Co-directed by Harry and George Kirby, Accident Man: Hitman’s Holiday is currently available in theaters, VOD, and Digital. The film is the follow-up to Scott Adkin's Accident Man and once again centers around professional killer Mike Fallon. However, in contrast to the original film, he finds himself on the defensive. When a mafia boss kidnaps Fred, Mike is forced to protect her son in exchange for his friend's life.
In addition to starring as the Accident Man himself, Mike Fallon, Adkins serves as a writer for both the original and the sequel. He has previously appeared in films such as Doctor Strange, Day Shift, and Triple Threat. The cast of Hitman's Holiday also includes Ray Stevenson, Perry Benson, Sarah Chang, Javad Ramezani, George Fouracres, Faisal Mohammed, and Flaminia Cinque.
Screen Rant chats with star Scott Adkins about working with the Kirby Brothers and coordinating his own stunts for the film.
Scott Adkins Talks Accident Man: Hitman's Holiday
Screen Rant: How long have you been hoping to do a sequel? Was this always the plan after you finished the first one?
Scott Adkins: It took a year to get the green light, and then we did. There was a change of administration at Sony, which was a bit of a holdup, and then of course, the pandemic. But we got there in the end. And yeah, I'd love to do another one and keep doing some more. There are obviously many tales that we can tell of Mike Fallon the Accident Man, the escapades that he gets up to. You liked the film, then? Did we do better than the first? Or what do you reckon?
I like them both in different ways. I actually think I liked this one better because I liked seeing him in the bodyguard role. I thought it was fun.
Scott Adkins: The new dynamic. Yeah. There's nothing worse than being an assassin and desperately wanting to kill someone but having to protect them.
Yes! Was it fun to switch it up like that?
Scott Adkins: Yeah, well, that was the idea to come at it from a different angle. And George, who plays the Dante character—he was a great casting choice. And let me tell you, this guy went from playing that buffoon who sh*ts in a bucket to playing Hamlet on stage at the globe. So we're talking about a serious actor here. But he's so funny. And he brought so much to that character. But essentially—nothing against George—we wanted someone that the audience could just relate with Mike Fallon in just hating this absolute buffoon who's such an idiot. And that was the point. He wants to kill him, yet he has to protect him. A very difficult situation.
How was working with the Kirby Brothers? I know that you didn't work with them on the first film, but they seemed really excited to be a part of the second one.
Scott Adkins: They were fantastic. I was hoping to get the original director back, but it didn't work out for whatever reason. But then the Kirbys, and I know them from previously—I worked with George because he's a stuntman. He was Benedict Cumberbatch's stunt double on Doctor Strange—that's how I met George. But anyway, they sent me this short that they'd done, this zombie thing, and it was made so well and shot so brilliantly. And as soon as I knew it wasn't going to work with Jesse, I immediately thought of the Kirbys.
Because actually, they have a similar style to somebody like Edgar Wright, or Matthew Vaughn, in my opinion, which was always the first sort of idea that I had of how I wanted Accident Man to look—the movies. So they were perfect. They were English. They know the action. They've got great visual style. They're good with the comedy side of things as well, we've got the same sort of sense of humor, and they really wanted to go for it more with the comedy this time than we did with the first. And so it was perfect. It's always a leap of faith, but they were so good. They did such a great job. And they edited it themselves—that's the other thing. They understand the visual effects as well. They really understand that on a deep level, which I haven't got a clue about. So they're great, great directors, and they're going to go far. And I hope that they can take me with them.
I spoke with them the other day, and they said that this was their first feature film. That's impressive.
Scott Adkins: Yeah, they're really good. They've done a lot of the YouTube stuff, and they just get it. They're fantastic and perfect for this sort of film.
Well, how do you come up with the names and personalities of all of these different hitmen? There are so many.
Scott Adkins: Some of the assassins changed. We always had Poco the Killer Clown. And we went with Poco just because, well it can't be Coco. Let's call it Poco. Stu Small, one of the writers, he comes up with a lot of the names. Wong Siu-ling, that was completely my idea. Originally we were going to do the film in Thailand, and we had a different name and I wanted the character to be from Hong Kong, and I suggested that she should be a descendant of the great Wong Fei Hung who was played by Jet Lee in the Once Upon a Time in China movies. But people know about Wong Fei Hung if they're into Chinese martial arts films. They know who that is. So she is Wong Siu-ling and she's a descendant of Wong Fei Hung. And yeah, Silas the San Francisco Strangler, he was something completely different at one point.
We changed him, I can't even remember what he used to be. And then Yendi, he was different in some ways. You know, things get changed and dependent on who's going to play the part we can sometimes change things like Sarah's character Siu-ling , we completely changed her like two days before shooting—completely revamped the character. When we knew that Sarah was going to play her, I had this idea of making her much more mean-spirited. Originally she was quite cutesy and, "Hey, Mike, how's it going?" And it's like, "This isn't gonna work. We need to go the opposite direction." And so we got Sarah in there and I had her read both versions of the character. I said, "That's the one we're gonna go with." And I think that was a good choice, because she's great in the film.
You're a martial artist yourself. Do you guys have a stunt coordinator? Or do you come up with a lot of these stunts?
Scott Adkins: I actually designed the fights on this one more than any other movie I've worked on. Normally I like to get somebody who's better than me at choreographing fights, like Tim Man who did the first one. And I've worked with some amazing guys throughout my career—lucky to have them around me. When I've got somebody that good, I don't need to think about it and I can concentrate on other things. But Tim wasn't available, and we had Andy Long, but he wasn't there for the whole production.
And so me, George—we had a guy come in called Dante. We have stunt-double Sam—everyone's sort of throwing stuff into the mix. Even the performers were choreographing things on the spot. I've done so many of these films and I choreographed more on this than I have done on others, just because I didn't have a choice. It just ended up that way. I think I did a pretty good job!
I think you did a great job. It's funny because, when I first watched, I didn't know that you were a martial artist. I also noticed a common theme in both of these movies, and it's that Mike has somebody that he cares about. He's supposed to be this stone-cold hitman, so was that to show that he does have a sense of humanity?
Scott Adkins: Yeah, I mean, it's hard to root for a character that doesn't care about anyone, and is so selfish, and basically will kill anything with a heartbeat as long as you pay him. So you have to find ways of making that character relatable, and for the audience to forgive him. Probably less so on the first one. But what we wanted to do with this was make it about friendship, and just say, "Look, even if you're a stone-cold killer, put on this earth to extinguish lives, we all need friends."
We all need mates, don't we? Otherwise, it can be a lonely existence. Even these assassins need friends. Because if you haven't got that, what have you got? And that was kind of the theme of this film, and we had a lot of fun with it. And of course, we get to have a fully fledged bromance with Mike Fallon and Finicky Fred. Their relationship in this film, especially for the first half, it's full on bromance. We even had a song written for the movie called "Bromance."
Is that going to get released?
Scott Adkins: We need to release that. Yeah, we need to release that.
About Accident Man: Hitman’s Holiday
The Accident Man is back and this time he must beat the top assassins in the world to protect the ungrateful son of a mafia boss, save the life of his only friend, and rekindle his relationship with his maniacal father figure.
Check out our other interview for Accident Man: Hitman’s Holiday with directors Harry & George Kirby.
Accident Man: Hitman’s Holiday is currently available in theaters, VOD, and Digital.