Ron Perlman Details What Makes His New Film 'Asher' an Unexpected Story About a Hitman

Actor Ron Perlman has displayed his acting talents across a number of genres, from horror to fantasy to comedy, though his new film Asher delivers audiences one of his most emotional and subtle performances of his career.

In the film, Perlman plays a former Mossad agent turned gun for hire, living an austere life in an ever-changing Brooklyn. Approaching the end of his career he breaks the oath he took as a young man when he meets Sophie (Famke Janssen) on a hit gone wrong. In order to have love in his life before it's too late, he must kill the man he was, for a chance at becoming the man he wants to be.

"I was tremendously impressed with the world that this young writer, Jay Zaretsky had rendered," Perlman shared with ComicBook.com about what drew him to the role. "It was just filled with style, the style that the character Asher chooses to employ to make his life worth living as juxtaposed against the brutality of the profession that pays for that lifestyle, to me was incredibly smart, very, very, very sophisticated, very evocative of some of the great filmmakers that I love who grapple with the obsession for a profession to be as professional as is humanly possible. That was one of the overriding themes of Howard Hawks, he talked about that in interviews about he was obsessed with professionalism, and he was obsessed with people rose to a certain level in any given way of life, that set them apart from the average and the ordinary."

Perlman continued, "Jay Zaretsky captures this in Asher, but he does it in a way where the character, by definition needs to almost be unnoticeable. There's a quietness and an understatement in this character in order for him to survive that juxtaposes against these explosions and violence that he's forced to participate in because that's what he does. I just couldn't stop reading it, I couldn't stop admiring it. Every time I read it, I loved it more. I couldn't wait to make it."

The actor has an immensely diverse career, with Perlman's subdued performance in Asher coming as a surprise to fans who expect larger than life characters from the performer. The actor admits he doesn't intentionally try to buck the trends in his career, but merely pursues the scripts that excite him.

"Every script that comes to me I hope is great, and the ones that end up being great and also have a character in them that I'm fascinated by, and I feel actually I can come to grips with understanding enough to maybe do a decent performance, those are all surprised," the actor recalled. "You just can't plan for that. That's not a result of design or planning, that's more a result of just like, 'Holy sh-t, I'm just so grateful that there's somebody out there that can f-cking write, man.'"

He continued, "When I read Jay Zaretsky's script, that's how I felt. This is a kid who'd never been produced before, brand new screenwriter, and yet he just comes to the party with a poise and trusting of silences, trusting of not overly expressing. Descriptively setting up a world, but doing it in the most minimal fashion possible. That seems to me, more like a writer who's in his 60s and 70s would have the patience to be able to do that. I was just blown away by what was on the page, and that's always the jumping off point for everything that I do."

Fans can check out Asher in theaters, on Digital HD, and On Demand on December 7th.

Are you looking forward to checking out the new film? Let us know in the comments below!