Sam Jackson on Snakes on Planes

Sam Jackson goes from dealing with Eugene Levy to battling snakes.

In “The Man,” Sam Jackson is a federal agent trying to stop an international gun deal and find the man who killed his partner; unfortunately, Eugene Levy gets in his way. While promoting the film, Sam talked about his brand of action and comedy and what attracted him to the script:

Samuel Jackson: “I guess the fact that it was a comedy and I hadn’t done one in a while, it was an action comedy, which is something I’m attracted to. I like to do action films and I like to laugh and I felt that would be great. I had Eugene in my mind as I was reading it. And when I met him, I said this script is great and he had no idea what I was talking about; I guess about a week later he had gotten the script and we ran into each other in London, we read it and was totally down for doing it.”

But in one of Sam’s next movies, he takes on a scarier co-star – snakes:

Samuel Jackson: “The movie I’m doing right now is kind of like a no-brainer. I don’t want to say it that way, but it’s pretty much what it is, it’s a thriller. “Snakes on a Plane,” there’s no mystery to that. We’re going back, it’s not ‘Flight 121.’ You either want to see this movie or you don’t – “Snakes on a Plane,” common. You don’t have to think about it, there’s snakes, you go ‘Ah, Oh, Ah, Oh’ and that’s what I’m doing every day and I don’t have to figure out the dramatic purpose of this. I’m going to do that with “Black Snake Moan,” I’ve got enough of that coming. Six and a half weeks going ‘Ah, Ooh, Ah, Ooh, Ah, Oh’ it’s cool, awesome. So it’s like a break for me. And then I get to be heavy.”

So who does Sam Jackson play in Snakes on a Plane?

Samuel Jackson: “An FBI agent; I’m an FBI agent transporting a witness from Hawaii to Los Angeles. And the kid witnessed a murder by this gangster, the gangster, who personally killed somebody, stupid gangster. The kid saw it and I’m transporting him to LA and over the middle of the ocean, this timed crate opens and there’s 500 poisonous snakes in it and they get out all over the plane. And we can’t go back, we’ve got to go forward and it’s us battling snakes to LA.”

Sam also gave us a little preview of “Black Snake Moan”:

Samuel Jackson: “Yeah, I have a whole other look for that; I was at the dentist yesterday.”

Is Samuel Jackson going to have fake teeth, gold?

Samuel Jackson: “All the guys that I’ve seen, I’ve been going back and forth to the Mississippi Delta and all these musicians I’ve seen, they all seem to have these blingin’ grills.”

“The Man” will be in theaters September 9th. Look for “Black Snake Moan” and “Snakes on a Plane” out sometime in 2006.