he can't create it himself. He needs an external source of flame to begin it, like a match or a lighter or something. So, that's his little handicap.

PAQUIN: I drain people's energy if I touch them. If they're a mutant I take on their ability or their power, whatever that may be. So I don't really do anything spectacular because Rogue doesn't really use her powers very many times. So that's kind of it. I just wear a lot of gloves.

ASHMORE: I play Iceman. Basically his ability is to lower his core body temperature and then manipulate water molecules. You know, shoot it out in a stream of frost or create forms with it. Stuff like that.

QUESTION: Chill somebody's ice tea?

ASHMORE: Yeah, cold drinks. Whatever anyone needs. Good party trick.

QUESTION: Is it good to know that your characters will be back whenever there's a third one, because there's so much to do with everybody's characters.

ASHMORE: If there's a third one, I think there's an interesting relationship between the three of us. There's a bit of a love triangle going on. Obviously Bobby and Rogue are together and I think that causes Pyro a little distress. We were talking about this yesterday. Maybe that's why he's such an angry young man.

STANFORD: Maybe if he did better with the women he wouldn't be blowing up cop cars.

ASHMORE: Yeah, so there is a third and it all comes about I think there're some interesting things for us to go on. I think a lot of things were started in this film that will be interesting to continue on. The relationship between the three friends that happen to break off. They're all put through the same, sort of circumstances and you see how each character deals with that in a different way. I think it's interesting.

QUESTION: Anna, you say you don't do much with your powers but they do present an interesting dilemma in the film. Can you talk a little about that?

PAQUIN: Although I have what I think is possibly the lamest power of all of the X-Men they chose to have in these movies -- I really do nothing cool, you know what I mean? It's not spectacular in any way.

In terms of the emotional life of a character like Rogue, which you got to see a lot more in the first movie than you did in the second one, is because anyone she really cares about she really, physically has to keep far way from her, which is also, I think, is true in terms of regular people. Whenever you get really close to someone there's always a possibility of hurting each other. That's also a physical reality with her as well. That gives her a lot more depth than your average comic-book character, I think, in terms of stuff you get to do or explore.

QUESTION: Have you had any strange encounters with X-Men comic-book fans?

STANFORD: Didn't you get accosted outside a comic book store?

PAQUIN: Yeah, actually, I was with a friend of mine and we were buying like a Star Trek thing, because she wanted to get it signed by Patrick Stewart. So we actually had to go into the comic-book store. I thought it'd totally be fine, walk in, buy the Star Trek thing...

STANFORD: And you had the white stripe in your hair.

PAQUIN: I had the white stripe. Big mistake. Big mistake. Huge. Because I did get followed around the comic-book store and kind of refrained from leaving for about half an hour, which totally fine but I didn't realize quite how ... you forget about it for months and months and months and then you go into a situation where there happens to be someone who's really into the movie or the comic books. It's interesting. It's very news for me.

QUESTION: Don't you run the risk of having somebody go, "Poser. She thinks she's Anna Paquin?"

PAQUIN: I get asked a lot...people ask me if I look like Anna Paquin and I say, "yes." If they don't ask anymore questions, that's fine.

QUESTION: Aaron, your character displays a lot of adolescent angst through different mannerisms with his Zippo. Did you bring that to the set?

STANFORD: You mean like flicking the lighter? It was in the script that he's supposed to flick it on and off. He uses it as a device to annoy other characters really. But I think you're right, it does get to that energy of that age and constantly ready to pop.

But the actual little tricks that I did, like flipping it open or there's like a trigger trick that I do, Shawn actually taught me beforehand.

ASHMORE: Iceman taught Pyro his lighter tricks.

STANFORD: So there's a little irony for you.

QUESTION: Are your characters in the X-Men video games that are out?

PAQUIN: Someone said that we have cameos in them.

ASHMORE: Yeah, in the new Xbox game that's out. I haven't really played the X-Men games, but apparently the new one's really good. I was talking to my brother and he brought it right up, so I'll probably end up playing it.

QUESTION: For your video-game cameos, do you voice those cameos?

PAQUIN: I didn't.

STANFORD: No.

ASHMORE: Maybe they took lines from the movie? I'm not sure. I don't even know if they speak. It could just be sort of like maybe there's a mansion scene and we're all just sitting in a classroom or something. I have no idea.

PAQUIN: We have no idea.

QUESTION: I have a feeling we'll be seeing you guys in X-Men 3 and 4.

ASHMORE: It's possible. We don't know anything about the future.

PAQUIN: Nobody tells us anything.

ASHMORE: We get asked a lot about the third one and we're like, "This one's not even out yet, so I think we have to wait and see what happens."

QUESTION: Do you three have action figures?

ASHMORE: I know that I have an action figure. I saw it on the Internet the other day, and you had one last time.

PAQUIN: Yeah.

ASHMORE: It's really strange knowing that there will be toys out there and people will have like a miniature version of you, doing whatever they want. I used to blow up G.I. Joes with firecrackers, so I hope nobody does that to mine, but it's interesting.

QUESTION: How much does it look like you?

ASHMORE: It's really, really close. They did texture mapping, which is like a 3D scan and they just essentially plug you into a computer and make a mold and then send you off.

QUESTION: How scary is that, knowing that they've cataloged all of your features?

PAQUIN: They also do that in terms of the stunt stuff. If there's anything that they can't physically act an actor to do, they'll ask a stunt person and then digitally place their texture mapped body, which they can manipulate on a computer. Basically, like that movie Simone, where they created the digital actress, they've basically done that to all of us. So, if they ever chose to, not that they could...

STANFORD: Scary times.

PAQUIN: But like if we died mid-movie or something, like if we got involved in something dangerous on the set we died, they could finish the movie without you at least. … It's also very expensive, so they don't like to do it. It's kind of a strange thought.

ASHMORE: I'd like to think that directors like Bryan (Singer) probably wouldn't want to do something like that.

PAQUIN: He'd be respectful enough to get you to do a re-shoot.

ASHMORE: Yeah, get the natural performance as opposed to alter your performance digitally. But it's a scary thought.

QUESTION: You talked about X-Men being like a family. What about when you worked together on 25th Hour?

PAQUIN: There were three people in 25th Hour that did X-Men and none of us worked together on 25th Hour, and Aaron and I never worked with Brian Cox, who was the third person.

QUESTION: But it makes me wonder, even though it's a different type of film, whether there's a certain comfort level that you have when you work on the same films together even those it's different characters.

STANFORD: Well if we had worked together on 25th Hour I bet would have been very comfortable with one another.

ASHMORE: No, if we're on a different picture where we worked together it would be nice to have friends...

PAQUIN: Yeah, to have friends and to be comfortable around each other, because I think one of the main things I found about acting is that a lot of it is getting to know people and not feeling self-conscious and that's when I think people do their best work is when they're really open.

STANFORD: That's when communication happens, once you're comfortable.

PAQUIN: Because then your just sitting and talking to the person. You're not feeling self-conscious or strange or like they're going to judge you, because you already know them. It's all kind of relaxed.

QUESTION: On the merchandising end, I'm assuming we won't be seeing the Pyro lighters on the shelves.

STANFORD: Oh, I hope so.

ASHMORE: That'd be kind of cool actually.

STANFORD: I don't know. I don't know what they're doing.

QUESTION: Pyro has a line where he says, "I can't ignite the fire. I can only control it." Will he ever reach a level where he can ignite it? It seems like it would be something to develop in the sequel.

STANFORD: I don't know if he'll ever reach that point. He never did in the comic books. He's actually dead in the comic book. He died from the Legacy Virus. But no, I think that's one of the defining factors of that character is that he needs the external flame or he's nothing. That's his Achilles heel.

QUESTION: So where do you guys go from here?

STANFORD: I'll be doing some stuff back in New York. I just finished a dark satire called Rick with Bill Pullman, a small independent. Then I'm working on a film called Winter Solstice with Anthony LaPaglia, another small, family-driven drama.

PAQUIN: I have a film coming out some time this year, I think, called Buffalo Soldiers. I'm kind of taking a little bit of a break, or I have been for the last couple of months, from both school and work, which is very pleasant.

ASHMORE: I'm just sort of, now that this is coming out, looking for the next part. I want to try something different, whether it's small and independent or whatever. Just something different. I'm just looking for that right part that really feels like it fits.

QUESTION: What is it that you liked about living and working in New York?

PAQUIN: Everything. I think that there's some cities that, when you live there and you're really part of the kind of experience of being in a very exciting and very packed and very diverse city like New York, there's so much that influences your life. I feel like you have things to draw on. I think you get a lot of life experiences in a shorter amount of time living in intense places. Especially as an actor, New York has the whole benefit of a really strong theater community and that's a whole other range of opportunities that I think are really amazing for actors to do. I love New York. There's nothing like it.

STANFORD: You've got two choices, either New York or California. I don't trust anywhere where the weather is this pleasant all the time. I grew up in Massachusetts, on the east coast, so it's just unsettling for me. It's a pace of life and a style of life that I'm used to and it helps ground me.

QUESTION: Can people enjoy this movie without having seen the first one?

STANFORD: Absolutely.

PAQUIN Totally.

ASHMORE: We saw it for the first time on Friday and it's such a riot. It's a lot of fun. At the end of the day, there are certain inside things, if you're a comic book fan there's definitely, sort of little...

PAQUIN: In-jokes...

ASHMORE: Hints and little jokes and stuff, but at the end of the day I think it's a self-contained film.

PAQUIN: Especially because the plot, it introduces a new bad guy and a new whole scenario. In some way you see some characters growing and developing from the previous film, but it's self-contained within this two-hour period of time. That's really great. That's very hard to do when you're making a second film to achieve that.

QUESTION: But if somebody wanted to go out and get the DVD for the first one you wouldn't necessarily discourage that.

PAQUIN: Of course not. Especially the DVD 1.5 that has the additional bonus footage.

ASHMORE: What is the bonus footage?

PAQUIN: You guys talking about your parts.

ASHMORE: Really? No it's not.

PAQUIN: It's like the new cast members. They interviewed you guys and put it on the new DVD or something. I don't know. They were laughing about it a while back.

QUESTION: Were any of you guys comic-book readers?

ASHMORE: I was. I still, at my parents' house, have a big box in my old closet. And I did read X-Men and I watched the cartoon so I was aware of X-Men before I was part of this. So it was exciting.

QUESTION: Where are you in terms of politics, music and film?

PAQUIN: That's a very broad question.

ASHMORE: Politics right now, let's be honest. It's a turbulent time and it's difficult. We could get into it, but I don't really think it's worth it at this point. It's just too complicated. Everyone has different opinions.

Music-wise, I could list you some bands that I'm interested in. I love the new Audio Slave album, which is really great. That's the newest album I bought that I really like.

Film-wise, a variety of things. That's why I think being a part of something like this is really interesting. It's a fun, entertaining movie, which is great.

PAQUIN: It's a nice distraction.

ASHMORE: Entertainment's an important thing right now, escapism. A little bit of fantasy helps everybody.

QUESTION: X-Men is about tolerance and not fearing things that are different. What do you think the value is of entertainment exploring issue like that? Do young people respond to that element of it as well?

PAQUIN: I think that's the been role of theater and film and performance arts for as long as there have been, you know, back to like Greek times. The old, old, oldest plays that were ever written were this form of catharsis for people. You go and you experience something and it makes you think about things and maybe you won't need to necessarily go out and behave in a really aggressive way or do certain things because you've experienced them through art. Whether or not people realize that, I think that definitely it's a function that art can still serve, even if it's a film.

STANFORD: It's the hope to keep people interested long enough in something to communicate something to them.

QUESTION: Anna, have you had to work to get your Kiwi accent out?

PAQUIN: I'm bi-lingual, so to speak. If I talk to my mother on the phone, or my sister, or anyone at home, I sound completely like I'm from New Zealand and when I'm here I sound like I'm from here. It gets kind of tedious when you're buying a bottle of water in a deli to be like, having someone wanting you to explain your life's story and what your accent's from. It just takes too much time. Plus, I've had the best dialect coaches on the planet teach me to speak perfectly correct American English, which doesn't hurt.

X-Men 2
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