I was very excited to be cast as Chris Redfield in Capcom's Resident Evil Biohazard. I never got to see the footage until recently, when a friend of mine who is an avid gamer happened upon it by accident on youtube, and he forwarded it to me. At the time I was an actor in Tokyo, from 1990 to1996, it was very difficult to get production companies to make a VHS copy and mail it to you. It's not like today, where they can just email you a link.

Anyway, that was a really fun shoot, with super cool costumes, and much more fun than most of the acting work I was doing at the time. That was over 20 years ago, and my memory of the other actors and other details are fleeting, but I am happy to share with you what I remember:


At the time I was represented by I.M.O. (Inagawa Motoko Office) in Tokyo. I am pretty sure that all the actors on that shoot were hired from I.M.O. I actually also worked for I.M.O. as a casting agent. This agency hired bilingual foreigners to work in the office doing castings, taking talent to auditions and film and tv shoots, to act as their manager and translator, as well as being talent ourselves. It was a unique business model, that allowed the agency to leverage our acting and language skills at the same time. Many foreigners would come and register at this agency, and they supplied actors and background talent to countless Japanese films, tv shows, and commercials. I did not work on any other projects with any of those other actors from Biohazard, except Eric, who played Wesker. Eric was a regular that would often go to auditions, and acting jobs with me.I remember he used to always ride his bicycle around Tokyo like a crazy man, running red lights. I remember feeling like someday he would get in an accident with a car, but as far as I know he was fine. Sorry, I don't remember his last name. As for Inezh being a high school girl, and complaining about bug bites, and wanting to finish early, that all sounds correct to me. I don't remember much about Linda or Jason. I do remember thinking Jason looked just like the sketch of his character,. Greg was really fun, and I know you already have been in touch.
I remember seeing the sketches of the characters at the audition, and how cool the costumes looked. They asked me permission to dye my hair, which is naturally very dark brown, almost black, and they also asked me to grow some stubble. I remember the stylist having a very strong opinion that the character would never grow stubble, that he would be very disciplined about shaving, while the director felt very strongly that I would have stubble because we would be on the mission for several days. When they dyed my hair, they used straight peroxide, which turned my hair almost a red color. That red hair with my almost black beard stubble looked ridiculous, so they decided the character would be clean shaven.


I recall shooting the majority of the scenes in an abandoned warehouse, and the surrounding area that was overgrown with bushes. That is where Inezh would have been complaining about the bugs, and working late into the night. The director told us to imagine we were being attacked by dogs, and I think for the interior scenes he described giant werewolf type creatures. I know you said the director was later quoted saying the acting skills were not very good. I would agree with that, but I would also say that his talent as a director, and the overall production value was also very poor, but I think all of that adds to the charm of this video, especially the cheesy Japanese pop music on the soundtrack. For the scenes where we are sitting down and resting from the battle, and I am smoking (seems like I was constantly smoking) were shot at a different location. I don't remember exactly where it was, but probably somewhere on the outskirts of Tokyo. I think it was an office inside some sort of commercial real estate area. I remember that before we started shooting that scene the director said my white shirt was much too clean, because this was supposed to be after we had already battled. I remembered that the parking lot outside was unpaved, it was dirt and gravel, and there were some puddles from recent rain. I offered to go outside an roll around in the dirt to get the shirt looking dirty and worn, and they thought it was a great idea. I rolled around in the dirt and came back. The stylist was horrified, and thought I was too dirty. The director said that I was not dirty enough, and so I went outside and rolled around some more. Looking at the video, I think the shirt is still too clean. Really it should have been much more dirty, and maybe a little bloody too.


The very last frame of the video is a close up of my eye, just before the creature kills me. We shot this in one of the hallways at the abandoned warehouse. I remember the director saying, "when the camera comes right up to your face, open your eye as big as you can in terror". I did as he asked, but my eyes are kind of small to begin with, and did not look big enough for him. So we tried it again, and he told me to wait till the camera got close in, and then use my fingers to open my eye even bigger. I remember at the time thinking that surely they will see my fingers in the shot, but it looks like it worked OK in the end...



are they going to make any more Resident Evil films? I had a quick look on IMDB, but I did not see any plans for a new movie... I live in Los Angeles now, and I still do acting work sometimes, and I was thinking how fans like you would love it if I could get a cameo in their next film...




Anyway Fred, it is a strange and very new phenomenon to me to have fans! And I am very grateful...