In this business, legends don’t come much bigger than the great Nicolas Cage. Recently, I had the chance to see his latest movie, The Surfer, at a pretty raucous screening at SXSW. You can read my review Here, but I enjoyed this surreal tribute to seventies Ozzploitation flicks. In it, Cage plays a harried businessman trying to reconnect with his Australian roots, only to run afoul of a local surf gang, run by a magnetic, macho guru (Nip/Tuck’s Julian McMahon in an excellent performance), who launches a campaign against him that challenges his sanity.

Suffice to say, I was pumped when I received an invitation to speak to Cage recently. I’ve interviewed Cage a few times before, and always found him to be an upbeat, friendly guy – and this time was no exception. You can really see in our chat (embedded above) that Cage cares about the film,...