Can you talk about filming the action set pieces and being so involved – the leader on the film.

Timothy Olyphant: It was great. I really enjoyed it. It was very challenging for a number of reasons - it was challenging because it was a big responsibility and I hadn't had it before – be the lead in this kind of a film. And it was all sort of amplified by the fact that the director was French and the crew was Bulgarian and so on and so forth, it added all sorts of additional challenges. But that being said, I really enjoyed it. Like I said, Xavier was a very smart guy, and it was very rewarding, engaging with him, creatively, and fighting the fight if you will, day in and day out. How can we make this… is there a way to make this scene smarter? How much of a character film can we make, given the source material? Can we still try to get to the heart of something here?

What sort of acting tools did you have when you're playing this guy who is almost nothing but a killing machine?

Timothy Olyphant: The angle I take is that you trust that takes care of itself. You trust that if you kill a bunch of guys in an elevator and you walk out the only guy without a scratch on you, that defines who you are. And so you trust that, and you can leave that alone. You say, well, I don't need to convince everybody I'm a bad ass because I just walked in that situation and I’m the one who walked out of that without a scratch. You put that aside. Then what you do is say, what else is there? How many angles can you look at this? Where's the humanity in it all? You start with a guy who goes from job to job to job. It sounds sort of… I don't know if it's a cliche or something, but you assume it's a lonely existence, like a traveling salesman kind of thing. I thought it was interesting to look at his job prior to the events that happen, and it's kind of mundane. You go from job to job, you're good at what you do, it's probably pretty easy, and you're not engaging with a lot of people. There's a sort of detachment to it all to be able to do it. That starts to get kind of interesting, when you look at something that seems so special and you try to find what’s pedestrian about it. Then the second thing that starts to happen is then you take that and you just turn that upside down. What happens when that guy's world turns upside down, and you have this soldier - for lack of a better term – who essentially his job is you point and I'll shoot, since the assassin isn't choosing who dies and who doesn't die. Somebody gives him a target and he goes and takes it out. But what happens when there's no trust, there’s no boss, the boss is not to be trusted, the target's not being given to you, who do you take out and who do you not take out? What starts to happen is it starts to force him to examine in some sort of small, maybe unconscious way, is what else is out there? If I'm not that guy, do I have any other job skills? You start looking at it that way, and those are very human experiences. Everybody can relate to that. Everybody can relate to the carpet being pulled out from under you. Everybody can relate to asking yourself, is this who I am, or am I capable of being something else? Not necessarily something better, but something else, or is that just pre-determined? Those are interesting things to try and explore.

Is this a character the studio envisions as a franchise? Is this something that you want to pursue a franchise?

Timothy Olyphant: I don't know what the studio's plan is, you'd have to ask them, but it seems these days everything is intended to be - if it's successful, there's another one coming. It's hard to find a movie these days that doesn't have a franchise potential. Someone was telling me the other day, Game Plan, sequel. I was like, really? A franchise? I didn't see that. But it did great, so why the fuck not?

Are you signed for multiple films?

Timothy Olyphant: Yeah.

Does the film set up a sequel? Does it end on a cliffhanger?

Timothy Olyphant: It's certainly rich with possibility. But we're getting ahead of ourselves.

You recently finished this. Are you lined up for another project? Are you signed on for something else?

Timothy Olyphant: I leave on Wednesday for Canada. I’m starting next Monday and that will take me towards the end of the year, and I’m not sure after that.

Can you tell us what the film is?

Timothy Olyphant: I'm doing a movie called The High Life. Not sure if there's a The, but it's definitely High Life. A guy named Gary Yates is directing it; he directed a film that was at Sundance a couple of years ago called Seven Times Lucky, which was a great little film. It's a movie about four morphine addicts in 1983 who attempt to rob a bank. And it's funny.

Who are you doing the film with? Who are your other…

Timothy Olyphant: Joe Andersen from Across the Universe is in it.

You're going from this big, action mainstream, to a much smaller, edgier movie. Do you see yourself dancing back and forth like that?

Timothy Olyphant: You know, as long as they'll let me. Like right now, my mindset, while excited about Hitman, I can't wait to do this tiny, little film. God bless the studio executives who gave me this job, but it's a really different creative conversation. It's nice to be able to go and just shoot. You got 98 pages, whatever the script is, and it's just perfect and you just shoot that, it’s great. It's a nice feeling. The director's got all the power in the world, and those are great things. On the other hand, when this is all done, I'll say, “Somebody give me a big fucking trailer, because this is just ridiculous! This is a fucking joke - they don't got cable or nothing in there!” It's lovely to be able to go back and forth. If I can keep doing it, I had the pleasure of working with Bruce Willis and how he's been able to go back and forth from big picture to small picture without any lack of credibility and without disrupting the film - there's no sort of hurdle to get over. When he puts himself in a small picture, you don't have to say, “What the fuck is Bruce Willis doing in there?” He's a goddamn genius and it’s really impressive. I'd love to be able to steal a page from that.

I’ll bet he still has a really big trailer even on a small film.

Timothy Olyphant: You know that’s a good question. But I don’t think so.

Now that it appears that the Deadwood TV movies are probably not going to happen…

Timothy Olyphant: Probably not. Were they going to happen?

Now that it appears to be totally in the past, what are your thoughts on the legacy of that show? Did you keep anything from the show as a memento?

Timothy Olyphant: The answer to your last question is no, I didn't keep anything from the show. My feelings on the show are the same as they were from the jump - it was an incredible creative experience. Really one of the greatest creative experiences I'll probably ever have. Working for David Milch was the job of a lifetime.

Do you feel kind of gypped that you won't have a chance to go back?

Timothy Olyphant: Honestly? It always feels a little... I could really give a shit. I mean it in the most respectful way. I had a great time making that show, and I am thankful to have been given that experience. To look at it from any other angle is a slippery slope. I don't think anybody owes me anything. I walk away from that saying thank God it existed. And I have great relationships from that show, and you know what's better than seven or eight years on TV? Like three years on TV.