Mr. Trejo, it seems like you’re the kind of actor who is open to any kind of film. Would you say that’s true?
Oh, absolutely. It's kind of like being a house painter, you know? Whether it’s a two-bedroom house, or a 12-bedroom house, I’ll paint anything just the same. When somebody comes to me with a movie, I read the script and if I like it, I’ll do it. It doesn’t matter what the role is, really.
You have over 400 credits to your name on IMDb. You’ve even called yourself the King of Independent Films.
Let me tell you this, I’ve done my share of studio films, some of them were multi million dollar projects. I've done studio films where I've laid on the beach for a week because it was more expensive to send me home from Hawaii, so I just stayed there until my next job. Independent films, B-movies, they are acts of love. You ask an independent film director how they got their financing and they’ll tell you they sold their house or their parents took out a second mortgage… They’ve given up everything to get this movie made. They are an act of love, so I really like doing them for that reason.
“People would say I was getting typecast because I was always playing the mean guy, the bad guy, the robber, the Chicano guy with tattoos… I didn’t care. Look at me, I am the mean Chicano dude with tattoos!”
Even if the film isn’t as successful as a studio picture?
You never know! I got asked by this director, his name was Craig Moss. He had a movie he wanted to get done, and when he came to ask me if I wanted to take the part, I was waiting to hear back from another film, which was offering me a lot more money, right? But my agent and I talked about it and she said, “This one is low budget, no budget… But it looks like a winner.” And so that's all I needed to hear, we took it. That was a movie called Badass, and eventually it’s turned into a trilogy. I’ve made three times the money I was going to make on that other movie. So you’ve got to keep an open mind. I’ll really do any size project, and as you said earlier, I’ve played just about everything.
Is there a role you wouldn’t be interested in playing?
There’s really no role I would say no to, even if it was controversial, then it’s like, “Okay, let’s make the check bigger.” Let’s do it, I’ll play it! I think you can’t take yourself too seriously. And that’s how I’ve always felt, you know, even at the beginning of my career, people would say I was getting typecast because I was always playing the mean guy, the bad guy, the robber, the Chicano guy with tattoos… I didn’t care. Look at me, I am the mean Chicano dude with tattoos!
Being typecast doesn’t bother you?
Who else are they going to cast as the mean Chicano dude? I’m telling you, sometimes I go out to the market on Saturdays and people get scared of me because they recognize me as the robber or the bad guy from the movies. But the way I see it, I think everyone in the film industry is typecast in a certain way, Ben Affleck is the leading man, you know what I mean? It’s going to be tough to sell me as the babysitter. I am just happy to be making a living in this industry and having fun while I do it. You asked what makes me so open; I think I’m just having fun! My most recent film, Seven Cemeteries, that’s what it was all about, just having fun. All we did was laugh on set, and for me, that’s more than enough.
Kevin Smith recently said the same thing; that he doesn’t care about awards, he just wants to have fun making movies with his friends.
Absolutely. Awards, I mean… Just the fact that you’re in this business at all is an award. Before I got into the movie industry, I was a drug abuse counselor, working with heroin addicts in LA. Before that, I worked in construction. And before that I was in prison for 10 years. So something like playing a bad guy in a movie? That’s not hard, that’s just fun.
I guess you have the life experience to back it up.
I remember when we did Heat, Robert De Niro and Val Kilmer they needed to know how it felt walking into a bank with a gun… Michael Mann, he looks at me and says, “Okay, Danny, you’ve already done the training.” (Laughs)
“That’s all I want to do in life: be a good dad, make a good living.”
Does that happen a lot?
Sure, I remember being on set with this one director and he said, “We're robbing a poker game. I want you to kick in this door, rush in and rob it.” This was a scene with loads of stunt people around, so I kicked in this door and bam, I head butt this guy, I knock down a lady, and I run up to this other guy and put a gun to his face, shouting, “I haven’t shot anybody all day, make your move!” The director says, “My God, Danny, where did you study?” I said, “Vons Supermarket… Safeway…” (Laughs)
It seems like no matter how far you get in Hollywood, you’ll never forget your roots and where you came from.
Oh, yeah. I’ve seen people get so caught up in image and they abuse it and they’re gone. But I remember my daughter when she was being interviewed and this guy asked her, “Well, what do you think of your dad being this big movie star?” She looks at him and says, “He's just my dad.” When she said that, it just warmed my heart, because that’s all I want to do in life: be a good dad, make a good living. So yeah, I want to keep working, and the good Lord has provided me with a job that I can do for a few more years.