Even though his name might not be widely known yet, I guarantee you’ve seen David Dastmalchian on the big screen at least once before. In an acting career that’s already bordering on legendary, the man knows how to pick a project that will enhance his idiosyncratic brilliance into something truly remarkable. Whether he’s a supporting character or a leading man, Dastmalchian is always memorable.
His first film was “The Dark Knight,” in which he played the Joker’s giggling psychopathic henchman Thomas Schiff. Other credits include multiple films with Denis Villeneuve, like “Prisoners” and “Blade Runner 2049,” and playing Piter De Vries in “Dune,” as well as Kurt in the first two “Ant-Man” movies, Polka-Dot Man in James Gunn’s “Suicide Squad,” and more recently, supporting roles in “The Last Voyage of the Demeter” and “Oppenheimer.”
Dastmalchian’s newest film has him front and center, carrying every single frame of the movie with what looks like an effortless confidence. The film is “Late Night with the Devil,” a genuinely fun and spooky flick about Jack Delroy (Dastmalchian), a late-night talk show host in 1977 whose show is struggling in the ratings and very close to getting cancelled. The film is built around the master tape of the Halloween evening episode of the show, which just so happens to land on the first night of sweeps week. Delroy is desperate for good ratings and has an episode packed to the gills with psychics, skeptics and a young girl who is apparently possessed by a demon.
Without delving into spoilers, “Late Night with the Devil” is easily the best horror film of the year so far and the creepiest possession movie since 2013’s “The Conjuring.” Written, directed and edited by the great Cameron and Colin Cairnes, the film has delicious ‘70s vibes, a charismatic and complicated lead performance by Dastmalchian and enough bat**** insanity in the third act to make “Late Night” a ridiculously entertaining throwback to the best of Vincent Price and Bela Lugosi.
This is the perfect movie to show friends and family that are just starting to dip their toes into the horror genre and don’t want to get mentally destroyed just yet. But as fun as the film is, Dastmalchian gives Delroy such an empathetic and heartbreaking center that “Late Night” never strays into disposable entertainment.
I had 15 minutes to chat with Dastmalchian and it was an absolute delight. Here’s what we talked about.
Rasic: “Late Night with the Devil” is an incredible film. One of the things I thought was so fascinating about your character of Jack Delroy was that he started in radio before becoming a talk show host. When you were going into building the character, did you start from a place of coming up with a radio voice or a different kind of voice first?
DD: That's really interesting. I didn't think about it that way. What I did think about, though, was the Chicago roots, the fact that he was a local guy. But there's a musicality, there is a tenor to the voice of a late-night talk show host in the ‘70s that does come from that tradition of radio. So, I don't think consciously that I did that, but what I did do consciously was try to capture that jazz that I feel like those talk show hosts had in their delivery. It's like watching stand-up from the ‘70s and early ‘80s, like watching Johnny Carson do his monologues or watching Dick Cavett talk to the camera. It's just a different style, right? Yeah, I didn't even think about that, but you're right. I do think I could do a decent job if I was like in radio.
Rasic: I know you have a deep love of the old horror movie show hosts and you brought that level of comfort and trust where you're like, “I know you're going to show me something bad, but since you're with me, I guess it's okay.”
DD: You know what's crazy, dude? (I don’t know) if anybody out there realizes the Cairnes brothers let me throw a little improv nod to Svengoolie -- one of the greatest horror hosts of all time -- in the opening monologue. I give a shout out to my parents back in Berwyn, Illinois which is where Sven is from. I love horror books, I love that whole culture. I love that subgenre, the gallows humor, and all that was stuff that I wanted to infuse into “Late Night with the Devil” and Jack Delroy.
Rasic: I was trying to describe the film to somebody recently and I remembered back when ‘Drag Me To Hell’ came out, Sam Raimi described the movie as a Spook-A-Blast and that was the first time I'd ever heard that description. I think “Late Night with The Devil” is totally a Spook-A- Blast because it takes you on a trip, but it's fun and scary instead of like deeply wounding and psychological.
DD: Dave Dastmalchian is excited that people are calling this movie a Spook-A-Blast!’ I am so excited because it does all the things that I want to do with movies. I have my own company, Good Fiend films. We're co-producers on this film. I think that taking genre and giving an audience an opportunity to be scared, entertained, to laugh, to escape, but also to think about and wrestle with really complicated ideas, is possible through the magical medium that is movies.
Rasic: Could you tell from reading the script that tonally it was going to have those vibes to it?
DD: Yes, the Cairnes brothers accompanied the script when they sent it to me with this beautiful look book that they had been working on for a long time, which they had cobbled together all this collaging of imagery and ideas from the ‘70s. They even made it look like an old TV Guide from the ‘70s. They photoshopped my face into stuff. I was like “Oh, these guys get it, man. They get it. This is like one of those made-for-TV horror movies of the ‘70s, like “Burnt Offerings,” you know?”
Rasic: Your first film set was “The Dark Knight,” so starting with such a giant experience like that, when you’re going onto a new set, do you still feel nervous and all the pressure?
DD: I always get the nerves. I can never sleep the night before the first night of filming. I still get scared. And I think that's a good thing. I don't think anything is worth doing in this world, especially not art, unless it scares the living s*** out of us. So, I'm just going to keep trying my best to gather the courage and walk through the fear just like I did the first day I went to “The Dark Knight,” just like I did the first day I went to “Late Night with the Devil,” just like I'm going to do on every project that comes up. It scares me and I think that's a good thing.
