Why Kevin Bacon Based Toxic Avenger Performance on Real-Life Billionaires

ComingSoon Senior Editor Brandon Schreur spoke to The Toxic Avenger star Kevin Bacon about the new, ultra-violent reboot movie. Bacon discussed what drew him to the project, how his character is different than other villains he’s played in the past, and more.

“In The Toxic Avenger, when a downtrodden janitor, Winston Gooze, is exposed to a catastrophic toxic accident, he’s transformed into a new kind of hero: The Toxic Avenger,” the official synopsis reads. “Now, Toxie must rise from outcast to savior, taking on ruthless corporate overlords and corrupt forces who threaten his son, his friends, and his community. In a world where greed runs rampant… justice is best served radioactive.” 

The Toxic Avenger hits United States theaters on August 29, 2025, from Cineverse.

Brandon Schreur: To start, I’d love to ask how it was that you got involved with this project. What’s the story of how you got cast in The Toxic Avenger, and what made you most excited to play this character?

Kevin Bacon: You know, I kind of knew Macon Blair. I’m trying to think — it’s funny, when you do these interviews, you kind of go, ‘How did that actually happen?’ It’s hard to remember. But he hit me up, said he was doing this, and that he had this part. I read it. I thought, ‘That’s funny. That’s going to be fun.’ The idea of having Peter Dinklage play that role, I thought was fantastic. And it all just kind of fell into place, and we found ourselves in Bulgaria. It during during the pandemic. A place I’d never been before with a Bulgarian crew. And we’re making this bananas movie. I think it came out great.

I totally agree. Bananas is a good way to describe it, too, which leads into what I was going to ask you next. The Toxic Avenger has been a franchise since the 1980s because of Lloyd Kaufman. I’m wondering if you were a fan of these movies before this, and if you have seen them, was any part of you nervous at all about how a Toxic Avenger movie would play in the 2020s? Just because those originals are so gory, off-the-wall, and there’s so much wild stuff that happens. What was your approach to doing Toxic Avenger now, in modern-day?

Well, to answer your first question, I’d of course heard of the movie and heard of some of the other Troma films. But that wasn’t the time in my life when I was really watching those kinds of movies, I guess. Maybe I was too old. So I kind of missed that whole thing. But, of course, I went back and revisited, and I was really kind of knocked out not only by the movies, but by the combination of independent filmmaking versus pop culture. Or not versus, but including the juxtaposition of pop culture filmmaking.

A lot of times, you think of low-budget indies as being serious dramas. And yet, what Lloyd was doing was going out and making these movies for a price in New Jersey. And really just going over the top in a way that, to me, first off, is risky. Because a lot of people would say — probably a lot of people did say — that this is definitely not for me. But, also, it’s so fundamentally what I love about movies: that people can work in all kinds of zany worlds and make something cool and interesting.

When Macon came to me with the script, obviously, I went back and I thought, okay, the sweet spot, here, will be to not disappoint the fans of the original Troma stuff, but also make something that holds up now. And to not back too far away from it and make it more accessible. But to lean into all of the craziness that was in the original movies. At the same time, just give it a fresh look. And I think he did a really, really nice job in terms of that.

Oh, for sure. I talked to Macon about a week ago about this movie, and we talked a lot about that bicycle scene from the original movie. You remember that moment, it’s so vivid and graphic. We talked about whether you can adapt a moment like that in 2023, and he’s like, ‘Yeah, we can. It was an indie back then, but there’s still an audience for it now.’ I thought that was a cool take to have — maybe it was risky, but people still like that kind of stuff.

I think so. Clearly, it’s not exactly horror, but clearly, horror still finds an audience. I think that bloody comedy — I just made one myself. I’m totally into that. I love genre, and I love filmmakers like Macon who are working within genre, but doing it with so much skill. And, also, emotional complexity. These characters, the Toxic Avenger, he’s got a really kind of deep sadness and struggle that, to me, sort of feels like the hook of the movie.

Totally. Kevin, you’ve played villains in the past — I’ve seen you in X-Men: First Class as Sebastian Shaw. You were the bad guy in James Gunn’s Super, and just recently starred in Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F. How does your character in this movie, Bob, compare to those villains? Is it more of the same thing, or do you have to hit a certain different level since the tone of this movie is so up there?

I’d like to think that I hit something different each time, but maybe I’m dreaming. But, if I approach a bad guy, I don’t think of him first as a bad guy. I think of him as, ‘Who is he?’ The bad part is just kind of like the byproduct of what the character does. There’s no real way to play evil, you know? You can play hungry, sad, angry, confused, lonely — there are a million things you can play. But evil, to me, is too undefined to really kind of sink your teeth into.

In this approach, yeah, the tone is certainly big, and I think Macon encouraged me to go big. We went big with the look and the physicality of it and everything. But I was thinking a lot about televangelists. I was thinking about self-help gurus. People who sell shit that’s useless and bleed innocent people of their money.

But I was also thinking about the billionaire class. Nowadays, billionaires, we know who they are. They’re very in our face; they’re very public personas. But that wasn’t the case years ago. They were hiding in dark rooms. Nobody could tell you what so-and-so looked like. Nowadays, that’s not really the case. Because we live in a society where people are so interested in your own personal brand — the brand is the person as opposed to the brand is the stuff that you’re selling. So you see a lot of these billionaires come front and center. But those were the things I was thinking about when I was playing Bob.

Sure. One last question for you, there was a period of time after The Toxic Avenger screened at a few festivals where it was having trouble finding a distributor. There was a minute there where we didn’t know if the general public was ever going to be able to see it. Cineverse picked it up and now it’s coming out as an unrated movie, which is super exciting. How exciting is it for you that people are finally going to have the chance to see this on the big screen?

I love it. I love movies, and I go to the movies. That’s what I started out wanting to do, to be on a movie screen. I certainly had a lot of great times and a lot of great opportunities on the small screen or on the screen that you’re watching at home. But, to me, movies are the most exciting thing. Look, if you work really hard, as everyone did on The Toxic Avenger, and it never sees the light of day, that’s pretty depressing. Especially when the movie is awesome. So, I’m thrilled. I’m thrilled that it’s coming out, and I’m thrilled that people are going to see it. I think it’s great that Cineverse picked it up, and good for them. Obviously, they know what they’re doing. I couldn’t be happier.

Thanks to Kevin Bacon for taking the time to discuss The Toxic Avenger.