RW: "Good morning to you, today it is my pleasure to catch up with one of Hollywood's finest young actors, Christian Slater, who started his theatrical career at the age of nine in The Music Man and who has over the years starred in string of box office hits including Untamed Heart, The Name of The Rose, Interview With The Vampire and True Romance. Christian Slater is in Australia to promote his current movie Broken Arrow."

CS: "The basic outline it's about these two stealth bomber pilots that are on a mission carrying nuclear weapons and one of them turns out to be a bad guy and tries to steal the nuclear weapons and then I have try and stop him."

RW: "You are the good guy, of course."

CS: "I am the good guy."

RW: "How was working with Travolta?"

CS: "Ah, it was great, you know, he's a very sweet guy, he's got a wonderful sense of humor, very down to earth, very warm nice guy"

RW: "What do you think of nucelar weapons?"

CS: "Well I think of course nuclear weapons are terrible destructive devices, I suppose the underlying message is , I think, a real simple one, you know, good against evil, that type of thing, there's certainly betrayal. Like you say I think nuclear weapons are horrible."

RW: "Do you consider each project you take on something of a calculated risk?"

CS: "I suppose each time you do something it's a little bit of a gamble, sure, you roll the dice and take your chances and hopefully when your making the movie you'll work well with people and everybody will get along, that's usually my main objective."

RW: "To get on well...."

CS: "Sure, yeah to keep it collaborative, nice working environment, to try and get along and work well and be a professional."

RW: "Your body of work is quite exceptional, can I throw a few movie titles at you? "Interview With The Vampire." "Sure."

RW: " Tom and Brad, it must have been terrific." "It was historic, yeah (laughing) it was great, they are wonderful guys, I had a great time working on it. Absolutely."

RW: "The Name of The Rose with everyone's favourite actor."

CS: "Yeah, Sean Connery, he's wonderful, almost like a father figure type of guy, you know, very warm, he's got an incredible presence on the set, he's very very disciplined and very very strong, he doesn't take any crap from anybody."

RW: "True Romance."

CS: "I am just too positive, I have to say something bad about something. But ah, True Romance actually was great, I can't say anything bad about it. Tony Scott he's a wonderful director, he wears the same clothes everyday which I thought was interesting."

RW: (Laughing) "What are they?"

CS: "He wears these shorts, like pink shorts, and a hat and he smokes a big cigar and he's got this pink vest, that's what he is in to."

RW: "You are often described as a young Jack Nicholson, how does that feel?"

CS: "I think that's kind of a label I gave to myself I think in one interview when I was about 18 they were asking me about Heathers and what I was thinking about and that's sort of something that was attached to me. He's certainly an actor I respect and admire but I think with all the other different types of projects that I've done I think I've been able to do other kinds of things."

RW: "Is it just the acting that you think gets you linked to him, I mean he's a bit of a party boy and you've got something of a reputation."

CS: "Ah, well, god, I don't know (laughing) it could be, I have no idea."

RW: "Is it hard to keep the focus of the public's attention on your work?"

CS:"In the last couple of years I've definitely made a much more conscious effort to, ah, when ever anybody, a journalist or anybody really brings up a particular subject of that type of arena, I always say 'No Comment', and just try and keep what I do, and also all that sort of stuff gets blown out or proportion, you know, so it's very hard for me to take it seriously, so a lot of the things that people read, not that I want to destroy any kind of image (laughing) but ah, might not be quite as dramatic or as intense as it might appear on the page."

RW: "The media had a field day a few years back when you apparently carried a hand gun through JFK airport, what was all that about?"

CS: "Ah, well, No Comment" (laughing)

RW: "Yeah, okay." (laughing) "The, the um, Hollywood is such a ah....."

CS: (Holding up his hand and laughing) "Bang, bang, no just kidding."

RW: (laughing) "We're not going to edit that either."

CS: "Yeah, I'm sure, I know" (smiling).

RW: "Well Christian, good luck with the movie and thanks for talking to us."

CS: "Nice to see you."

RW: " Cheers."

RW: "Broken Arrow opens up around the country later this month."

The Today Show appears on the Channel Nine Network.

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