In case you missed news of its existence earlier this year, Ivory Tower is a forthcoming feature length comedy that revolves around two chess playing brothers and a former performance artist love interest. Aside from the ridiculousness of the plot, which includes the discovery of a new form of chess called “jazz chess”, the film is notable for its musician heavy cast which includes names like Tiga, Feist, Peaches and Gonzales (who also co-wrote the screenplay).
To find out more about the film’s unlikely genesis we recently caught up with Tiga, Canada’s most self-deprecating DJ/Producer/Actor, to discuss what he describes as a cross between Dodgeball and an artsy biopic:
“In real life myself and Gonzales started playing chess a lot and we were playing over the internet and got into it and he had the idea to do a chess based album. It ended up being a new project called Ivory Tower, which he did with Boys Noize as a kind of techno/piano hybrid. Then he had the idea, as he often does, to make a film around it. I think it started as an idea for a promo clip but it became a whole movie then he inevitably cast me as his kind of asshole brother-slash-me in a way. So yeah, that’s it. It was shot in Toronto. I’m in it, Feist is in it, he’s in it. And I guess it’s like a hybrid between a classic sports comedy like Dodgeball with a bit of artsy biographical info about Gonzales.”
Tiga also said his performance was “abysmal” and describes the acting process as playing a douche-ier version of himself. Love this guy:
“I didn’t write the script but I wrote my own lines. And it’s actually very similar to the character in the interview [see below]. The truth is, that asshole on the screen is not really that far off from me. We all have that side of ourselves where if we didn’t censor ourselves it would come out.”
Look out for the full interview soon. In the meantime check out the best interview on Youtube right now…
