There are few movies that make as much sense for throwing a huge, splashy panel at San Diego Comic-Con than Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, Paramount’s upcoming blockbuster adaptation of the cultishly popular role-playing game.
But if Dungeons & Dragons was “playing to its base” by unveiling an entertaining trailer to 6,000 cheering fanboys and fangirls on Thursday, one of its stars may have singlehandedly added a quadrant or two to the movie’s projected demographic with a single quote.
“I had the best ass of my life [shooting the movie],” Regé-Jean Pagetold the crowd. Page, of course, became an instant heartthrob for his occasionally backside-baring role in Netflix’s steamy costume drama Bridgerton when the series premiered in late-2020. (Page has since left the show and seems to be smoothly transitioning to major film roles, currently seen in Netflix’s The Gray Man.)
In an interview following D&D’s panel — which also included co-stars Chris Pine, Michelle Rodriguez, Sophia Lillis and Hugh Grant and writer-directors John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein — Yahoo Entertainment does our due diligence in asking Page what he did, exactly, to land in such, um, optimal shape.
“I knew this was coming,” Page admits (watch above). “It involved a lot of sword training. I got to literally swing a sword around and slay dragons for this one, which is every kid’s dream growing up, you know? And so I got to kind of live all of my dreams. I couldn’t have asked for a better time than making this movie.
“We worked it hard, we worked it well and we had a great time.”
The film unites Page’s Xenk (a Paladin) with Pine’s Elgin (a Bard), Rodriguez’s Holga (a Barbarian), Justice Smith’s Simon (a Sorcerer) and Lillis’s Dorc (a tiefling Druid) as thieves in the Forgotten Realms who make the mistake of stealing from the wrong Rogue (Hugh Grant’s Forge Fletcher).
“Making sure we were true to the lore was important to us,” Daley says. “But more than that I think it was establishing the tone. Because that’s what sets it apart from so many other things in the fantasy space. And it was really important to us to really capture that feeling you get when you’re playing the game.”
Adds Goldstein: “And to combine the aspects of playing the game of D&D into the movie, because it’s always a mix of action, comedy and heart and emotion. So that’s really what we tried to do with these characters.”
ORDER A COPY OF ROB’S NEW BEST SELLING BOOK! Called “America’s Number ONE Gossip Columnist” by The National Enquirer. Rob ‘Naughty But Nice’ Shuter breaks celebrity news every day on his website NaughtyGossip.com where he delivers all the dish about the stars we love in his naughty but nice signature style. You can also catch him co-hosting and breaking celebrity news on Good Day New York, The Today Show, The Talk, Wendy Williams Show, CNN, Extra and Z100’s ‘Elvis Duran.’ Previously, Rob was the Huffington Post’s only celebrity columnist and the former executive editor of OK! Magazine. Rob has also hosted his own Saturday night talk show on Mark Cuban’s channel and his own daily morning show, ‘The Gossip Table,’ on VH1! Breaking some of the biggest entertainment stories, including Jamie Lynn Spears’s pregnancy news, Britney’s first post-meltdown interview, Eva Longoria’s wedding, and baby exclusives for Jessica Alba, Tori Spelling and Mathew McConaughey’s tots, Rob always knows where to find the best scoop. Before Rob was one of the world’s most successful entertainment reporters, he was a publicist working for Jennifer Lopez, Alicia Keys, P. Diddy, Jessica Simpson and Jon Bon Jovi! Now he is bringing all this experience to his new show on I HEART MEDIA in his unique cheeky way, that is always a pinch and never a punch!