I GUESS it's not really surprising to find an actor by the name of Diesel starring in a movie about fast cars, but what you may not know is that Vin chose the name himself and is very reluctant to talk about his early life.

Source: Hull Daily Mail, September 14, 2001, Page 6

LIZ HOWELL

I GUESS it's not really surprising to find an actor by the name of Diesel starring in a movie about fast cars, but what you may not know is that Vin chose the name himself and is very reluctant to talk about his early life.

I have seen it suggested that he was born Mark Vincent, but he became Vin Diesel during a short career as a club bouncer in his native New York, and has stuck with that ever since.

He first came to the attention of the rest of the world with his memorable appearance in Saving Private Ryan a little over three years ago and even young children are aware of his deep, gravelly voice, thanks to The Iron Giant.

Boiler Room and Pitch Black followed, but you can see him on the big screen in The Fast and The Furious, a high-octane thriller set around the illicit world of import car racing.

I grew up in New York, revealed Van when we chatted recently. I had a motorcycle in college, but outside of that, The Fast and The Furious was a training ground for the whole car culture for me.

Now, Vin prefers to drive a utility vehicle but then he is rather a big guy and he uses driving time for other things.

I need transportation time in LA to meditate, he revealed. That's the one time you are completely alone and you can roll up your windows or roll down your windows and listen to whatever you want to listen to.

So he doesn't get his own adrenaline rush zooming along the highway then?

Film gives me an adrenaline rush, he admitted. It's a cop-out answer I know, but that whole excitement of making something out of nothing and coming in with a collaborative effort to make a film is what does it for me. Especially to make a film like The Fast and The Furious that is multi-layered and has so many different exciting elements to it.

But, despite the energy of the movie, Vin doesn't really see himself as an action hero.

The whole idea of being labelled an action hero is interesting because it's a relatively new term, he suggested.

The Fast and The Furious is most similar to those 1950s films like Rebel Without A Cause and The Wild One. Back then, those actors, including Charlton Heston and Kirk Douglas, weren't considered action heroes. They were just actors.

I think one of the great things about The Fast and The Furious is, we were conscious we were making a film that paid attention to story and had very flavourful characters and very interesting character relationships, which is probably why the film did so well. I think the public's over the wham-bam, all-for-action, special-effects thing.

And for those of you who loved Pitch Black you might be pleased to know that a sequel is definitely on the way.

Yeah, The Chronicles of Riddick, he confirmed. I'm actually getting the script this week.

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