Dean Devlin: I Made A Whovian Faux Pas While Pitching Bad Samaritan To David Tennant



Dean Devlin, director of the upcoming thriller Bad Samaritan has confessed to making a slip up while talking online to one of the movie's stars, David Tennant, about his role.

"It's no secret I'm a giant Doctor Who fan," he explained. "And [David]'s just one of my favourites in the world. Luckily he agreed to have this Skype call with me and I embarrassed myself because I started fanboying over the entire call. Of course I really embarrassed myself because I was wearing a Doctor Who t-shirt and he pointed out I had the logo for the Matt Smith Doctor Who and not his. So I definitely had a Who faux pas, But he forgave me and did the movie anyway."

Dean was talking to press at New York Comic Con alongside Robert Sheehan who plays protagonist Sean in the film. Dean described the plot,

"Two young guys who work as valet parkers at an upscale restaurant have come up with a little scam," he said. "They realise that when people hand them their car keys they usually hand them the keys to their house. They look at the registration and if they live near enough to the restaurant they can get into the house before dinner is over. These are not sophisticated criminals, they are not wiping houses out, they're not wiping people's lives out, they are taking things that people then say, 'Where did I put my watch?' or 'Where did I put my cash?' So it's a small time scam and they've been doing this for a while. So one day they break into the house of someone they shouldn't have and there are immense consequences for having robbed the wrong house."

The two thieves find a woman held captive in a house belonging to David's character, Cale Erendreich, and Robert explains that Sean's decision about this woman is the pivotal moment of the film.

"Sean leaves the girl, abandons her, fails to save her. This causes much despair...he's stricken with remorse for the rest of the film. He has to undo that moment," he said.

"I think he's looking death in the face," he added. "That's how we played it, that moment in the story. I'd defy anyone not to wimp out. I certainly would."

Dean and Robert explained that the shoot was hard work, taking place over 38 days. with the difficulties exacerbated by the snowy conditions of a Portland winter. Robert also drew attention to the nature of the scenes they had to shoot.

"The intensity of scenes between myself and David, those were really difficult, really intense and you came out of them exhausted on so many levels," he said.

Dean explained that there were five snowstorms while they were filming which worked out great in the film but made actions sequences more difficult. He paid tribute to his lead actors, saying that David and Robert shot one intense scene in the middle of heavy snowfall. "They literally were standing in the middle of a blizzard," he explained, "Acting their asses off!"

You can watch the full video interview here:


Bad Samaritan was written by Brandon Boyce and directed by Dean Devlin. It was produced by Dean's own company, Electric Entertainment as was shot on location in Portland, Oregon in December last year. Other cast includes Carlito Olivero and Kerry Condon. The film will be released in cinemas early in 2018.


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