We caught up with Jonathan Bennett to talk about his new action movie Submerged, his favorite “mean girl”, working underwater and since he’s in Cake Wars he also helped us solve the problem regarding the most controversial cake of all time.
In Submerged you play a bodyguard. Did you play Whitney Houston to get into character at any point?
(Laughs) Even before the movie, I played that album all the time in my dressing room.
Being trapped underwater must be one of the most horrific things ever. Did you guys try out any extreme experiments to figure out how it would feel, or was the thought alone enough to inspire the performances?
We actually didn’t have to imagine anything because we were actually underwater in that limo.
The film reminded me of those fun thrillers from the 90s that you would end up watching a million times on TV. Did Steven C. Miller recommend you watch any other movies as preparation?
No, we didn’t watch anything else really. Steve is his own country!
Mario Van Peebles is probably one of the coolest men alive. How was it to work with him?
Mario’s great, he helped me as an actor, because he knew this was my first action movie, so he had a lot of advice.
After successes in comedy and drama, it’s like you’re trying out every genre!
One genre I haven’t done is horror, I wanna do more though, I had so much fun in this one carrying a gun, that it made me think I wanna do more films like this. I have many fans who are teen girls, who will think it’s really cool to see Aaron Samuels carrying a gun.
Is this your most physically demanding role to date?
We were underwater, with water constantly rising up, breathing on a breather in between takes...you know what it was, it wasn't very physically demanding, but being soaking wet for two weeks in water that’s not so warm required a lot of endurance.
You also have a credit as Executive Producer in Submerged. What did this entail, did you go into Executive Producer mode in between takes?
It means I helped bring the movie together and had lot to do with the casting, but this was really a team effort. We really didn’t have a lot of money, but the movie looks as good as a Jason Bourne movie. About wearing different hats, some people do that not me, once the movie was up and going, my job was done.
The film made me think of reality TV, and obviously I thought of Dancing with the Stars. Have you found your dance moves from there have come in handy ever since?
Actually we shot this before Dancing with the Stars.
I feel if anything you should’ve done Dancing after Cake Wars to burn off all the calories.
(Laughs) I wish it was backwards, Submerged we shot before, all the physicality really got me amped up for Dancing with the Stars.
With the holidays around the corner, what’s your stand on fruit cake?
Being a cake expert, I can tell you if it’s done right, fruit cake can be great.
Obviously Aaron Samuels is a god, but I wonder which of the actual Mean Girls do you identify the most with?
When you’re Aaron Samuels you can’t think like this, they’re not really the mean girls, they’re Rachel, Lacey, Amanda and Lindsay. I was engrossed with them in real life, so I don’t see them that way. I don’t think I’ve even watched the movie in 8 or 9 years.
You’ve been part of Love is Louder and Declare Yourself, what do you think is the importance of young people getting involved in political and social change?
It’s really just a matter of: people just need to stop being assholes, literally. Just stop bullying, cyber bullying...things often get so out of hand, people just need to stop.
Submerged is now playing in theaters.
