Jemaine Clement is a Vampire

[size=150:3ssf7ody]Jemaine Clement is a Vampire
Words Jana Roose Photo Kane Skennar | September 8, 2014

For the first time in his career, Jemaine Clement has well and truly sucked – let us finish – blood. Clement and his frequent collaborator Taika Waititi (Boy, Eagle Vs. Shark), co-direct and star in this hilarious and endearing mockumentary about four vampires who are flatting together in Wellington. It’s in cinemas now, so be sure the check it out.

We chat to the Flight of the Conchords actor about the new vampire mockumentary below.

How did you and Taika first meet?
We met at university. The day that we met we did an audition for the review, which is a university stupid thing where people do sketches and stuff. I noticed him in the library – we noticed each other and we took an instant dislike to each other, just from the sight of each other. Mainly, what I remember is Taika kind of leaning over some girl, going over some book, wearing this Jamaican crocheted reggae hat, a Rasta hat. And I guess I thought he was pretentious because he looked so confident. He saw me and I was wearing a tapa cloth shirt – this was the ’90s – and he thought I was looking pretentious as well. And then we did the audition that night and I just found him really funny, the stuff he came up with was different.

Did you have to put up with a lot in your time in share houses?
I think the worst thing was one of our flatmates was doing her nails in the living room and one of the nail clippings went in the glass of one of my other flatmates. That wasn’t the worst thing. The worst thing was that she assumed it was me and then I kept hearing the story from other people, saying, “Oh, I heard you cut your toenails in the living room and your toenails went in her drink.” It was a slander. It was defamation.

Are you a method actor, did you do anything freaky leading up to filming?
If the character has a voice, I usually practice the voice, so I go around mumbling to kind of find the accent, like, [puts on thick vampire voice] “walking around the streets talking like this.” That would be the creepiest thing.

Who did you model your accent off?
You know a little bit of Bella Lugosi, a bit of Going to Greece, a little bit of various eastern European accents.

What kind of research did you guys do for the film?
We both know a lot of vampire films, so we knew all the rules. Really I got the one book I could find at my local bookshop which was really aimed at 14 year olds.

Wait, did you accidentally read Twilight?
I would never go that far. I’m dedicated, but there’s a limit. I saw the first Twilight.

Was that around the time of your short film, or was your short film first? Because all this vampire craze seemed to rise up at once.
Our short was a good four years before the Twilight films. But the fact that Twilight was around and True Blood and Vampire Diaries, and all that stuff was around when we were looking for funding made it easier to get funding. When we were first pitching it to people they were like, “Vampires? That’s kind of a weird, old-fashioned, retro idea.” And then at a certain point they went, “Yeah, vampires are cool now, yeah definitely.” And a little bit later people would roll their eyes as soon as they heard ‘vampire’. Over the years we could watch the evolution of a person’s opinion.

Your character in the film has a mixed success rate with hypnotism. Do you believe in hypnotism in real life?
I’ve seen someone get hypnotised so yes, I believe in hypnotism. I concentrated so hard so that I wouldn’t accidentally be hypnotised. I watched a hypnotherapist, so it wasn’t a stage-show hypnotist, but there is something they do with their voice where they switch into this hypnotic mode which is quite distinct from them talking.

What’s at the heart of the film for you?
I guess a lot of people think that it’s about friendship, but I think it’s about that no matter how long we get, we never grow up.

Having a career in comedy, is that something you relate to?
How dare you? This is over. I am ending this interview. (laughs) I just think that about my generation. Like, I go out and there’ll be businessmen who are my age skateboarding to work. But we talked about a lot of things when we were writing it, also prejudice and homophobia, things like that we used as analogies for what it would be like being a vampire, having to hide amongst society, or being foreign.

What’s the most you’ve laughed on any film set?
I actually think doing Flight of the Conchords during the band meetings, they would be the funniest, you can see on YouTube outtakes of us trying to get through those scenes and I am crying sometimes.

What’s coming up for you in the next year? What are you working on?
Just a little while ago I just finished acting in a movie [called Don Verdean] with Jared Hess;
we’ve worked together one time before. I’m playing an Israeli archaeologist slash goat herder. It’s a comedy, but it’s not as fruity as his other comedies. It’s a bit more tinted to the drama. His other films are Napoleon Dynamite, Gentlemen Bronchos and Nacho Libre, so they’re all very wacky. And this has a bit of that, but it’s slightly more in the real world.

Which vampire perk would you most like to enjoy in real life?
I’d probably go for eternal life I suppose. It seems pretty good. I’d be able to finally do those saxophone lessons.