Vin Diesel and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson have had a well-documented and famous feud with each other over the past couple of years. According to Diesel, much of that is to blame on his own approach to working with Johnson.
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Speaking in a new interview with Men’s Health, Diesel noted that a lot of the animosity between the two stemmed from what he calls “tough love” in trying to get the best performance out of Johnson while working on the Fast & Furious series.
“It was a tough character to embody, the Hobbs character,” Diesel said. “My approach at the time was a lot of tough love to assist in getting that performance where it needed to be. As a producer to say, ‘Okay, we’re going to take Dwayne Johnson, who’s associated with wrestling, and we’re going to force this cinematic world, audience members, to regard his character as someone that they don’t know.’”
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Diesel went on to say that while it wasn’t always fun, he was very happy with the performance that Johnson gave, and that it stayed true to the character.
“Hobbs hits you like a ton of bricks. That’s something that I’m proud of, that aesthetic. That took a lot of work. We had to get there and sometimes, at that time, I could give a lot of tough love. Not Felliniesque, but I would do anything I’d have to do in order to get performances in anything I’m producing.”
