ON THE PHONE WITH JOHNNY KNOXVILLE

_A few days ago, our friend Zero was traveling through Barcelona. While there, he decided to do what all conscientious visitors to Spain should do: a phone interview with _Jackass 3D's_ Johnny Knoxville._

VICE: Hey Johnny, how are you, brother?
Johnny: I'm good, Zero. How are you?

Thanks for taking the time out.
Aw, shit man. I love Vice; I'm psyched to talk to you.

Where are you now? No, No-Let me guess! The Women's shoe department of Filene's Basement!?
Nope. I'm in London on my way to the Graham Norton Show, and then we jump on a plane to Madrid.

Let me say first, I don't normally do celebrity interviews, so please excuse any glaring missteps on my part. My bosses normally has me interviewing old ladies at the farmers market.
Well, they usually have stories to tell.

The new movie is in 3D. What do you think of the current 3D craze? Because, I have to wear the 3D glasses over my regular glasses…
How is that?!

Well, often times-when my friends go to a 3D movie, I have to wait in the car. I take solace in the notion that it's just a fad. Are you into it?
The 3D thing? Well, aside from Jackass and JAWS 3D, I haven't seen a 3D movie since I was 14, you know. I think it works great for Jackass. I think Jackass is kind of made for 3D. I wish we had done the first two films in 3D. It just really puts you in the middle of the stunt and prank, in a great and - horrible way. (Laughs maniacally)

What should the audience be prepared to have flying at them in the third dimension? I'm expecting semen, feces, maybe Wee Man.
Yeah, there's no- (asking someone in the car with him) is there semen? Is there…semen? We filmed some stuff with semen, but that's going to be in 3.5.
You have to deal with all the things we're dealing with. 50000 Africanized bees, Bulls, Dildo bazookas…Pontius's cock.

What's the grossest bit in the movie?
There are 47 bits in the movie and three bits that are gross. Two involve…poop. One of the bits that involve poop is pretty unbelievable, because the poop goes weightless at one point. It's like a grand ballet of poo floating around above Steve-O's head. We did the 'port-a-potty bungee'. It's actually called the "Poo Cocktail Supreme." We put Steve-O in a full port-a-potty with two cranes, and a hundred feet up, and it just like, rockets him into the air. We have cameras inside, and at one point the poo just goes weightless. It's pretty unbelievable, and thank god Steve-O had his mouth open, otherwise that shit would have hit him in the face.

Fuck. Which stunt in the picture got axed because it was two fucked up? Did you shoot anything that didn't work?
Well we shot enough footage for two films; we are releasing 3.5 in January, and sometimes something just does not-fucking-work. Our success rate on this film was higher than any others. It's just like they can't all be, home runs. And you just say "Ok that sucked, lets move on to the next".

I feel the same way about this interview. So, let's keep trekking.
Oh, IS it?! Am I sucking?! No, its not you, it's me. I'm sucking. My roofie is kicking in. Have you been drinking?
Oh man! Crap. I have been drinking, but I'll drink more!

I'll drink more, too. Let's play word association. I'm going to say a word, and you say whatever springs to mind. This will help loosen you up.
Yeah, I need to get loosened up.

No. This is for me! This is, for me. Let's begin…Captain.
And Tennille.

Broken.
Dick

Farmers Market.
Los Angeles, I don't know.

Wasted.
Yes!

Carlito's.
Gay!

Australia.
Rules!

Walt.
Whitman.

Minnie.
Me.

I would have also accepted, Driver. Paycheck.
Johnny.

Rimjob.
Yeah!

Alec.
Baldwin?

I would have also accepted, Guinness.
Yeah…you're going for something smarter-

No-no I'm not. I'm really not-COME ON! Enough nonsense. Usually the second sequel is the best in the series right? Matrix Revolutions, Spiderman 3, Return of the Jedi, Rocky 3.
What?! Is that the way it is?

No?
Johnny: I thought Rocky 1 and 2 were pretty great, but by the third one, that's when he started losing it.

Any Ewoks in this one?
We dressed my son Rocco up in a tiger outfit; and as a boxer, and he had a great big fake black eye on him. My daughter is in the credits as well, she's also in the bit where I'm the old man. She's hula hooping, and then we put boxing gloves on her, and she's punching the fuck out of Jeff.

It's just an aside, but I always thought there was something kind of fatherly about you on Jackass. I reckon you'd make a good dad.
Well, I hope I am. My parking spot at work does say, 'Mother Bear'. And Tremaine´s says –without any ego attached- his says, 'The Emperor'. And he appointed the names. (laughs) He also drew a Christmas card one year, of two guys fucking missionary. And of course I'm the guy on the bottom. He photo-shopped my face on the bottom and his face on the top. Excuse me, hold on a sec- I got to burp. (BUUUURP)

Alright now we are warmed up! My kid brother is in the states, and he told me it's the most sentimental entry in the series, (which isn't saying much, I'll grant you). He attributed this to Steve-O getting clean and said the film touches on this. This really shocked me, because Steve-O doesn't strike me as the kind of guy who would use illegal narcotics. Is my kid brother Gut, a fucking liar?
Well, he's not anymore man, but when Steve-O was using, he was using the worst shit you could get. PCP, man. Like 600 whippets a day, tons of cases. Mountains of cocaine, you know. But he's taking to being sober like he took to drugs and alcohol. And when we started the movie, we knew that being around all the guys, he's the only one sober, so it's going to be tough. So we didn't allow beer on the set this time, and Steve-O traveled with a sober person. We wanted to keep him sober because, man, we can't have him going off the rails again. We almost lost him. He's doing awesome, and this is his best fucking movie too! And I know what your brother is saying, because the camaraderie between the guys in this one- like it was really great in the first two, but this one is really special.
It's a little-I mean it's a fucked up Jackass film, but it- it seems a little sweeter.

I think the crew's friendship has always been at the heart of the show.
Yeah, because there is a certain spirit about it. We've been together ten years man, and we've been through a lot and we're family and we give each other hell. If someone passes out, it gets real bad quick, but we do love each other.

I can tell. In Steve-O's case, is it even possible to staple your balls to your leg without the help of Vicodin?
Dude he did some gnarly shit, he did this one thing –it didn't make the movie -but he tried to walk this balance beam over a flaming pit of fire, with big huge wrecking balls on fire trying to knock him off, and he fell into the fire, and his skin, like-he went up (in flames), you know. They put him out, and any other normal person would have gotten pain relievers, but he got his privileges revoked, so he just toughed it out. It got that fucked up and he still didn't take pain pills. I know you're married, and your wife is sitting right next to you in the car, but women throw themselves at you guys pretty regularly right?
Yeah… the boys do alright.

How many celebrity interviews am I going to have to do before girls try to fuck me?
Ummm. (Someone in the background offers "six?") Hmm. Maybe just start putting your picture in there.

This is for Australian Vice, I know you and the boys have been down there. What's your favorite Aussie memory…its ok if its not sex.
(laughs) Australia is awesome. We were driving in a rental car, and got pulled over by the cops, and I realised right then, that I had a bottle of speed in my pocket. I mean, I had a prescription for it. But I wasn't thinking about the prescription. When we got pulled over, I just dumped all the pills into my palm and downed the whole thing. But I forgot the cameras were rolling. People were laughing later, (saying) remember when you downed that whole bottle of pills, when we got pulled over by the cops?

I read that you became friends one of your heroes, Johnny Cash before his death and then bought his cabin?
No. Cash was one of my heroes, and I did buy his cabin, but I didn't become friends with him. I never even talked to the man…I did get to meet Hunter Thompson before he passed away, and we became friendly. I don't know if I he would consider me a friend.

He's probably a pretty tough guy to get close to.
Well, I just didn't know him long enough. I just hung out with him a little and I cherish it because he's a big hero of mine. That's beautiful, but I had a joke set up there. I wrote a joke about the Cash thing. Can we go back?
Oh…ok, get out your joke.

Did you ever see that episode of Columbo, where Johnny Cash is a crooked preacher who poisons his wife and attempts to cover up her murder by jumping out of his plane and parachuting to safety?
Oh shit, I have! I don't remember the specifics; I just remember his intense acting. I think that it's based on….Jesus, what's his fucking name….This is going to drive me nuts.
I have no idea. Fuck. My memory is not good when I'm drinking. You stumped me, dude.
No, I'll get it! Fuck…fuck. D.B. Cooper! It's D.B. Cooper!

Now who's the smart one?! Walt Whitman! D.B. Cooper? Do you have any projects coming up?
I've got a new movie with the Farrelly brothers and Sean William Scott. It's kind of a Kentucky Fried Movie thing, really, really funny.

Kentucky Fried Movie is the fucking best! Maybe the next Jackass flick will be shown in Feel Around.
It's going to be awesome. Also we just did a documentary where we went back and revisited the family of Jesco the Dancing Outlaw.

Wow, really? That's a classic doc.
It's called the Wild and Wonderful Whites of West Virginia.

The title makes it sound like a Doctor Seuss book.
It's not. They are up to some crazy shit. Gas huffing, pill popping, backwater crazy…

I'll watch for it. Good to see you're still going strong.
I took a break for about three years from acting and now I'm just… happy to be doing it again.

Alright Johnny, I'm gonna let you go be on the Graham Norton Show. Congrats on the new flick. Thanks again.
It's all good, Zee-RO! See you in the showers.

ZERO SELON