Mike, Tommy and Kevin welcome on Vincent LaRusso to talk about everything from the old Mighty Ducks and the new. Vincent talks about going from being Larson to Banks, trying to live a normal life after success at a young age, giving it all up, long hair, coming back in Mighty Ducks: Game Changers, and so much more.
Executive producers: Elsie Barnett, Bryan Berg, Alex Ybarra, Josh Luecht, Bobby Lemaire, Rabbi Lex Rofeberg, Aaron Davis, Ed Scimia, Alex Vlahos, Joyce Eng.
Producers: Deborah Chen, Jeremiah Bersche, Adam Ferry, Jarrod Beasley, Lisa Wobig, Anthony Gioffre, Jeff Fantus, Matt Holtwick, Stevie Yanks, J.D. Youngblood, Chris Garland, Sarah Mihalopoulos.
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Transcript Highlights
Mike: “How did you first learn the old Ducks were coming back and how did you get the call to join them?”
Vincent LaRusso: “It felt like a build a little bit. There were a lot of anniversaries happening. I’ll get all the numbers wrong but we had the 25th anniversary of Ducks 1 and then we had the 20th anniversary of the NHL team. There were a lot things happening.
We went out to Anaheim at one point. They did like a PR thing for the Anaheim Ducks. And it was all based around these anniversaries, which were all just: “It’s been a billion years, let’s all gather again.” So it felt like a little bit of a build. It had been mentioned in the past. Ducks 4 was always mentioned. But after a while it just seemed like white noise.
I’m not in the business any more. I don’t have like a constant connect. I had an agent that I was friendly with through the years but I hadn’t spoken with her in probably 10 years. She shot me a text and said, ‘Hey, you’re on Acting Breakdown. They’re looking for you.’ Normally it says they’re looking for a “Tom Cruise-type.” I was like, ‘That’s very strange.’
Long-story short she said, ‘You’re on there. Do you want me to connect you?’ I said, ‘Yeah, sure.’ It’s always worth a conversation. They told me the story and, ‘This is what we’re thinking, and we would have you up in Vancouver, and we would shoot this episode. Nothing is confirmed.’ I hung up the phone and I turned to my girlfriend and I said, ‘This isn’t going to happen.’ Who knows? It was a fun phone call.
Then, I don’t know, it felt like within 36 hours I had a plane ticket. It just happened real quick. They made it happen.”
Mike: “You mentioned you’re not in the business any more. How did that affect your day job to go up to Vancouver and quarantine for two weeks and shoot and do everything?
Vincent LaRusso: “Because of Covid we were all working from home. I do food and beverage for a live theatre group that has theatres all over the country, so all of our theatres were shut. … I had admin work and stuff to do, but I wasn’t upside down, and everything I was doing I did from home. When I asked my boss, my CEO — he knows my history — ‘This is what’s come up, it’s kind of exciting. I have to quarantine so I’m going to be in the hotel room, I’ll be able to work.’ He was cool with it.”
Mike: “Did you know who was going to be there and what the plot was? How much did you know going up there?”
Vincent LaRusso: “I knew who was going to be there. I keep in good touch with Elden (Fulton) and Garrette (Guy). Elden is one of my best friends in my whole life. I reached out those people, like ‘what’s going on?’ People started confirming like, ‘Yeah I’m doing it,’ or ‘Yeah, she’s doing it,’ so I knew the people going up. I don’t think I’d seen the script. No, we got it in the hotel. I remember reading it in the hotel.
Mike: “What was it like to for you to be back, not just with all those people but acting and acting with Emilio again?
Vincent LaRusso: “The obvious answer — the red carpet answer — is that it was amazing. It was. But it was surreal. I’m sure you’ve had that word before if you’ve interviewed any of the other Ducks. It was truly surreal. Even though you know things are far away you don’t really think of things — at least I don’t — of being that far away.
When my college diploma got 10 years old, it was like, ‘Wow, how did 10 years go by since I graduated college.’ Things just happen very quickly. To have gone through a life where I’ve always felt that even though it was so long ago, it was within my reach, all of the sudden it was such a smack in the face that it’s been long enough that we are re-booting this. That’s how long it’s been. It’s not just a long time ago. It’s been long enough we have another generation doing a similar story. It was super surreal.
The one thing that I keep repeating to people that was significant for me was the fact that they rebooted it with new kids. It was like a time warp, because not only are you going back and wearing the jerseys and all that. That’s one thing. But now there are kids that are doing it and you almost see yourself back in time.
I wanted to run up to all the kids and say, ‘If this happens, do this. And then if this happens, ‘Do this.’ You want to give them advice for real life. I feel like I’m talking to my younger self.
Show Notes
Thanks to Vincent for coming on.
Elijah Wood played “Mike” in Radio Flyer. Garrette Ratliff Henson (Guy Germaine) played Chad in that movie. It has 33% on Rotten Tomatoes from critics but has a 72% from the audience.
Here he is rocking the longer hair:
Thanks to Dave for the first #QuackQuestion:
Thanks to Stevie Yanks for the second #QuackQuestion:
Thanks to CatsFanInOhio for the third #QuackQuestion:
Here is the Milk Bar Birthday Cake.