Lorenzo di Bonaventura: The $7 Billion Box Office Film Producer Talks Transformers and Michael Bay

Lorenzo di Bonaventura’s movies have generated well in excess of $7 billion at the global box office, and he has worked on some of the film industry’s largest franchises such as Transformers, G.I. Joe, Jack Ryan and Maze Runner. The list of actors Lorenzo has produced in films reads like a who’s who of Hollywood royalty, including Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Keanu Reeves, Anthony Hopkins, Mark Wahlberg, Dame Helen Mirren, John Malkovich, Catherine Zeta Jones, Morgan Freeman, Angelina Jolie and Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson to name but a few.

I caught up with Lorenzo ahead of the release of the third Transformers movie, Dark of the Moon, to discuss what it was like working on such a popular and big budget franchise film, and with ‘stars’ of the film that nobody ever saw on set as they were digitally added afterwards. In this brief interview Lorenzo discusses his early film influences, the challenges of producing a billion dollar feature film using a new 3D technology, and how they chose the lead characters for the Transformers movies.

Lorenzo talks about why he and director Michael Bay chose Chicago for a climactic battle scene, and how Chicago is different from almost every other US city. He also tells us what Michael Bay is like to work with on a daily basis, especially when shooting action sequences.

Watch this episode on YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZx3b5Lvif4

About your host:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/darrenjamieson/

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