Zoe Bell Talks Game of Death

By Sean Decker
February 17th, 2010

It may be an action film, although given genre badass and babe Zoe (Death Proof, Bitch Slap, Angel of Death) Bell’s inclusion, we thought we’d clue you in on her latest feature, director Giorgio Serafini’s upcoming Game of Death. Starring opposite Wesley (Blade) Snipes, Bell chatted with Dread recently regarding her turn in the Detroit-lensed film, which at present is wanting of a release date.

“It was a really interesting experience,” said the New Zealander, who in the past has employed her physical prowess as Uma Thurman’s stunt double in Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill films as well as Lucy Lawless' for the "Xena: Warrior Princess" television series. “There were a lot of obstacles during production. We ended up shooting the whole movie in fifteen days and the script changed a bunch of times. There wasn’t the luxury of rehearsals, but I learned a lot about communicating to people about what I need (as an actress), which is quite the opposite of how I work as a stunt-person. I certainly wasn’t the biggest name on the production so I had to figure out how to pick my battles and how to fight them. I mean, it’s my job to make sure that I give the best performance that I can.”

As for her attachment to the Jim Agnew/Megan Brown-scripted Game of Death, which stars Snipes as a diplomat’s bodyguard who teams up with a nurse to defend his ward from a team of ruthless assassins, “I wasn’t on-board from the start,” said Bell. “It wasn’t my project. I was definitely coming in as ‘staff for hire’, and I’m so used to being ‘grass-roots’ and being involved from the beginning, so I was like, ‘Holy shit, I just have to come and do my thing and then leave,’ and I was like, ‘Wow, I lose all control of the situation,’ so it will be interesting to see how it turned out. The DP (Erik Curtis) was awesome and they had a crack team in there so I think whatever we get will be phenomenal for the amount of time we had to shoot it.”

- Sean Decker