I definitely wasn't a jock at school, but I wasn't as clueless as Napoleon is 
Raised in Oregon and bound on a career as an animator before being cast in director Jared Hess' acclaimed short film Peluca, Jon Heder makes his feature debut with Napoleon Dynamite. The 28-year-old is, in life, nothing like the bespectacled, curly-haired ubergeek of a character he plays, which must come as a relief to his wife Kirsten. But he does not rule out returning to the role in the future.
Is Napoleon Dynamite (Nappy D) the role of a lifetime?
It is for me, in a lot of different ways. It's the first feature film I've done, and it may be the only role of my lifetime. I have to accept the fact that for the rest of my life I'll be known as the guy who plays Napoleon. It's bigger than a mere novelty. I don't know that I'll be able to top that kind of a character or if someone will come to me with another character as memorable.
Did you draw on your own high school experiences to find the character?
Yeah, it was a case of making observations and remembering but it wasn't like I was taking notes through high school. I drew a lot of inspiration from my two younger brothers in terms of how Napoleon talks, and how he moves and stuff. He's very awkward socially, physically he's very stiff, and he runs like an idiot.
And then there's that perm - were you stuck with it for the whole duration of filming?
I hardly ever walked around in his outfit, I would never wear the moon boots in regular life, I didn't wear glasses, and I would open my eyes when I was myself.
When you were at school were you a nerd or a jock?
I definitely wasn't a jock, but I wasn't as clueless as Napoleon is. He has no idea how dorky he is, whereas I knew how dorky I was. I was kind of in between. I had a twin brother, so we sort of had a clique of our own.
There are moments when you go above and beyond the call of duty for the role - like when Uncle Rico (Jon Gries) hurls a beef steak at you really, really hard. Did that hurt?
It did. We did about four takes of that, and in the first two takes he completely missed because he was a good distance away. The third one hit me in the armpit and left this nasty meat juice stain on my shirt. Then for the fourth one he said he was going to throw it really hard because he could aim better if he did that. He did as well, it smacked me in the face and ripped my glasses off. I ended up with this big bruise that we had cover up with makeup. So it hurt, but fortunately I stayed in character, because otherwise I might have had to do it all over again.
There is much humour drawn from the sleepy Idaho town of Preston in which the story is set. Did they mind being sent up in this way?
Well we had a premiere there for them, and that went okay. I think a lot of the youngsters really loved it, but some of the older people didn't quite get it. They were unsure whether it was making fun of them or not, so I guess it got kind of a mixed reaction. But I hear that now they're into the new school year they're having steak throwing competitions, and they're doing this whole Napoleon Dynamite fair at the high school. So maybe some of them are embracing it.
Napoleon Dynamite is released in London's West End on Friday 3rd December 2004, and nationwide from 26th December.
