Gerard Butler’s Detective “Big Nick” O’Brien and O’Shea Jackson Jr.’s Donnie Wilson were enemies in Den of Thieves. Big Nick was the hunter who always delivered. Donnie, the getaway driver, was Big Nick’s prey. Yet at the end of Den of Thieves, Donnie is the master thief, robbing the Los Angeles Federal Reserve Bank and fleeing to Europe before a humiliated Big Nick can catch him.
When Den of Thieves 2: Pantera begins, Big Nick’s obsession with Donnie leads to his divorce and benching from the force. Meanwhile, Donnie is in Europe, planning his next score. Hellbent on revenge, Big Nick finds Donnie overseas and confronts him at gunpoint. This time, Big Nick wants in on the action and forces Donnie to include him in his next heist. Their mission is to rob the World Diamond Center. Donnie describes it as “the cop going gangster,” as Big Nick switches sides to attempt the heist of the century.
Butler and Jackson spoke with Digital Trends about returning to this universe and how they reshaped their characters for the sequel. While the action remains stellar, Den of Thieves 2: Pantera shows a much funnier side of Big Nick and Donnie. Butler tells me that if Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and The Odd Couple had a baby, it would be Den of Thieves 2.
Note: This article has been edited for length and clarity.
Digital Trends: One of the quotes I want to start with comes from Donnie, who says it in the trailer: “It’s not about the money. It’s about the challenge.” That’s his creed. I think we’ve all faced that decision in our lives, to really test ourselves. As actors, is there a specific time you can point to when you sought out a role to challenge yourselves?
O’Shea Jackson Jr.: Well, for me, it would probably be, number one, I think this is the most challenging movie I’ve had to deal with. When it comes to action roles and everything, it’s going to take a toll on you physically. Your endurance throughout the day, you know, you just want to make sure that you’re ready for whatever gets thrown at you. Then, there’s a lot of things that I tried in this film that I haven’t done before in my short acting career…
One where it was just strictly for growth and the love of the game would probably be a film I did after Straight Outta Compton called Ingrid Goes West. It was an indie. It was with people who I truly believed in and cared about. It was completely night and day from Straight Outta Compton. It was to to show myself, like, “Yo, are we really gonna do this?” So, I gotta say Ingrid Goes West.
Gerard Butler: For a period, I would choose movies on the fact that they terrified me. Like I played the Phantom in the Phantom of the Opera. I’d never had a singing lesson in my life! I took one singing lesson and then had to sing music for the night for Andrew Lloyd Webber. I made a surf movie, and I’d never surfed in my life. A bunch of other things, too, like performing Shakespeare opposite Ralph Fiennes, where I’d never really done any Shakespeare before.
Another one was when I went into a movie not knowing a single line. It was called Last Seen Alive. The idea was nothing special, but going in, I thought, “I don’t even know if I can do this.” I’ve loved that for challenges, but I agree with you [turns to O’Shea]. I think that this movie feels like it’s challenging for everybody. Big Nick is challenging and a lot of fun at the same time.
I look at the character details of Donnie and Big Nick and the way they talk and stand. Donnie is a man of many languages and nice jewelry. Big Nick — slicked-backed hair and the chain. With those details, how do you utilize them to get back into character for the sequel?
Jackson: With Donnie, it was kind of night and day as far as with the first one. It really mirrored my actual feelings about myself. Den of Thieves, the first one, was my third movie ever. I had this idea in my mind that I just got to keep my head down, do my work, not cause any complaints, not cause any issues. Get in and get out.
Butler: [sarcastically] And it did cause complaints, by the way.
Jackson: Absolutely, bro.
Butler: Big time.
Jackson: They sent me to weapons training at like 6 in the morning. I don’t shoot a gun the whole movie. I’m down for the team bonding, but like, let’s go to dinner. [laughs] The first one definitely mirrored how I felt about myself career-wise, so it was easy to open up and show that side of me.
Then with this one, I shot this in my ninth year of choosing this [acting] career, so I felt more confident in myself. I felt like I knew what I wanted to do, knew how to execute it, and I was familiar with the people that I was working with. This is my first time in a sequel, so I felt like I was getting the gang back together. It helped me relax a little bit. Being comfortable in my own skin as a performer shined through for what Donnie needed in the second one.
Butler: I have stuff to say about Big Nick, but first, I want to state that watching O growth from movie to movie has been fascinating and awesome to watch, especially now. He gets to play a different Donnie because the first Donnie we all thought was somebody completely different. I remember I would be doing scenes with him, and I’d seen him in stuff before and thought he was very talented, but I had no idea [about O’Shea’s talent]. The scene where I’m kicking the crap out of you, and the way you were coming at it, I was like, “This kid is good, like really good. Just a natural.” Now, to see him get a chance to do more with the different Donnie we now know — the real guy, the kingpin, the master thief — and to see your confidence grow where you’re even more aware.
Big Nick, everything about him, like you said, the greased-back hair, his beard, the way he holds himself. I did a lot of work on that in the first one. Literally, how did I hold my drink? How did I talk to people? How did I answer? How did I hold a door for somebody? I did that all the time, and it was kind of interesting to really feel that out with Big Nick.
Weirdly, I did that less this time. I actually came off of that because I thought, well, that’s cool, but I think if I come off of that a little more, there’s more color to be gained. There’s a lot of color to be gotten from our story and everything he’s going through. As I came off that a bit, I felt like it opened up Big Nick and allowed him to play different aspects other than the machismo, brutish energy. That was really fun, especially with this guy here.
I was going to mention that it’s a lot funnier than I expected. It’s almost like a buddy-cop odd couple with comedic vibes in certain scenes. I don’t know if you worked on that with Christian [Gudegast, the writer-director] to get that vibe.
Butler: Yeah, that was a big thing for me. Actually, Christian came to Scotland, and we spent like seven days going around castles and hotels, just shooting the s***. One of the big things for me was how much we could get out of [Big Nick and Donnie’s] relationship. There was a lot more humor and bonding. That was the main part of the work.
When we get together, a lot of it is him O and I improv-ing. Our energy together, you could see that from the first movie. Our little moments together were really good, but this time, there was a lot of space for deliciousness watching Donnie. Like you said, The Odd Couple. I always say it’s like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid meets The Odd Couple. If they had a baby, then that’s us.
Jackson: In the first one, Christian really made it a point to keep us separated. We had the outlaws and the regulators. We rarely saw each other on set unless it was a shootout [laughs], which is great for chemistry because it made us band together as two separate teams. The times when I did have scenes with Gerard, it was like unfamiliar territory with each other. But this time, we’re with each other all the time. It really was a lot of bonding moments on set/off camera that led to the chemistry you see on screen.
Major WWE vibes.
Jackson: Yeah!
Almost like Big Nick joining The Bloodline.
Jackson: Yeah, bro.
Butler: By the way, what was the belt you were carrying? In the first movie, you came in–
Jackson: There’s like this huge warehouse full of props from like a ton of movies. I was going around being just an ass. [laughs]
Butler: It was very funny. Was it a WWE belt?
Jackson: Yeah, a WWE belt.
Butler: Carrying it around like it was his, like he just won. [laughs] He just never stopped talking, and it was hilarious. He had this stream of consciousness — he would just talk and talk. It was very clever. For instance, and I know we’re talking about the wrong movie [Den of Thieves 1] here, the day that we had to beat you up, our gang was all trying to be tough, trying to be scary, and to keep it real.
He’s O just joking about it. When we did the scene, he was brilliant. It was hard to say, “Come on, man. You know, stay with us,” because he was giving a great performance. But then he’d be joking around with us, so I kept slapping his face in between. The rest of the guys would be walking over, slapping his face, trying to scare him, which wasn’t really working. In the scene, it worked out because he seemed scared. But I was like, “For Christ’s sake. Take this seriously.” Yet, he was killing it.
Jackson: I’m a little brother, bro. I got beat up a lot as a kid. [laughs]
Butler: I’m a younger sibling, too. I get it.
Jackson: [laughs] Yeah.
Speaking of the wrestling theme, I like the question you ask on your podcast about the bar — four guys on your side. I want to flip it back at you guys — heist edition, though. You’re in the vault. You got the money. Police are outside. Four movie characters with you. You can choose each other if you want.
Jackson: [to Butler] I have a wrestling podcast that I do, and on the podcast, I ask wrestlers, “All right. There’s a bar full of 50 guys. They all hate you, and you need four other wrestlers to make sure you can get to the car.” So what I do is I have wrestlers come up with this fantasy team that they wish they had with them if s*** hits the fan. So he’s asking for us to pick four other movie characters to do a heist with.
Obviously, I need Big Nick on my squad. What’s Tom Cruise’s name in Mission: Impossible?
Ethan Hunt.
Jackson: Ethan Hunt. Yeah, you got to have him.
Butler: Oh yeah, Ethan Hunt. That’s good.
Jackson: I want Paul Walker from Fast and Furious so we can get out of there. Donnie’s a driver, too, but we need two cars. I could just pick James Bond, but I feel like it’s cheating. So I want, oh, John Wick. I need Wick. [laughs] I need Wick.
You said Paul Walker. I was thinking of Vin Diesel. We’ll get Dominic Toretto.
Jackson: Yeah, Dom. He seems like a Nick guy. [laughs]
Butler: I would say Donnie because he said me, and that gets one out of the way. Great driver. Can get out of situations to the extent that he would be so good that I would not even be sure he would not leave me behind. I know he would get us out of there. The rest would be me just kind of grabbing onto his coattails.
Little Miss Sunshine, I think, because nobody would expect that. Wonder Woman to keep the women happy, so we’re not just gonna be talking about male heroes. Wonder Woman because she’s beautiful, and she’s a badass.
Jackson: That’s our tank.
Butler: Then me, Leonidas.
Jackson: Oh, that’s great!
Butler: Come on now!
Jackson: Double the Butler!
Butler: Come on now!
All the cops are dying.
Jackson: First of all, you got Leonidas and Wonder Woman. They’re just gonna be sparring the entire time. [laughs]
Butler: Oh, that’s gonna be interesting.
Den of Thieves 2: Pantera is now in theaters.
