Casper Van Dien Interview

Last week, Casper Van Dien was in town, and I got the opportunity to briefly chat with him. As an honored guest of this year’s International Horror & Sci-Fi Film Festival, Starship Troopers (he plays Johnny Rico) was the featured screening to kick off the event. Besides the box-office smash, you may have also seen his Lifetime reality show, I Married a Princess (That’s right. He is actually married to a Princess). He and his wife, Catherine Oxenberg, are involved with many charitable causes. Most notably, Childhelp, which is an organization devoted to putting an end to child abuse and neglect. In fact, all proceeds from Casper’s signings during his appearance at the festival were donated to this worthy cause (which is headquartered in Scottsdale!). It’s great to see someone in the Film industry giving back! I guess the Phoenix Film Foundation thought so as well…They inducted Mr. Van Dien into the International Horror and Sci-Fi Hall of Fame.

Not only is Casper handsome and charismatic, but he is genuinely nice and family-oriented as well. Read on for his thoughts on Childhelp, kissing bugs, meeting his beautiful wife, and his current projects…

On Childhelp:

“Childhelp is a charity that my wife and I have been involved with for over five years. It’s about stopping child abuse and neglect –more kids die every day in the U.S. from this. Childhelp came to me and said, “We’d love for you to do a PSA for the organization as Johnny Rico.” I said, “Guys I can’t do that for the kids, it’s a rated “R” film.” They said, “Casper, no offense, but what happens to these kids is worse than rated R.” They said that the Sci-Fi and Horror film fans were the most dedicated and most loyal, so they’d love to get them on board to help fight child abuse. So I said “Yes” and I did it. Online donations for Childhelp have gone up 20% for the year. Thank you all.”

On filming Starship Troopers: 

“I filmed Starship Troopers in ’96. Today is my daughter’s birthday; she’s 13. She was actually born during the making of it. I was filming the water tank scene, and the next day they let me out so that she could be born. I felt like I was in utero, so it’s like I was in there the same time she was. She was going to be born whether I was in that tank or not, but they let me go, and the next day I was back in the water tank. It was interesting to see where everything was and just laughing and remembering where we shot, and who was in it.”

On picking the best kisser out of Denise Richards, the Bug, and Dina Meyer:

“It was the bug, let me tell ya. But the answer is my wife. I married her. I had kids with her. Denise and Dina, lovely kissers.”

On how he met his wife:

“I met her in Montreal on a film set. I saw her, walked up to her, and I said, “Hi, welcome to the set, I’m Casper Van Dien. You’re beautiful. Are you married?” She had this huge ring on! She said, “No”. So then I asked her if she was engaged. “No” again. So then I said, “Ohhh it’s one of those F-U rings, my sister wears one of those to keep the guys off too.”

On filming a reality T.V. show with his family:

“We did a reality show because I said,” I’m an actor, not a reality guy and I’ll never do one.” But my wife really wanted to, so I put my foot down and said, “I’ll never do it.” So who ended up doing it? But it was actually fun for me, I enjoyed doing it. We got some great home videos of the kids and I was wrong, she was right. I was simultaneously filming something else, so between the two sets, I actually felt like I had a new freedom on camera for me as an actor. I had a prejudice before, and was like, “All those reality shows are BS.” A lot of it is, but the fact was I didn’t have a chance to get in character. I had to be just me, no pretending. So they saw when I was a nice guy, and when I was an asshole.”

On finding out his 2009 Hall of Fame inductee news:

“The organization called me and said, “We’d like to do this award for you, a lifetime achievement… We’re inducting you into the Hall of Fame.” I told my daughter about it, and she says, “Oh yeah, they give those to you when your career’s over.” I’m 40 years old! I don’t think that my career’s over. But yeah, she’s sweet, a lovely kid!”

On his latest projects:

“I just finished the last two episodes of Monk. Very cool show, a lot of fun! Also, this last year and a half, my wife and I wrote a script about her grandfather, HRH Prince Paul of Yugoslavia. He was the regent from 1934 to 1941, and had to deal with Churchill, Mussolini, and Hitler. Prince Paul was exiled to Africa and labeled a Nazi sympathizer, when he in fact fought against the Nazis. We wrote that script, got the funding, and I am going to direct it. My wife is going to play HRH Princess Olga of Greece. She looks like her grandmother, and it will be the first time we’ll have a royal blood playing a royal family member.”

For more information on Childhelp and how you can help:

http://www.childhelp.org/

xoxo,

Vanessa

Credit:  Aaron Marion and Zared Goldfarb from Allied Integrated Marketing

Photo Credit:  Photos courtesy of Google Images