How Bob Odenkirk and Director Ben Wheatley Built Their Shape-Shifting Action Movie ‘Normal’

When Bob Odenkirk was shooting “Nobody,” his 2021 action movie, that film’s writer, Derek Kolstad, had an idea.

It was on the night when they were shooting one of the sequences with Odenkirk, who played an everyman who has a secret past as an assassin, on a city bus. This new idea also involved long-buried secrets and Odenkirk as an unlikely action hero. (Although, to be fair, he has become a more likely action hero since doing “Nobody” and its sequel, released last year.) Kolstad wrote a pitch and sent it to Odenkirk’s manager. A year-and-a-half later, he finally showed it to the “Better Call Saul” star.

That idea, as Odenkirk said, from “a restless night in Winnipeg,” was “Normal,” which is now playing in theaters nationwide, the widest release ever from indie distributor Magnolia.

“I loved it because it had this opening chapter that was suspense and comedy. So many action films just go to the action as quick as they can and they just stay there as long as they can, and they don’t do any character development. They don’t take their time, they don’t want to have any other values or qualities,” explained Odenkirk. “And this one had this whole, it was almost like a separate movie that it starts with before it becomes action, and then even a little bit of horror. I loved it. I saw opportunities to act, to be a character and not just fight.”

Odenkirk loved the story so much that he wound up with a story by credit on the final film.

“The reason I get that story by credit is because I helped build out that world of the small town and I kept thinking of the towns that I’ve been through and lived in and I also thought of Garrison Keillor’s ‘Prairie Home Companion’ world, because I thought of the fun of that, the funniness of it, the quirkiness of a small town where for some reason, they have money,” Odenkirk said.

Since training for the first “Nobody,” Odenkirk said that he hasn’t stopped working out. He trains at the stunt gym two times a week when he’s in town. Oftentimes, actors will do action-oriented projects back-to-back because both the cool down and the subsequent ramp up to be physically ready for the next movie can be so taxing. Not the case with Odenkirk. “I don’t have that bounce-back,” he said.

Not that it’s the only reason he maintains his regimen.

“But more than that, one of the reasons I did this movie and wanted to do a third action movie is I love these guys who I’ve met and women who are in the action/stunt world. It was really a foreign world for me. It still is somewhat. Ben Wheatley and Derek Kolstad can talk for hours about action films and scenes and moments, and I don’t know any of their references. The stunt people at the stunt gym can do the same thing,” Odenkirk said.

While the comedian and actor is a relative newcomer to the action genre, he wanted to, more than anything, show his respect for the art of making a great action film.

“I’m very aware that I’m a bit of an interloper. I wanted to show those people that I respect their craft and that I’m willing to keep learning it, not just learn it once, just to do a film, just to run away and say, See, I did it, but to go, I see what you’re doing over here. I respect how hard it is. I respect how much you’ve devoted yourself to it. Let me keep learning. Let me keep showing what I can do. Let me keep learning what I can do. This is out of respect for a mentor, our second unit director, Daniel Bernhardt, the stunt actor who trained me for all these films and still trains me, out of respect for David Leitch and all these people I’ve met who give their lives to this art.”

His character in “Normal,” Odenkirk said, “is closest to me.” His sheriff Ulysses, who has his own tragic past, is both the audience surrogate, as he uncovers the hidden details of the town, and its slightly askew moral center. “Ulysses is older. He’s gotten his ass kicked. He is a bit demoralized and I understand how that feels. And I think a lot of guys in their 60s know what that feels like. I like playing somebody who I can relate to that directly,” Odenkirk said.

There was only one person who could bring “Normal” to the screen; this is not a by-the-numbers action movie, as it shifts from a slice-of-life smalltown story to something resembling a Hitchcockian thriller to combining elements of John Woo Hong Kong action and even flashes of 1980s-indebted horror.

“That mixture, it only works because of Ben Wheatley. And if you’ve seen any of Ben’s films, you know he can do all this and he does all this,” Odenkirk said of the British director who has made everything from a modern folk horror classic (“Kill List”) to a wry black comedy (“Sightseers”) to a giant studio monster movie (“Meg 2: The Trench”).

“Having a group watch it, I see as a great benefit, so that the person who’s watching it who isn’t familiar with ‘Final Destination’, or isn’t familiar with a John Woo film, they know that that action is heightened and that it’s meant to be entertaining. They get a big kick out of it when they otherwise might have gone, Well, now what world am I in?”

Wheatley said that he was approached by producer Marc Provissiero, who produced “Normal” with Odenkirk and Kolstad. Provissiero had seen Wheatley’s 2016 film “Free Fire,” executive produced by Martin Scorsese and featuring a lot of famous people shooting at each other (the cast includes Cillian Murphy, Brie Larson, Sharlto Copley, Armie Hammer and Jack Reynor), and thought Wheatley would be perfect for the “Normal” job.

“How are you going to say no to a Derek Kolstad script with Bob Odenkirk attached to it?” Wheatley remembered thinking. “It was not a very long decision making process to take the project on.”

Wheatley drew on his experience, not just on “Free Fire” but on making “Meg 2,” which had a number of elaborate action elements. The past 10 years of his career had prepared him well for “Normal.” “All the films for the last 10 years have been heavily storyboarded – storyboarding cause-and-effect, designing gags, executing gags and stuff. I love all that,” said Wheatley.

The filmmaker was also invigorated by the process of collaborating with Kolstad and Odenkirk.

“It’s a really open process. The script and the filmmaking is all being interrogated the whole time to make it as good as it can be on set. It’s not like the script was set in stone and then we went and executed,” Wheatley said. “It was much more like there were conversations all the time and there was little tweaks of the script, and in the prep for it, I did a little storyboarding and then had conversations with everybody and going backwards and forwards. It was a real group effort.”

In terms of movies that Wheatley was looking at for “Normal,” his touchstones ran the gamut. “I think it sits across lots of different types of films, some more serious than others,” Wheatley said.

He looked at everything from “Bad Day at Black Rock” to “Fargo” (perhaps the most obvious touchpoint), but he also looked at everything from old Warner Bros. cartons to John Woo films to Sam Raimi’s horror classic “Evil Dead II” – “that stuff comes in the second half.” He also drew inspiration from Sam Peckinpah’s work, like “The Getaway.” “It’s a mix of that. There’s a Coens-y vibe to it, but there’s also a ‘70s drive-in cinema vibe to it as well. It’s bringing all those things into the mix,” said Wheatley.

Odenkirk has been bolstered by the response to the film – at the Toronto Film Festival last year, where it premiered as part of the Midnight Madness program, and earlier this year at the South by Southwest Film Festival in Austin, Texas (“A more sober affair at 5:30 in the afternoon,” Wheatley commented). But Odenkirk’s favorite screening so far has been in Normal, Illinois. (The movie takes place in Normal, Minnesota, but close enough.)

“I was concerned that the people in Normal, not being film super fans, would watch it with too much solemnity and too much seriousness. But no, they got it,” said Odenkirk. He didn’t need to worry. “I think it’s part of being in a group. There’s always a few people who absolutely know what you’re doing. They get it. They watch a lot of movies, they see ‘Weapons,’ they see ‘Final Destination,’ they get it, and they tell the rest of the audience, Don’t worry. This is what’s happening. We’re having fun now.”

While Wheatley is quietly working on what he described as a “folk horror musical” at the moment, we wondered if Odenkirk would return to action cinema. He might not be as well-versed as the guys he trains at the gym with (or Kolstad and Wheatley), but his action movie bona fides are getting to be just as impressive as any Schwarzenegger or Stallone.

“I’m not hunting one down like I was when I said to myself, Look, I got to do a couple more of these, just to show everybody that I take them seriously and I take their work seriously,” Odenkirk said. “Now that I’ve done three, I feel like, first of all, let’s see how ‘Normal’ does, but I’m up for it. I would love to do it. I’m not going to be like, just line up another action film. I’m going to do a reading of a Broadway play on Friday, I’m writing a play with David Cross. I’m writing a show with my son. I’m looking at movies and stuff. I’m not sure what to do next. I overworked myself for about a year and a half there, and it knocked me out,” Odenkirk said.

Not that he’s ruling out another “Normal.” Neither is Wheatley.

“Normal” is in theaters now.

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