Interview with Eythor Gudjonsson

Let’s get one thing straight before we go any further: Eythor Gudjonsson is the coolest man on the planet. I’d say “the coolest man in Iceland,” just to get that slightly too obvious pun in there, but that would be unfair to him.

Eythor’s done a lot of different things in his time: from being a champion athlete, to breaking records as a marketing manager for Disney, then breaking more records at his pizza franchise, plus about a million other things most people would consider themselves lucky to achieve in a lifetime -- including a show-stealing turn in Eli Roth’s sophomore movie, Hostel. It’s not just that incredible list of achievements that makes Eythor cool, though. It’s more that coolness just emanates from him; he’s fun, interesting, and intelligent; and lest you think I’m eulogising the man too much, he managed to take time out of his hectic schedule to meet up with me in London recently, and he is just that awesome.

Running four different businesses meant that he took his time getting this interview back to me, but I really can’t hold that against him. So without further ado, let’s see what he had to say for himself.

Oli is undoubtedly everyone's favourite character in Hostel, so, first off, congratulations on that! Eli Roth said that Oli was written specifically for you -- how did that come about?

Eli came to Iceland to promote his first movie, Cabin Fever, met his man there and that lead us to the big screen. :-)

Would you say you’re as, shall we say, fun-loving as Oli in real life? Where does Oli end and Eythor begin?

I do hope so. Eli wrote this part for me and said to me "we need to express your endless happiness and fun to the rest of the world." Other parts of the character are based on pure fiction. Then we added all kinds of silly things that came up in our mind before and during shootings. It was great to be able to have some influence on the movie, and I think this is one of the major advantages of Eli as a director, i.e. letting his actors change the dialogue if they want and to come up with different suggestions into the script. He then, of course, said yes or no, if he liked it or not.

There must have been some interesting and/or crazy times on set for Hostel, are there any entertaining stories you'd like to share?

It was a mysterious time, filled with horror and hard work! :-) No, seriously I think I cannot take one thing out of all the funny and memorable moments we had. It was seven weeks full of fun, work and great friendship with other great people.

Where does one find the hottest girls in Europe?

In Iceland, of course my horse :-)

You've done a lot of different things: from your IMDB profile alone, you've been an athlete, marketing manager, pizza franchise owner, run animation and real estate businesses, and appeared in adverts before your appearance in Hostel -- that's a lot of achievement for one man! What's been your proudest accomplishment to date?

Short and simple - To have kids and to create a family :-)

Are you going to be doing more acting?

To be honest, I don’t think so. To begin with, I think I am a horrible actor; and besides that, I have my hands full of interesting projects going on today. I also think it will be hard to work with someone other than Eli.

You’re not a horrible actor, by any means! Weren’t you sad that Oli got killed off? And was it creepy, having a prosthetic severed head resembling you hanging around?

No, I am not sad Oli got killed. I knew about it from the beginning. The head part was a bit creepy, yes; I cannot describe the feeling that I felt inside myself when I took my head out the box when it came in from L.A. It was incredibly well done by Howard Berger, Kevin Wasner and their team.

As you may have noticed, we're all horror nuts over at Living Corpse; do you like scary movies?

Who doesn’t ? :-)

Ding! Right answer. Your MySpace profile says you're a "proud parent" -- LivingCorpseRon would like to enquire whether or not the picture of Oli's kid in Hostel is in fact one of yours?

No, it is not. It was someone’s kids in Prague. But I did put my sisters names in there; I have sisters that are twins and their names are Sunna and Eva. I therefore named my daughter in the movie SunnEva :-)

Speaking of MySpace, are you getting any hassle over there? Eli's had some hate mail; have you had anything nasty, or do you mostly get hero-worshipped? (Or is your inbox just flooded with messages from me, arguing over who looks best in that Sneepur Patrol shirt?)

I have had no hate mail or hassle at all, just positive messages from interesting and funny people. MySpace is therefore just fun and entertainment for me all the time :-) People are always telling me how much I look like Christian Bale -- so funny ! :-) -- but the thing is, I have much more talent as an actor than he does, and by far more sex appeal.

No argument here – some of us actually suffered through The Machinist! So what's it like being the new most-famous-person-in-Iceland?

Well, I think I cannot say Hostel has made me the most famous person in Iceland, it has attracted some attention from some people, but not all. Some people think I live in L.A. and are very surprised when they see me in Iceland. I have felt some jealousy from some people but most people think it’s great that I got the chance to go through something funny as this was.

Finally, will you be the best man when Eli Roth eventually comes to his senses, realises I'm the perfect woman and marries me? ;)

I am ready whenever! I will arrange your wedding on the top of the Europe´s biggest glacier Vatnajokull in Iceland and be your best man!

You heard it here first, kids. Now maybe someone should let Eli know…

IMDB link

Interview originally published at LivingCorpse.com.