Interview: Johnny Knoxville and Co. on Bringing BMX Power to Tribeca

I'm fascinated by the idea of Oklahoma being this sort of secluded laboratory for Advanced BMX Studies. Do you think you would have accomplished what you did in a denser, more conspicuous environment?

HOFFMAN: No, because people don't ask questions where I live. You talk to someone about wanting to put a weed-eater [motor] on a bicycle to go 50 miles an hour, they're like, "OK, let's see if we can do that!"

KNOXVILLE: "Sh*t, I got one right here!"

HOFFMAN: They don't go, "Hey, you got insurance for that? I'm not gonna be liable." There's a little more liberty and less paranoia, maybe.

KNOXVILLE: But I think no matter where you were, you were going to find a way to get it done, you know? It's just the spirit.

TREMAINE: But it interesting to think that Mat had to sort of interpret what he would see in the magazines. There weren't videos, there wasn't the Internet. You'd see pictures in a magazine, and you weren't sure if that was shot with a fisheye lens underneath it so it looks twice as high. So Mat is just kind of like, "Whoa, they do that?" So he would just kind of go invent stuff on his own.

KNOXVILLE: He would be like, "Oh, I wanna go that high naturally!" It was like when Hasell Adkins heard Hank Williams on the radio. He heard Hank Williams and all those instruments, and he thought he was a one-man band. So he became a one-man band! He didn't realize there were all those other musicians. Mat saw someone going so high with a fisheye lens, and he said, "I can do that."

Has the Internet compromised the way BMXers or extreme athletes in general have developed?

HOFFMAN: I think it's just a whole new game.

TREMAINE: I think it speeds up the evolution a lot. Just seeing the videos, or seeing it on TV, more kids see it and more kids try stuff. They take something they see is possible and turn it into something else
. It just evolves a lot faster. Mat was the rare one who'd tried things that no one had even thought to try. It takes a visionary like that. I mean, Mat sacrificed himself. It's a lot easier to see someone do something that you think is possible and perfect that and add a tweak here or there. But it takes that first person.

KNOXVILLE: It's like vision and crazy athleticism. Even if someone looked at things the way Mat did -- which they don't -- they don't have the athleticism. He's an insane athlete.

TREMAINE: It's a perfect storm, really.

KNOXVILLE: A perfect storm of heart, will and vision.

HOFFMAN: "Stupidity" is really the best word for it.

KNOXVILLE: [Singing] If you wanna be dumb, you gotta be tough.

All athletes obviously want to compete and win, but few seem to approach their sports with similar mandate to innovate. Guys like Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods... Even Greg Maddux revolutionized finesse pitching because he couldn't throw hard. Mat, where do you think you fall on that spectrum?

HOFFMAN: That's what's so great about it. That's what attracted me to BMX: I didn't really see sports as getting on a team with a bunch of people, and a coach tells you what to do and how to do it. I wanted to do something where I could make and break the rules -- where if something went wrong, I could look in the mirror and figure it out. Whatever I wanted to do athletically, it was explored as art. That's how I'd explain it. It's more about redefining a sport. That's why I've done BMX my whole life. It's good to have goals, but there are so many goals when other people are involved.

TREMAINE: Mat's really only competing against himself, you know.

KNOXVILLE: And he's a hell of a competitor.

Johnny and Jeff, what appeals to you about visiting -- and revisiting -- this culture of self-sacrifice, self-abuse and extreme living that we see in this or Jackass or even something like Wild and Wonderful Whites of West Virginia?

KNOXVILLE: I don't know. Well, this is a very personal story with Mat. We're all friends. They all have that same fire of just going for it, that common bond.

TREMAINE: Really, we're blessed to be able to follow what entertains us, you know? That's what entertains us. The Wild Whites came about from those early days when I met Knoxville. It must have been 1995--

KNOXVILLE: It was the day of the Oklahoma City bombing. That was the day I met you.

TREMAINE: Yeah. But you gave me Dancing Outlaw [director Julian Nitzberg's earlier documentary about Jesco White] soon after that. And we would always watch it and watch it. The opportunity came up because Johnny met Julian, and it just became about making a new movie about Jesco. And then with this, it's just an honor to be able to tell Mat's story. Mat's story need to be told, and Mat's not going to tell it himself. He's really humble.

Is there a manner of extreme living that's too extreme for entertainment? A manner that even requires intervention when you're filming?

TREMAINE: Yeah! We did with Steve-O.

KNOXVILLE Yeah, you can go over the line. Steve-O is a perfect example.

TREMAINE: Even in Wild Whites in a lot of ways.

How's Jackass 3-D coming along?

TREMAINE: It's coming along great.

We're hearing all about this "fake 3-D vs. real 3-D." Is Jackass 3-D "real" 3-D? Was it conceived that way?

KNOXVILLE: They had to convince us.

TREMAINE: We didn't want to shoot it in 3-D at first. We thought it would be gimmicky and change the way we do things. It really took us to go out and play with it.

KNOXVILLE: We did some tests and things. And it was fun -- the spirit was there. And once we tested it, we were like, "Oh, we can do this and this! Pontius, take off your pants!"

TREMAINE: We're taking 3-D down to a new low. We're not being precious with the 3-D.

KNOXVILLE: Nor clever!

Well, James Cameron did say that 3-D is what you make it.

TREMAINE: Right. We're just being very lowbrow about it. Whatever James Cameron says is fine by us.

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