The director Jack Black calls ‘The Warlock’: “One of my all-time favourites”
Known for his eccentric personality and penchant for all things comedic, Jack Black has appeared in many popular movies over the years, cementing his musically-driven persona with roles in movies like High Fidelity and School of Rock while also leading the comedy-rock band Tenacious D.
The actor and musician has landed roles in many notable movie series over the years, like Jumanji and Kung Fu Panda, while appearing in everything from The Holiday to Nacho Libre and The Super Mario Bros Movie to Bernie. Most recently, Black has leaned into his wacky persona with a leading role as Steve in A Minecraft Movie, one of many big franchise roles he has taken on over the past few years, getting further away from critical acclaim with each acting choice.
His recent roles in Razzie-nominated movies or kids’ films leave a lot to be desired, and it’s easy to forget that Black has appeared in some rather acclaimed films in the past, like his breakthrough High Fidelity. It has been highly praised over the years, even spawning a spin-off television series featuring Zoe Kravitz in John Cusack’s role while Da’Vine Joy Randolph played a character inspired by Black’s Barry.
Directed by Stephen Frears, High Fidelity gave Black his first proper taste of success as an actor, even if his character was a little too obsessed with niche bands and record store elitism. In fact, his character is so snobbish that he even refuses to sell someone a record they specifically ask for because he believes it to be “sentimental tacky crap.”
The film was a hit, and Black loved working with Frears, who had risen to prominence in the 1980s and 1990s with classic films like My Beautiful Laundrette starring Daniel Day-Lewis, the Oscar-winning Dangerous Liaisons, and the western drama The Hi-Lo Country. High Fidelity, released in 2000, became one of his most popular movies, and Black recalled filming it in an interview with GQ.
“Stephen Frears is one of my all-time favourites to work with. I called him the Warlock because he had these thick, juicy, bushy eyebrows, and he looked like he had magical powers. And he was grumpy, and he would oftentimes lay on the ground and just look at the sky and say, ‘I’m too old to be directing this movie’. But then he would get up and he’d give me, like, the perfect piece of direction.”
The actor also recalled filming the concert scene from the end of the movie, which featured Black performing Marvin Gaye’s ‘Let’s Get It On’. While Frears was dissatisfied with the first performance, yelling at extras to get things right, he refrained from getting angry at Black, instead saying, “Jack, great job, let’s do it again.” Perhaps Frears seemed to understand the pressure of the scene, which Black had to perform in front of a large audience of extras, and his encouragement of the actor allowed him to do a second take that was much better, which became the one that made it into the film.
