John McClane is turning into a real family man. In Thursday’s “A Good Day to Die Hard,” the fifth installment of the over-the-top action franchise, Bruce Willis’ NYPD cop introduces us to another one of his children, Jack, played by Jai Courtney. (We met daughter Lucy, played by Mary Elizabeth Winstead, in 2007’s “Live Free or Die Hard.”)
Somehow the whole family turns up in Moscow, facing off against a Russian thug named Komarov, who’s got nasty plans for the rest of the world. With whispers out that Willis, 57, wants to retire the McClane character after one more film, The Post asked him to reflect on starring in a series that has managed to survive into its fourth decade.
This is the 25th anniversary of “Die Hard.” How are you feeling about John McClane these days?
There is something that comes out of having the opportunity to do five films about the same character. And trying to not repeat yourself, and still be funny and still keep the character strong. I was only competing with myself. I was only trying to do better than I did and to be more honest or funnier.
So what’s the key to being a good action hero?
Action is comprised of a lot of things: fire and car crashes and peril of death — that you are going to jump out of this window and you are going to live somehow. But some of the best action I’ve done in these films is when I don’t speak. I am just looking at somebody, trying to figure something out. It’s just as much of that as it is talking or shooting guns.
What was one of the most challenging scenes, physically, to shoot in the franchise?
Someone said we should do “Die Hard 2” in the snow, and just from that it cost the studio an extra $7 million dollars because it was some year [1989] where they didn’t have a lot of snow. So we kept having to go farther and farther north to find snow. Then they found a really, really cold place [Kincheloe, Michigan, 10 miles from the Canadian border]. Remember that little T-shirt that I had on, running on an airport runway with no shoes on? That’s where I did that scene.
How do you deal with a scene like that?
I think it’s a guy thing — the challenge of not complaining is going, “I am all right, I am not cold. It’s OK.” It’s just those kind of silly, guy contests with yourself. A couple of times in this film, I got up a little slower after falling down. But I don’t think about it as age, I just think that I landed wrong. [Laughs]
Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone always seemed to be competing to outdo each other.
I don’t know about those guys competing. They are really good friends, even back in the time when everybody said they were competing. They are two completely different guys, two completely different approaches. The fact that they both still get to work now is just amazing.
Some people say you older stars are still working because there haven’t been any new action stars to replace you.
I think there are new action stars. Jason Statham is one. And Daniel Craig is a pretty tough guy. He made me start watching James Bond movies again. It takes a while to become a guy that is as mythical as Arnold Schwarzenegger. He’s done a lot of things. He was the governor of California. That was the most amazing thing that I’ve ever seen.
Have you ever thought about politics?
No. Well, yes. [Some politically connected] people have asked: “Do you think about it?” I go, “Yeah, I thought about it.” And then nothing ever happens. I did a lot of things when I was a kid that I think would always keep me out of politics. [Laughs.]
From “Yippee-ki-yay, mother-f – – ker” on, there have been so many great lines in the franchise. Were any of them improvised?
In the first film, when I was in that little air-conditioning unit, we were stuck trying to come up with a line. It was about 10 o’clock at night, and [screenwriter] Steve De Souza had gone home. They called him up on the [mobile] phone — at the time the phone was as big as an iPad — and he says the line to me: “Come out to the coast. We’ll get together and have a few laughs.” That was telephoned in to me, but that line is a very good line.
John McClane is one of the most famous New York cops in film. How do you get along with the real NYPD?
I love New York cops — they really have a great attitude and it’s a tough town. I get thanked for making cops look good, but I don’t know if I make them look good. [McClane does] a lot of things that are against the law, or kind of outside the law.
‘Die Hard’ by the numbers
Fans of utterly preposterous but jaw-dropping action have always found pleaure in “Die Hard.” Here’s a quick recap of how John McClane dispatches the the bad guys.
1998: Die Hard
Villain: Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman)
He wants: $640 million
Enemies taken down: 22 Methods: fists, handgun, C-4 explosive in an elevator shaft, hanging, plate-glass window, assault rifle, stairfall, tossing out of a skyscraper
Explosions: 4 out of 10 bombs
1990: Die Hard 2
Villain: Col. Stuart (William Sadler)
He wants: a rebel general set free
Enemies taken down: 24
Methods: fists, guns, scaffolding, electrocution, jet engine, finger bite, snowmobile crash, stabbing, icicle, conveyor belt, golf club
Explosions: 5 out of 10 bombs
1995: Die Hard With Avengeance
Villain: Simon Gruber (Jeremy Irons)
He wants: $140 billion, and to avenge his brother, Hans
Enemies taken down: 19
Methods: handgun, head butt, steel cable from a truck winch, freighter’s steel door, helicopter shoot-down
Explosions: 2 out of 10 bombs
2007: Live Free and Die Hard
Villain: Thomas Gabriel (Timothy Olyphant)
He wants: to wage cyber-warfare on the US
Enemies taken down: 28
Methods: fire extinguisher, broken neck, car crashes into helicopter, handgun, SUV falls down elevator shaft, shredded by fan
Explosions: 9 out of 10 bombs
2013: A Good Day To Die Hard
Villain: Yuri Kormarov (Sebastian Koch)
He wants: one of Russia’s stray nukes for a terrorist plot
Enemies taken down: 24
Methods: handgun, knife, machine gun, snapped neck, shotgun, grenade, thrown off a building
Explosions: 9 out of 10 bombs