Inmate #1: The Rise of Danny Trejo (2019) - full transcript

- What's up? What's up?
- Hey.

What's up, fellas?

My name's Danny Trejo,

some of you might have seen me
once in a while on TV.

I, uh, I'm kind of
at a loss for words

'cause I, uh..

First of all,
I, I love doing this,

you know,
this is one of the things

that has kept me out of prison
since 1969.

My number was B-948.

I remember
this director once said,



"Danny, kick in this door
and intimidate."

I kick in the door...

"Cut!" He said,
"Where did you study?"

Dale's Market,
the Far East Market, Vonz.

Alright, fellas, let's do this.

They make movies and
stories about guys like Danny,

and actors are portraying
those people.

Danny is that guy.

He's been in trouble
since he was a kid.

It just got worse and worse
as he grew older.

I'm always astonished
by how he lived that life

and survived.

A lot of times you cannot
make an amends for that,

you can't clean that up.



I feel Danny has paid his debt
to society.

I don't think
Danny feels he has.

Falling down
is one thing.

What do you do
when you get back up?

That's Danny's life.

And it all comes back
to where he started.

My dad grew up
in Pacoima, California.

He actually grew up
in this house

that we're,
that we're in right now.

Back when there was
a dairy farm over there,

dirt roads, dirt allies,

just poor Mexican neighborhood.

This was
life without seat belts,

life without cell phones,

life without
some houses having telephones.

From the time you were four,
you just went out the door

and hopefully you came home
at dark.

Pacoima
and San Fernando

was just transitioning
from farm land.

When I moved out there
in the mid '50s,

it was orange groves, we moved
right into an orange grove.

We turned on the faucets
and mud would come out.

Pacoima and Sylmar
and all those communities

were really just starting
to grow up.

There used to be
this old man that walked around

with this pony.

I don't know what he charged,
but I remember

my mom seen the pony,
I got on it,

and they put
this little scarf on me,

I took a picture
with that pony.

It was this kind
of sense of ownership

that all the kids had.
We were creating this.

Chevys, low riders,

big Buicks.

Back in the days
in San Fernando, Pacoima,

they did a lot of cruising,
everybody

was really into their cars.

Particularly
with the Mexican community,

the Chicano community,
it wasn't to get the fast car,

the vroom, the race car,
the thoroughbred

that could
make it across lifers.

They were show horses,
they did slow,

so they paraded around
with their little slow moves.

It wasn't like,
"Look at me be fast."

It was, "Look at me be slow,

to admire the power."

I remember cruising around
when I was 13 years old

in the backseat with a,

a... a cord of Miller Highlight.
Yeah.

I couldn't wait till I could
get, you know, a... a car,

a convertible,
a sun low or something.

How you doing? Alright!

Machete cruises!

Right now we're in a '60...

I'm sorry, a '56 Chevy Bel Air.

350 Chevy engine.
And this is a monster.

Now this is Branford, this is
the street that I lived on.

It was really
a good neighborhood.

You know what I mean?

Oh...

I can actually beat that guy,
isn't it?

Oops. Foot took over.

I love that.

Neighborhoods
were neighborhoods.

When the lights went down,
you know, the sun went down,

things changed.

The kids
didn't have anything to do

and there was no money and there
was no employment for them

or nothing,
your parents were gone,

working probably,
so they got into mischief.

The atmosphere
of Pacoima

was that of a lot of tension.

Pacoima was like the murder
capital of Los Angeles

at the time.

Pacoima, San Fernando,
North Hollywood, Van Nuys,

all the Latin communities
used to, like, just be at war.

There were
no automatic weapons,

there was none of this
people driving down

and shooting everybody
to get one person.

There was no head of the Mafia

because the Mafia
hadn't even been formed yet.

It was a lot more civilized,
but it was still there.

That's my old
junior high school right there,

Pacoima Junior High.
We were, like, crazy there.

This is
Pacoima Middle School.

It used to be Pacoima
Junior High School,

and then they changed it.

Everybody calls it
Ritchie Valens Middle School

'cause he went here.

Me, Mike Cerno,
Malcolm Armaderas,

Julian Valdez, Eddy Valenzuela,

they were like my dogs, man.

I got here in 1957, I think,

when I moved into Pacoima.

I got kicked out of here,
went to San Fernando,

but I never got in,
I got in a fight on the steps.

None of those buildings
were there.

There, there used to be an alley
that went all the way

like that way,
there was old houses,

and we used to steal wine
out of Dale's Market

and go drink in that alley.

Hi, how are you? What's up?

It's a weird trip, boy.

We first got our television,
I was about ten.

And I missed
about 15 days of school.

Growing up,
he's always loved Westerns,

and if you love Westerns,
you loved John Wayne.

When I was
12 years old,

I found out John Wayne
was an actor,

and that was a real shock to me

because we thought

that The Duke
was a historical figure.

When my kids were little

and John Wayne
came on the screen,

I'd say,
"Stand up, it's John Wayne,"

and they would actually,
like, stand up

and we would all salute
John Wayne.

He's like,
"That's The Duke,

you have to salute The Duke."

He always had
these great sayings.

"Life is really tough. It's
even tougher if you're stupid."

I like that.

He was a hero.

He didn't have to wear tights,
he didn't have a cape,

you know, he didn't fly,
he just kicked ass.

Pedro Gonzalez Gonzalez,

he worked with John Wayne!

He was actually
one of the first Latins.

When you saw him, you knew

that your limit just increased.

Wait till I show you
what is in this package.

In my neighborhood,
you could either be a laborer

or a criminal.

I mean, you just didn't see
a lot of lawyer Mexicans

and a lot of doctors.

...she could have climbed down.

When I saw
Pedro Gonzalez Gonzalez...

you had another,
wow, you could do that.

And here's where I grew up was,
I was about

13 years old right here.

I used to come home drunk,

and on this big old wide street,

I'd try to make a U-turn
and still crash into the curb.

My dad left my real mom.

I was three, and I moved in
with my grandma.

I lived
with a lot of girl cousins.

Yeah, it was like
a real happy time in my life.

Grandma was cool.

That's why I started dancing,

"American BandStand" and all
that, so I could always dance.

Nine women.

And all of a sudden I move in
with my grandfather,

and my dad
and my dad's six brothers.

So shit really changed.

Kind of like going, like, from
Shirley Temple to John Wayne.

You find out real quick
little boys don't do pee-pee

sittin' down.

My dad was my first role model,
but...

It wasn't very, uh...

huggy,

I... I-love-you kind of guy.

Not too much good happened
between me and my dad.

He would tell me that

"Man, I wasn't really
that good at working."

"And every time
my, my dad will see me,

he'll get pissed off
and he'll say,

'Man, go inside
and go wash dishes,

go and help your mom
wash dishes!'"

We come
from the same neighborhood,

His father was mean,
my father was mean, you know?

A big old smack in the head.

"My job
is to support this family.

Don't ask for anything else."

I know that sounds harsh
and it sounds like he was mean,

but that's just the way it was.

In this neighborhood,
success is like a, a house,

a car and a camper.

And I... I think
my dad was just kind of saying,

"Is that all there is?
You know, is that all there is?"

You know, and then kind of
disappointed at the end,

you know what I mean, the "Wow,
is that all there is?" You know?

He was real strict
with him.

His mom, Alice,
would come to the rescue.

Alice
was not his birth mother,

but was his mother.

When Danny moved back
to live with his father,

he was already married
to Alice,

and Alice never had
children of her own,

but Danny was her son.

That's his mom,
that's the person

that was there for him.

Alice was there,
always, for him.

She'd been with me
since I was three.

She would always say something
to throw water

on whatever was happening
with me and my dad.

One of her dreams
was to have a restaurant.

So we'd talk about
a restaurant.

"Hey, mom, yeah,
and we can do this

and you can make your tacos."

And my dad would always, like,

"Ahem. Hey,
we got a kitchen right there..."

He was like the,
the Mexican Archie Bunker.

My dad, I think
he hated his younger brother

'cause I worshipped him.

My dad knew
what Gilbert was doing,

and they, they couldn't
keep me away from him.

I remember when I graduated
from junior high school,

graduated on a Friday.

My dad found me passed out
in Gilbert's front yard

on Wednesday.

To know Danny
is you must know of Gilbert.

My uncle was doing
robberies and shooting dope.

God, man, it was like, always
had a car, always had money

and never had a sweat ring.

When my Uncle Gilbert
was on the run,

he used to sneak in
to that window.

That was before we had bars,

before my mom lived alone,
and so that was my room.

He didn't fit in real well
with his older brothers.

I didn't fit in with anybody,
you know,

so me and him just really like,

became inseparable.

When he talks about
Gilbert, he talks about

the clothes he wore and
pulling up in the new Cadillac

and the money
he was throwing around.

That was amazing to see
as an eight-year-old,

nine-year-old boy, just like,
"Wow, he's got the girls,

the car, the money.
I want that."

All my friends' older brothers

and sisters...

respected Gilbert.

So when I was with him,

I automatically got that "Wow."

Everybody knew.

Gilbert goes by,
let Gilbert go by.

You know, that's how it was.

He was a real gangster.

Great sense of humor,

and if you pissed him off,
he'd kill you.

He turned me on to grass,
I was about eight,

and my mom and dad
did everything to try

to keep me away from him,
but you know,

things kind of
had already lost control.

Scary when you see
a certain type of kid

vibrate towards that direction
so radically, so quickly.

Danny was in a high-stakes
world from a very young age.

My dad was always a fighter,
that was his thing.

This is a, a picture of him
at 18 getting pulled away

from a fight at the park,
right here.

She looks just pissed.

Well, Uncle Gilbert
taught him how to box,

started him boxing.

He became very good
at it.

He was
a welterweight champion

in his paratrooper unit, 101st.

He was in the golden gloves,

and I was his sparring partner.

I was really his punching bag,

but so I had to learn
how to fight,

or get my, get my head beat in.

You know,
he's got this aura about him.

He's gonna really do something,
you know?

Drugs got him.

Danny noticed
the change,

and that's when they had
started using heroin.

I can remember the day

that I wanted to be
just like him.

My grandfather
was like a tyrant.

And I'll never forget,
he was mad at me and Gilbert,

he was standing in front of us
and he was screaming

and I knew he was gonna hit me,

and I'm kind of like wincing

so I won't shit
and he won't hit me,

and then I look over
at my uncle

and he's going...

He's falling asleep!

We're staring in the face
of death, he goes...

And he walked into his room,

and Gilbert goes...

"Did he hit us?" You know?

I just, I prayed to God,
"Let me be like that."

Danny realized
at that young age,

he has
a secret escape-hatch mechanism

that he can access...

to get away from the violence
in the household,

and whatever that is,
I want it.

'Cause I was scared
of my grandfather,

I was scared of my dad, uh,

I wasn't scared of Gilbert.

When he was 12,

he took
his first shot of heroin.

Two weeks later,

he was no longer
like this cool Gilbert,

he was like crazy.

He is going through withdrawals,
he's sick.

I seen him.
Oh, he's like this...

And he had
my grandfather's syringe.

My grandfather was a diabetic.

He says, "Get outta here."
I said, "No, give me some!"

"Give me some or I'm gonna
tell." That's how young he was.

"Give me some
or I'm gonna tell."

He's like, "Wait a minute,"

so he says, "Hold this."

So I'm holding this belt
for him like this.

It's a glass syringe,
so when the needle registered,

it does this
little atomic-bomb thing. Tsshh.

And then, bam, he hits, he says

"Let it go," and I let it go.

And when I let it go, I seen

this whole change come over him.

From this crazy,

to this huh,

he's back to that guy
that could go to sleep

in front of the, the dragon.

He gave me a fix,

a couple of drops of his cotton,

and the next thing I remember
I was soaking wet

sitting outside
in my grandmother's yard just,

I'd overdosed.

You're not thinking, "Oh, well,

now I don't have to worry
about school,

I don't have to worry
about errands,

I don't have to worry
about this."

Nothing! It's just gone.

I just decided
"This is what I'm gonna do

because this is all there is."

And then all I remember
is hearing the ice-cream truck

and getting some ice cream.

Fuck, man, the thing is,

is it's only blissful
the first time.

Every time after that
it just becomes a chase.

The thing about drugs
and alcohol is

you're trying to survive
something that in a way

your psyche can't match
at that point,

and so you, you get these things

that are like a blanket,
you know, and they help

until the day you realize,

"Oh, that, that blanket's
strangling me now."

That began the life of
learning how to sustain that,

so they taught him
how to rob liquor stores

and convenience stores,

and the crimes
just escalated from there.

His dad started calling
this side of the family to say

"I don't know what to do
with him, help."

When I realized
Gilbert was doing robberies,

I, I thought
it was kind of heroic.

You know,
I didn't think it was bad.

His Uncle Gilbert

and a friend of his,
his crime partner,

they showed up
on the front lawn here.

Each of them

handed my dad $10.

I knew they did
a robbery, they told me.

So I had $20 in $1 bills.

I remember holding it, I
remember looking at these guys,

I remember seeing their cars,

everything that I ever
wanted in life at like,

nine years old,
that's what I want to do.

First robbery
was the Far East Market.

Had a gun.

A revolver that didn't stay up.

It would fall,
you had to hold it like this.

We went in the store,
I'm holding the door,

Richard's saying, "Give me the
money," to the lady, you know,

"Give me the money,"
so she gave him the, the $8

that were in the cash register,

but then said,
"No, no, in the box!"

And he pointed to the box,
that's when the gun opened.

I started laughing,
she started screaming,

Richard grabbed the $8.

We ran, we ran down Lankersham.

We didn't use that gun anymore.

Shotgun is probably
the best deterrent

for heroes there is.

You know,
a shotgun will make people

think twice of becoming GI Joe.

So was that
your go-to gun?

Yeah. Sawed-off shotgun.
That's what my uncle gave me.

Right...

That there, up there, upstairs,

that used to be a,
a, like a little hall,

and they had a poker game
up there. We took that down.

Now the guard was over here
where the steps were

and we just did a walk by
and stuck a gun in his mouth

and just kind of, uh,
tied him up

and then went up,
kicked in the door.

What spurred a robbery for me

was not seeing anybody
in the liquor store...

or watching somebody
come out of the bank.

If you're gonna be a criminal,
be a criminal 24 hours a day.

We did a gang of them in '65,

and I was only out a 100 days.

Hamburger joints, delis,
convenience stores.

Most of the liquor stores
in San Fernando Valley.

Ralves, Dale's Market,
White Front.

They used to rob
White Front stores,

like the Best Buys of their day,
that was an appliance store,

they had washing machines,
televisions.

I remember those
when I was a little kid.

My dad used to take us there
to go shopping.

Burglaries,
and they liked to steal cars.

You'd go into a liquor store,

pull the pin out
over the counter and say,

"Give me everything
or I'm dropping it."

It started out as a, a rouse.

We walked in
and pulled out this grenade,

and the guy got so scared,
said, we said, uh,

"It's a robbery,"
and emptied out his cash box.

Even to this day
I'm like, "Who does that?"

It's like the wild west.

Totally unfathomable for me.

To me it's mind boggling
that you would

rob a place called Patties
or Bob's Big Boy,

two, like, legendary places
right next to Warner Brothers,

like where everybody
and their mother went.

But he robbed that place.
Still it blows my mind.

He had to be high.
You know, like, it was crazy.

It was hard to reconcile
what I knew intellectually

with what I knew,
like, intimately about my dad,

and it was almost like
hard to believe

that he had been that person.

If you're dedicated
to that life,

I... I think guilt
isn't a, an emotion or a feeling

that you really deal with

simply because,
otherwise, you know,

hell, you, you rob a guy
and tell him you're sorry

and give him back his money,
you know? So...

Drugs take care
of a lot of things,

any kind of feeling you got.

It's almost like, you ever seen
one of those little squirrels

in a cage running around?

Well, that's the kind of way
this thing is.

It's something that
you just can't walk away from

because it's your way of life.

Me and about 10-15 guys,
a whole car load,

we're, like, cruising down
Van Nuys Boulevard,

and we saw this old house
with a bunch of cars,

you know, parked in front of us.

Something's going on in there,
you know?

Three bottles of wine,
half pint of whiskey,

I was already loaded on pills,
and a 38 snub nose,

and kicked in the door,

and the first thing we saw
was a big sign that said

"We care."

They walk into a,
a 12-step meeting.

He said,
"And I told all my friends

they need to stay together,

and they're all in little groups
with these guys,

and they're hugging them!"

All these people just, "Hi,
welcome! Come on in!" You know?

Somebody ac... ac... actually
asked me to join them, they said

"Why don't you join us?"
you know...

And this guy actually told me
"If you leave the program,

you will die, go insane
or go to jail."

It really turned out to be true.

When that started happening
to me,

I never forgot
what that old geezer had said.

I hate to say old guy,
'cause he was like, 40.

I got the shit
kicked out of me

by the cops, regularly.

Nine times out of ten
when the cops

kicked the shit out of us,
we had it coming.

In and out of Youth Authority,
non-stop.

I mean, he'd get out,
go right back,

get out, go right back.

I mean, that's where he grew up.

When I got
to Juvenile Hall,

there were
so many Mexicans there,

I thought
Mexicans were supposed to go.

It's almost like school.

When I went
to county jail,

I learned how to steal,
how to manipulate,

how to get the best jobs.

You learn what you learn
in there.

Danny reminded me
of me when I was younger.

He was so hip,
the balls of his feet

would tickle him when he walked.

He'd come up to me
and he'd smile at me,

just look, that look he has,
and he said...

"What are you gonna teach me,
old man?"

And I said, uh, "Nothing,

I'm gonna give you some previews
of coming attractions, punk."

And he turned on his heel
and went away.

The next time I saw him, uh,

he looked at me and, you know,
"What do you think now?"

And I said,
"Danny, the only thing

that's gonna beat you
to San Quentin

is the headlights on the bus."

When I went to prison,

I sold four ounces of sugar
to a Federal agent,

bunko sales, no drugs at all.

He didn't have nothing,

so he filled up
these bags full of sugar,

came back,
sold it to the under cover,

and the under cover's
telling him, "Is it pure?"

Danny's like, "Yeah, it's pure."

You know,
it's pure sugar, right?

He said they kicked
his ass when they caught him.

He said they kicked his ass
all the way to the station.

A brand-new 1965 Buick.

I'll never guess I was
on the floor of the back seat,

this guy's punching the shit
out of me, right,

and beating me all the way
from North Hollywood

to the Federal building
downtown.

"Where's my money?
Give me my money?"

"What do you got to say?"
And my face is on the ground.

"What do you got to say?"
I said, "Is this a new car?"

I'm like, 'cause it smelled,
it had that smell.

And I said, "I'm bleeding
all over your new car."

I had to plead guilty
to a bunko sales

which carries six to ten years.

When I left the joint,
I had a, a sawed-off shotgun,

two pistols, uh, about $8000

and a... hand grenade.

And, uh, I... I buried 'em.

This was my stash place.

I had a 4x4 hole right here

with a lid and grass on top.

My mom and dad were talking
about putting sprinklers

in the backyard,
and I told my mom,

"Be real careful around,

around the waterfall."

He ended up
in San Quentin.

I don't know
how it is now,

but when you're on a CDC bus,

it's the only bus
on the freeway.

Everybody knows
you're a criminal.

Seeing people pass by,
people working in the street,

you know you screwed up.

I've known people
that have hung themselves

in the county jail

because they were so afraid
they were going to prison.

Unless you've grown up
in that system...

you're scared to death of it.

How long were you
in San Quentin for?

Which time?

I've been arrested 78 times.

I got five felony convictions.

I was a resident
vacationing at San Quentin.

I was actually in
when they were shooting

"Blood In Blood Out"
in the '90s.

I seen a few,
few things in there

that I, I wanted my mommy,
you know what I mean,

I wanted,
I wanted to come home.

When you're driving
up that wall in Quentin,

you see that gun tower
right in front,

you know
that once you go in there,

you're not coming out.

This is the big house.

The gas chamber's here.

The minute
the bus stops,

the tension starts.

As soon
as you get off that bus,

you gotta get butt-naked,
and it's freezing.

People are screaming
and yelling behind the gates,

you know, it's like
everything that you've seen.

You hear this engine...

And all it is
is everybody talking.

If you've ever been next to
someone that's insanely angry,

just so fucking angry,
just crazy rage,

if you can imagine

4000 guys that angry,

that kind of rage,

that's the tension
in San Quentin.

They might be
laughing and joking,

but one little spark
or something,

oh, everybody's back
to being the Incredible Hulk

without being green. Madness.

You have to be able
to control that

and make it caution

because when you start
getting paranoid,

people get paranoid of you.

It could be...

somebody didn't get a letter.

Somebody forgot a birthday.

It could be somebody woke up
on the wrong side of the bed.

Anything can get you killed
in prison.

Size, strength means nothing!

Everybody knows
four inches of steel,

thirty-five pounds of pressure,
bang, you're done.

You see this guy, ah,
get stabbed in the back.

He's walking around
the upper yard.

Reaching for this knife,
coughing up blood,

reaching for this... Ah!

And everybody started laughing!

What a fucked-up place.

You're either alpha
or you're not.

Someone's either gonna say,
"What size shoes do you got on?"

And if you don't crack 'em
in their head that first second,

you're soft.

They know
they can get over on you.

I know I'm an alpha guy,
you know?

Danny's for sure
an alpha guy.

One of the things
that Gilbert did was teach me

that in... in prison there's
only predators and prey,

that's it.

If my enemy is down the tier
in a cell

and I hear him
sharpening a knife,

well, I'd better
stab that guy first thing,

as quick as I can.

I can't wait for him
to attack me.

Two guys that I'd, I'd robbed,
literally,

in, in Youth Authority,
Tyrone, says,

"Hey, this guy's here,"
you just get a magazine,

just put a magazine here
and a magazine in the back.

I walked out of the cell
and I went to the, the corner,

I turned around, bam,
this guy hit me with this shank.

Whoa, urgh, kind of knocked
the breath out of me.

Tyrone was right behind me,
just came around,

whomp, whomp, whomp, hit him.

I was like,
"Ah! Oh, yeah, magazine!"

It happened so quick,
I forgot I had the magazine.

And this guy ran down,
bleeding, you know?

Tyrone threw a knife,
came down real slow, you know?

"Well, what happened?"
"I don't know."

If you were on fire
I wouldn't piss on you.

I had no, I had no...

You know, no feeling.

The conflict is
I know it's wrong to do this,

but I do it anyhow.

You go into a shell

and you protect that shell
at all cost.

Even if you decide
that you're a predator,

that doesn't mean that the dude
you're coming up against

hasn't decided
he's a predator, too.

That's a level of stress
that the human body was not,

was not built to deal with.

Back then, you know,
San Quentin

was a level-four prison.

It was a gladiator school.
I mean, it was rough.

San Quentin and Folsom
were both on the same level.

Both straight killer prisons.

In the 60s,
there's drama everywhere

with the racial tension.

The Aryan Brotherhood formed,

Mexican Mafia formed,
you know, protection.

We had
some stone killers.

One of my best friends,
he was, you know,

one of the top dogs
in the, in the Mexican Mafia,

so I was left
to my own hustle.

I had pretty good backing,
you know,

I had pretty good guys,
crime partners,

that were with me.
Tyrone, double murder, you know?

Cookie, double murder.
Frog, double murder.

You know, we had this
little protection ring going.

If you think somebody's
after you, then you tell us,

we'll take care of it,
but you're gonna pay us.

Sometimes they want to be,
you know, big dog,

"Nah, I can take care
of myself,"

but this is
a completely different element.

The guards can only control

so much of what happens
on the yard.

And then you fall
under that wing of those guys

and in a sense
they become property.

Keep my cell clean,
you know, my shoes were shiny,

make sure my laundry got done,
that kind of stuff.

And then other people had
parents to send money to my mom.

How shiny
were your walls in your...

I had waxed walls.

I've met guys
that did time with him

that still look at him like,
not 'cause he's a movie star.

They just remember
who he was.

His name
rang through every prison.

They knew he was coming,
they always knew he was coming.

The boxing
probably didn't hurt either.

Back then, uh,
it sounds cliche,

but people used to fight
with their fists.

He became very good at it.

He was a 1966, '67 and '68
San Quentin Champion.

I remember Eddie Bunker
telling me

that he was badass.

People just knew
that I could fight,

so I got to the joint,
I'm just like, automatic,

hey, come on,
I'll fight the champ.

Some people get in the library
to do time,

some people, you know,
do crossword puzzles,

some people play chess.
I trained.

That's what kept me sane.

Soledad, same thing,
I won titles.

As you can imagine
in San Quentin,

the boxing rules
may not be exactly,

you know,
what they are on the street.

I got great elbows.

God, first thing I did
was hit somebody with an elbow.

The, the ref might have been
a friend of yours,

so if you elbowed somebody,
he didn't see it.

People were
betting on him,

so when he won fights,
made him more popular.

Mexicans don't know
what exhibition means.

No, we got money on you,
you know?

That prison
boxing program

probably kept him alive,
a lot of that, that time.

At that time,
the powers that be

in the prison system were like,
"Whoa, man,

the Mexicans are starting
to get really organized here,

we got to start
shuffling them around."

That's why Danny and those guys
moved so much.

Because at the time
they were just so confused

about the leadership.

Over the decade
that he spent doing it,

he ended up in all of them.

Every one in the state.

Soledad, San Quentin,
Vacaville, Susanville,

Sierra, Tracy, Folsom and Chino.

Wow.

He was
a travelling man.

And so
they would move him out,

like even with the story
of his tattoo.

The big-ass tattoo
on his chest, well...

comes from Excellent Tamale
wrapper.

Guy named
Harry "Superjew" Ross,

everybody was getting
Mexican flags or Aztec wares

and, see, I got a beautiful
lady, we put the outline

and then I got kicked out
of Quentin,

I had to go to Folsom.

He was on the Sallyport

and I was being transferred,
I was on the bus,

and he was screaming,
"Don't let anybody touch it!"

"That's my first tattoo,
I want to finish it!"

"I'll be in Folsom to meet you!"

"Okay!"

We could have kissed,
it'd have been a love story.

He started having them
all over his body,

that was extreme
for those days.

This one is...

We did this in Soledad.

It's a peacock, but, but if you,
but if you look at this,

the other side is a monster.

The story was
in everything beautiful,

there's that other side.

Who notices this real quick?

If I have a shirt like this,

kids'll go,
"Look, mommy, a monster!"

Prison tattoos end up
with a lot more meaning

than just a, a whim,
an "Oh, let's get a tattoo,"

you know, on the streets.

This is like a... a block of time
in your life.

It's funny 'cause you're ruining
state property.

That loss of time is something
that's always a regret.

And as many years later
as it's been, I still, like,

"Man, I lost time
in the middle of the '90s."

Danny lost the '50s and '60s.

You know what I mean?
Like, those were great times.

At times you...

you kind of realize
what you're becoming.

Playing dominoes,
a lot of people around us

and it's a big game,
lot of money game,

and I'm killing,
I set the spinner,

it's double five,
you know, I was like,

"I got you, you guys are mine."

Voom-voom-voom, boom,
this guy falls on the,

on the table
and he's just bleeding,

somebody just hit him bad.

Everybody started getting away
and I'm screaming,

"No, wait, wait,
hold on, hold on!"

I'm screaming,
"I got a fives, I got five!"

I remember I was in my cell
and I,

I, I still had my dominoes,

and the thought,
"What the fuck am I becoming?"

You know, this guy dying,
you know, he had a mom, a dad,

a brother, a sister, maybe kids,

and I'm screaming
about my fives!

He knew that day that,
that he was, he was changed.

He wasn't, you know,
Danny anymore, he was,

he was, he was just inmate.

For a split second,

I felt so bad about myself,

and then the other part
jumped in,

"Fuck that dude, man,
he fucked up my game."

People talk about
correctional facilities

as if they are
correctional facilities. No.

It's a place to remind you
that you're shit.

So when you get back out there,
you act like shit.

And you'll always be shit.

May 5, 1968,

Cinco de Mayo.

They had a baseball game,
they used to let free people

come in and play baseball
with the convicts.

Me, Ray Pacheco
and Henry Quijada,

we were like, drunk and loaded,

and Ray had come down
from Atascadero,

so medications
and shock treatments

and everything
were wearing off.

It was a third baseman
chewing gum,

and I just joking,
I just kept saying,

"Don't, don't mess with
that guy, he knows karate."

All of a sudden Ray just jumped
up and just grabbed that guy.

Pulled out his lip,
trying to get the gum

and big old riot started.

When something like that
happens, it's just like, boom!

Wow, like everybody
starts throwing rocks

and throwing shit,
and Ray's pounding on this guy,

Henry kicks him cold.

It was alleged that I,
that I grab, I threw a rock

and Lieutenant Gibbons, bang,
got hit in the head.

Slow motion,
like he watched it go,

and he watched it, and
he watched it hit the sergeant.

And it was just like, "No!"

Captain Rogers was going
like this, he was pointing.

What this means,

it's for the gun tower
to shoot where he's pointing.

So I, I followed his finger,

and it was at me and Ray.

Crack, we fell, and I fell
on top of him, and Ray said,

"Danny, don't let him hurt me,
don't let him hurt me."

And I said, "Oh, I think
they're done hurting us."

At the time it would be
attempted murder on a guard...

which would get you
the death penalty.

We went to the hole.

I'm looking at the wall,

and in my cell
somebody had gotten feces,

and it says,
"God sucks... God sucks."

The thought hit me...

ever since like, grammar school,

I've always had these teachers
that said "Great potential,"

and it all just felt like shit.

No matter how popular
I was in school,

no matter how cool I was,

no matter how everybody
liked me, it was done.

I know what's gonna happen,
they're gonna kill me.

It just doesn't go any further.

Solitary confinement
makes you

think about your family,

who your friends really are,

who really loves you.

Recreate days
of your life in your mind

when you're a little kid
when everything was okay.

You do plays in your head, you
re-watch movies in your mind.

You try not to lose it.

But you just keep
from going crazy

by making yourself crazy.

I was in the hole and I was
running around the cell,

and I would act out
"The Wizard Of Oz."

"Give me those shoes, Dorothy."

All this whole crazy movie

just to keep my brain going.

"The lollipop guild,"
all that shit.

Guards would walk by my cell
and say, "Shut up, Trejo!"

"You killed my sister,"
and, and they'd keep walking.

You have to cope
in whatever way that you can.

For him it was
"The Wizard Of Oz."

The hole's usually,
like, quiet during the day.

At night you go crazy,
you know?

I mean, just go berserk.

Sometimes he said the
guard would listen to a radio.

The Beatles song came out,
the first time we heard,

that, uh...

♪ Judy Judy ♪

The hole went
like completely quiet!

♪ Hey Jude ♪

♪ Don't make it... ♪

Slowly but surely,

they all start
going to the bars.

And everybody was trying
to hear it, it came out

of the speakers, everybody was
trying to hear, trying to hear.

♪ Judy Judy Judy Judy Judy ♪

They just went brr!
It just blew up.

♪ Judy Judy
Judy Judy Judy Judy ♪

There's different songs
that stick with you,

songs that remind you of
your wife, your kids, you know,

songs that, that take you
all the way back to high school.

♪ Jude Jude Jude
Jude Jude Jude ♪

♪ Ah ah ah ah ♪♪♪

I remember asking God...

to just let me die
with dignity.

"Don't let me scream, yell

and call for my mom
and shit my pants."

"Just let it get back to my guys

that, yeah,
he went out like a champ."

"And if you do, Lord,

I will say your name every day,

and I will do whatever I can
for my fellow prisoner...

from now on."

We all say
those little prayers

at the moment of like,
impending doom,

but I think that was one

that he kind of
couldn't take back.

The guard that had
been hit with a rock

couldn't identify
who had thrown the rock.

If he had said,

"Danny Trejo threw that rock..."

that's it.

One word, you know,

and that's,
that's a pretty crazy way

to like, cheat death.

Danny
had his life back.

I started
trying to do good.

I didn't think of it
as reforming,

I thought about
keeping a promise.

In keeping that promise,
I became a better person.

I remember the day
before I got out,

I was laying on my bunk,
I'd given away all my stuff.

And I remember when this guy
named Johnny Harrison

that I met at the end of 1962
in prison,

he said, "Why don't you give
yourself a break and join us?"

And I made a promise to myself

that I was gonna go
to an AA meeting

before I did anything else.

I ended up getting out
August 23, 1969.

I remember when I first
got out of the joint,

the first thing I saw
in the bus depot was,

wow, a puppy!

Wow! A doggie! Mwah!

Look how pretty.

I called this guy, Frank Russo,
Frank Russo, Frank Russo.

And I always say that
'cause he told me

never to mention his name.

He pulls up, I got in his car,
and he says, "What's up?"

And I said, "You know what,
I wanna go to my mom's."

He came back here
to this, to this house.

He walked up
to the metal gate

and he said
my grandmother opened the door,

but she didn't unlock
the screen door

when she saw him.

I said, "Mom, can I stay
a couple of days?"

"My parole plans fell through."

And my mom turned to my dad

who was sitting right there,
and said,

"Dan, Danny wants to know if
he can stay a couple of days."

And, uh, my dad said,
"Yeah, tell him yes,"

without looking up from the TV.

Walked into my bedroom
and I'm sitting in my bedroom

and I'm rocking
and I'm thinking

"This is the same bedroom
I was in

when I was 13 years old."

You know, tough-ass convict,
26 years old,

armed robber,
and you're at mommy's,

and your dad
didn't even say hello,

he doesn't really
want you here.

I was hating myself,
I started hating myself.

My dad hated tattoos,

and I wanted
to get back at him.

I got up and I went
and I sat front on the ottoman

in front of his television set.

I had taken off my shirt,
I had a big tattoo on my chest,

and I was just getting ready
to say, "Hey,

what's up with you?"
You know and...

My mom comes out,
perfect timing,

"Mijo, you want
some cookies and milk?"

All of that bad-ass
just, like,

totally fell off of him.

We have this idea of
how things are supposed to be

and how they're gonna be,

but we forget all the hurt
and disaster

and riots that we've caused.

I forget all that stuff,
you know, and, uh...

So he called Frank
and, and ended up

going to a meeting with him
that night.

Best thing I ever
could have done in my life

that welcomed me, because
people in AA and NA don't say,

"Oh, you've been in prison."
It's almost an asset.

When he made
the decision

that he wasn't going back
and that

he was gonna be different,

he had to completely
break that down.

I remember going to talk
to one of my sponsors,

a guy named Sam Hardy.

He always had that shit
in his mouth

like a hillbilly, you know?

And he says
"Danny, everything about you...

is meant to intimidate,
everything."

"The way you talk,
the way you walk,

the way you look at people."

"Your survival meant
striking first."

"Your survival meant...

killing somebody
if you had to."

"You have got to do things
for other people

and not expect
any kind of reward."

He learned
how to help other people.

He used to take
the trash cans out

for the next-door neighbor.

Mowing somebody's lawn

just to help somebody.

It just kept going
and kept going.

He started giving out
his number,

and people
would just call him up.

When I got a car, I'd
give people a ride to meetings,

you know, and, uh,
I'd listen to their shit.

I started working
for Carleasy Auto Wrecking.

Gilbert had been out
of the joint probably two weeks

or a week and a half, and he
pulls up in a new Lincoln,

and he asked me,
"What the fuck are you doing?"

And I said, "Shut up, Gilbert,
I'm working."

"I know, but this is
embarrassing. Oh, shit."

You know,
"We playing in dirt all day,"

and, and he goes "Here."

And he gave me two quarters of
heroin and he gave me a $1000.

He put a $1000 here,
and he says,

"You know what, look, get
yourself together, get out..."

"Start, you know,
going to work for me."

"I got the bag.
I'm doing real well," and...

This is my John Wayne, right?
This is the guy.

"Gilbert, fuck you.
I can't, man."

And that's the first time
I ever walked away from him.

I grabbed the 1000 bucks.

But I went to the back and I'm
just sitting there thinking,

"God, man."

Frank came out, and he says,

"Danny, I... I know
how you feel."

"Please just wait.
Just wait a couple of months."

"You know what's gonna happen."

And, you know,
two-three months later,

Gilbert shot it out
with the police somewhere,

you know,
went back to the joint.

It's a way of life
for some people

that they can't escape.

My Uncle Gilbert
couldn't escape it.

You know, my little brother
couldn't escape it.

When he died, he had
two ounces of heroin on him,

a couple of thousand dollars
and some cocaine.

He overdosed and died.
My cousin found him.

That was
like his big brother.

Even though Danny
had veered from that path,

you know, his, he just
loved Gilbert to death,

you know, he just,
that was his everything.

When Gilbert's son was little,

Danny took him as his own
to raise him,

but, you know, that,

he was already
on another path, too.

After we had him
for a while, he was doing good

and his mom
wanted him back, so...

She immediately lost control

and he just started hanging out
at the park again.

At the age of 17,

went to the pen, uh,
second-degree murder,

him and about three guys,
and, uh,

shot out of a car
and killed somebody, and, uh...

He was just a kid,
he was 17 years old.

He was caught up
in the game.

You know,
drugs and everything else.

How long has Gilbert
been, uh, incarcerated?

Thirty-eight years.

I've still not seen
anybody

make it as a drug addict

or as a full-fledged alcoholic.

They die, they go insane
or they go to jail.

I became a drug counselor.

It wasn't as much money,
but it was really rewarding.

It's a place that he could,
he could speak true from.

Let me make the mistakes
of my youth

so you don't have to make them
for yourselves.

Danny was very infamous
in AA, NA, CA.

People flew him around
the United States to speak.

He had an opportunity
to be a drug counselor.

That opportunity led him
to an opportunity

to help somebody one night,

to guide him
into his first movie.

He'd been out
of prison for almost 20 years.

One of the kids
that he was helping called him.

Danny was watching
"Johnny Carson."

He said, "Hey, man, there's
a lot of blow down here."

"Hey, whoa, whoa, hold on. hey,
I'll be there right now."

And he ended up
going to this warehouse.

He walked inside the warehouse
and it was a movie set,

the movie set
of "Runaway Train."

There were a bunch of guys
all dressed in their blues

like they had been in prison.

I'm watching
all these guys

in these prison uniforms going

"Mother, eh, watch out, punk,
eh. Does this look tough?"

I go, "Yeah,
be somebody's wife in prison."

This guy came up to him and
said, "You want to be an extra?"

Danny's like, "Extra what?"

He goes,
"Can you play a convict?"

He goes, "I'll give it a shot."

"We'll pay you 50 bucks a day."
And he goes, "Shit, okay!"

"You guys don't know,
but those blues on me,

they just hang just right."

So as he's taking his shirt off,

Eddie Bunker, screenwriter,
saw the tattoo

and goes, "Oh, my God, I know
you, you're Danny Trejo."

"You're the boxing champion,
you know, amongst other things."

And he said,
"We need somebody to train

one of the actors how to box."

And I said, "What's it pay?"

And he said, "320 a day."

I said, "How bad do you
want this guy beat up?"

"No, no, you gotta be careful,
this actor's

really high-strung, man,
he, he might sock you,"

I said, "For 320 bucks, give him
a stick. Are you crazy?"

"I've been beat up for free,
homes!"

By this time, the director who
is a, is a Russian aristocrat

came by
and started doing these...

And Danny's going,
"What gang sign is that?"

And he's looking
at the tattoo,

he said, "You, you be in movie,
you be in my movie."

I remember he said,
"And you be my friend."

If you've been in prison,
you don't like people saying,

"You be my friend."

Andre then kissed me, he, like,
kissed me on one cheek,

kissed me on the other cheek
and walked away, right?

And I remember telling Eddie,

"Look, if I'm gonna be kissing
that old man,

I want more money."

And he goes,
"No, no, he's European."

I didn't know Europeans kissed!

That was
his introduction

was "Runaway Train."

And that's a funny part
of his story.

It was like going
from Pacoima to Mars.

He'd never been to Hollywood...

...in East Hollywood.

One day he got paid

and he thought
he got paid too much.

The first check was more than
what I had added up

on 320s. I mean what?

And I, I remember sticking
that check in my pocket,

phew, I'm splitting,
I'm going to the bank

to cash it,
because they blew it,

they gave me a lot more money
than I'd added up.

"No, no, no,
that's what you get paid."

"You get paid that every week.
It's okay."

He just couldn't believe it.

You're not only
going from

a class shift in perspective,

you're also going from
a cultural shift in perspective.

Eddie was Danny's guide

on how to be successful
in Hollywood.

Eddie had
an incredible high IQ.

He had served time,
longer than Danny did.

He had been on the streets
since he was eight.

He would diagram robberies
and he'd sell them.

Eddie actually knew
my Uncle Gilbert.

My Uncle Gilbert had bought
robberies from Eddie.

He brought Danny
into the business

and really taught him the ins
and outs of another gang,

as you might wanna call it,

you know,
'cause Hollywood is like that.

If you don't know
your way around,

you can get in trouble.

They used to pay extras
every day,

about 300 extras
on "Runaway Train."

They would bring Eric
his per diem,

they would bring John Voight
his per diem.

I remember sitting
in the parking lot

smoking a cigarette,
and I watched this guy

pull up, right, and I see him
with a big briefcase,

and he's walking by, right?

Damn, you know,

and I know it's nothing
but cash in that briefcase.

And I remember Eddie Bunker
coming by, "The fuck you doing?"

I say, "Sit in the car,
watch this, check this out."

Eddie goes, he's in there,

"That's it? Oh."
And I go, "Yeah, that's it."

Six, seven, eight-thousand
dollars in that thing.

And Eddie says
"That's chump change,

that's what
you're talking about,

that's just chump change."

He says,
"Danny, the way you look,

and the way you act...

you stick with this program,
that'll be chump change."

"You'll carry that around
in your pocket."

"Hollywood wants people
that can act tough."

"They don't want tough guys."

"You have to disarm people
immediately."

I go, "What do you mean, Eddie?"
He says, "You know what?"

"People are afraid of you,
Danny."

"We're on a movie set
and people are afraid of you."

"Because we have this look
that says I will kill you,

I will kill the people
that dry clean your clothes."

My career
took off immediately.

It was almost like doing porn,
every time I walked on to a set

the first thing
the director said,

"Uh, take off your shirt,"

'cause they wanted to see
that tattoo.

This girl was interviewing me,
and she said,

"Aren't you afraid
of being typecast?"

I said, "What are you
talking about?"

"Well Danny,
you're always playing

the mean Chicano dude
with tattoos."

I thought about it, I said,

"I am the mean Chicano dude
with tattoos,

so it's like,
somebody finally got it right."

You never went
to acting school...

Well, I, actually, I trained in
at San Quentin Drama Arts.

Yeah.

The good thing is I got to learn
kind of on... on the job

because the first five years
of my career,

I just played Inmate Number One.

Prisoner Number One,
Number Ten.

- Cholo Number One.
- Ese Number One.

Gangster Number One,
Gangster Number Two.

- Inmate with tattoos.
- Man Yelling.

You know, I'll be the bad guy,
I'll be the good guy,

I'll be the guy
that sells flowers,

you know, I'll be the
dry cleaner, it doesn't matter.

I'm acting,
and what am I getting paid?

The year I was born was the year

he had his first character
with a name.

"Death Wish 4."

With Charles Bronson.

Art Sanella.

He grabs Charles Bronson
by the arm and says,

"Hey, don't I know you
from somewhere?"

Hey, don't I know you
from some place?

I don't think so.

Charles Bronson throws water
in his face and blows him up,

because
it's a "Death Wish" movie.

We were on that movie
set and we're having a blast

and Perry Lopez
is this old guy.

This kid got shitty with him.

I thought
that they knew each other.

Then the kid comes out again
and says, "I went to Julliard"

or whatever,
"There's only one director."

So finally I said
"Wait a minute, bitch,

I know who the piss
you think you are,

but I just nominate him
director."

"You do whatever the fuck he
says or I'll beat you to death."

I, but I'm trying
to stay in character.

I said, "Well, your character is
about to get his ass beat, okay,

so now just lighten up, and I
think you owe him an apology."

And he goes,
"Well, I'm sorry, Mr. Lopez."

And then I turn around,

and the director,
standing right there.

The last thing you want
in the world

is for a director to hear

you're gonna beat
one of his actors to death.

And I remember him
looking at me and saying...

"We've had a little problem
with him."

"I, I don't think
he'll be a problem anymore."

And he walked away.

Charles Bronson is right there.

I turn around, he's looking
at me and he goes...

"You're some kind of
drug counselor, aren't you?"

And I'm, "Yes."

This Charles Bronson, man,
I'm a bitch, okay?

And he goes...

"I like the way
you counsel people."

And walked away.

I think that's one of the best
advice that he ever gave me.

The whole world can think
you're a movie star,

but you can't.

I love that one.

I would think somebody
like Danny would automatically

be like, "I would kill
a motherfucker like you

ten years ago."

And just brush it off.

This is a guy who's seen blood,
he's seen death,

just to get
to age 15-16 years old.

Hollywood, that's what this is.
It's, it's eh.

"Blood In Blood Out"
called my agency.

I talked to Taylor Hackford
and I really liked it.

I think that was one
of the first times that my dad

went back to prison
after getting out of prison.

People were
yelling our name, you know,

"Perry, hey, what's up!"
You know?

"Trejo! Hey, come to my cell!"

I first saw him,
I believe it was "Desperado."

I was like, "Who's that dude?
He looks creepy as fuck!"

"Like, damn, what the hell?"

I sent Danny
into an audition.

There really wasn't sides.

I needed a silent assassin
who had these knives,

and so I told
the casting director,

"Find me somebody
who just looks really menacing

because he's not gonna have
any dialogue."

And then he walked in,
and it was like, "Holy shit."

And he looked at me and said,

"You look like the bad guys
in my high school."

And I said, "I am the bad guys
in your high school."

I had never seen Danny
in my life

before he showed up on the set.

No matter how early you got up,
he was up

standing outside your door,
really, he...

Literally, it was, "Hey, Dan."
"Hey, you wanna go for a walk?"

He was an interesting character
right from the beginning.

I met Salma Hayek,

and she's like just
go-to-hell gorgeous.

I just walked up to her,
I just told her,

"Look, go, go pick two banks,

I'll rob 'em for you."

Salma's so funny,
she goes, "Just two?"

When I saw him
for the first time, he saw me,

and he runs over to me
and ripped his shirt off.

And he said,
"I knew you before I knew you!"

"I dreamt you
before I knew you!"

And, and sure enough, there was
a, a picture of a woman

that looks exactly like me.

And I showed her my tattoo,
I said,

"That's a picture of you,
honey."

She goes
"Wow, I'm really flattered."

Robert Rodriguez,
you know, is related.

They didn't find out
until they were actually on set

and filming that they were
cousins through marriage.

We found out we were
second cousins down the line.

That's cool, uh,
make my part bigger, homes.

"Put me in, coach, put me in,
coach, give me a line, give..."

I said, "No, I'm not gonna
give you a line."

"If I give you a line,
it'll blow the whole mystique."

Danny doesn't have any lines
in the whole movie,

which is interesting
because you always remember

his character,
the guy with the knives.

But he didn't say one thing
in the whole movie.

"Hey, give me a line, homes,
I'm your cousin."

You know what I mean?
"No, Danny, no, hold on."

And then he'd have me
in these scenes, it's,

"Well, just give him a look,
give..."

"Robert, give me a line, man."

And somebody asked me,

"Uh, Danny, you... you know,
you didn't speak a word

and yet your character
was so strong."

"Was that an actor's choice?"
I said, "Absolutely!"

I think Robert gave me
the finger, I'm not sure.

Going to prison
and having to be that scary

without saying anything?

When he was on screen,
like, took over.

That really drove him forward.

He always talks about "Heat."

He said,
"Sis, if I get this role,

that takes me
to another level."

I think it represented
a turning point in my life.

Robert De Niro.
Come on, man. "Taxi?"

Al Pacino?
You know, John Voight.

I'll be your Huckleberry, shit.

This is it,
the top of the line,

and I got to work with him,
I got to talk to him,

I got to eat lunch with him.

You're no longer
like just a bad guy.

You're like a actor.

On "Heat"
he served as a consultant.

He and Eddie Bunker,
they, they were the criminals.

"So how would we do this?"
"Well..."

No, you do it this way,
no, you gotta do it this way.

John Voight's character
was based on Eddie.

John Voight
went into the makeup trailer,

stuck a picture up there

and said,
"That's what I wanna look like."

People who didn't know
Eddie would say,

"Wow, is that it?"
No, John Voight.

Michael Mann did a movie
called the "Jericho Mile."

He won't cop to it,
but the reality is

he did Folsom Prison.

In order to get
the Mexicans to work...

y... you gotta kind of talk
to the un... union...

Union leaders, the guys
that are kinda in control.

My dad's Uncle Gilbert,
he was still in prison.

We ended up talking
to my Uncle Gilbert Trejo,

and a couple
of the other shot callers,

and, and so when I showed up
on "Heat,"

he came to me and he said,

"Danny? Do you care
if we call you Gilbert Trejo?"

And I, I mean, I wanted a homage
to my uncle, you know?

I said "No, man, thank you."

If you watch "Heat," my name
is Gilbert Trejo in that movie.

It was actually like
one of the few movies

that he's been in that
I was kind of traumatized by.

We were sitting there
and just like...

Like watching the screen,
looking over,

making sure he's still there,
watching the screen,

looking over,
making sure he's still there.

It was
a very real death to me.

Why'd you do it?

Knowing my dad's history,

it was too real for me.

They made me.

Robert asked me, he said,

"How do you wanna play this,
Danny?"

And I said, "I don't know, Bob.
What do you think?"

Notice I said Bob. "I don't
know, Bob. What do you think?"

And he says, "Well, you know,
Danny, I think you're dead,

I think you're already dead,
I think you just got

enough breath
to beg me to kill you."

Don't leave me
like this.

I know for Danny
that was the heaviest moment

of his film career
was his death in "Heat."

For this boy from Pacoima
who'd been through

all of these institutions,

Danny's death in "Heat"
was the most beautiful

and almost the hardest one
to watch.

It's where his life
could have gone.

When you find
really good people, working

with them on one movie
is almost a crime.

You're using one facet of their
personality and talent.

And now,
for your viewing pleasure.

I thought, my God, I gotta put
him in, in a, in a kid's film.

So that's when I got Danny
and put him in "Spy Kids."

You wouldn't just cast him
in a role like that

'cause you never
would have seen it.

I saw it, you know, day to day.

That's... that's just
who he was.

And I thought it was
a fascinating juxtaposition

of personality
and what you would think

that person's personality is
just by looking at him,

by profiling him.

What are you working on?

World's smallest camera.

Then he was Uncle Machete.

I don't see it.

Kids started recognizing him,

and the parents are kind of like

"Why does my kid know
who this dude is?"

And no one knows
what you do for a living.

I think we all have
uncles like that.

He got
a whole other audience,

kids would flock to him
when they would see him,

so that opened up
a whole other world.

That was when you knew
he was really gonna make it

was when they would
let him live.

It was like, "Oh, we're not just

killing him off
in the first 15?"

That was when you knew,
oh, he's gonna be a star.

If you ever see
a movie called "Sherrybaby,"

there's no violence,
he's not a tough guy,

it's just
straight, dramatic acting.

He's amazing.
Never had an acting lesson.

My name's Dean,
I'm an alcoholic and an addict.

Hi, Dean.

I was the nice guy,
I was the guy that helped her,

everybody else was,
like, ripping her off,

and she had just
gotten out of prison,

so everybody was kind of like

abusing her,
taking advantage of her.

It ended up
a really great movie.

He first
started getting jobs,

we'd be on the way to school,

and he would say, "Oh, hold on,
hold on, hold on,"

and just pull into this,
like, whole different world,

this, you know,
these movie sets

and then we just wouldn't
go to school that day.

Within a span of a few years,
he shot "Desperado," "Heat,"

"From Dusk Till Dawn"
and "Con Air."

If it wasn't
for Benny Urquidez,

five-time
world kickboxing champion,

I probably would have
killed somebody on that set.

What they did, they got
all the wannabe tough guys

in Hollywood.

Everything was a contest

on this, you understand?

If you spit...

somebody else
would immediately spit further.

They're all talking about
all their badass stories,

and, you know, everybody's done

some amazingly wonderful violent
things and how tough they are,

and Danny's just sitting
back there, sitting like this.

Nick gets up, Cage,
Nick gets up, and he goes,

"Well, I don't know
about all of you,

but the only person here
I'm afraid of is Danny."

And I wanted to say, "Why me?"

I'd be scared of me
in an alley, too.

By the time "Con Air"
came out, we were like,

"Whoa, your arm got cut off!"

Left his arm hanging,
and the tattoos, you know?

I was like,
"Damn, look at that shit!"

Some of the celebrities
that have killed me,

I've been killed
by some bad ones.

Mickey Rourke killed me
in a movie a long time ago.

50 Cent killed me.
You know that's...

Now wait a minute,
that's, that's like, cool.

There have been quite a few...

Shot, stabbed,
needles in the neck,

head chopped off,
hung, blown up.

The first one
that I remember watching

was "Dusk Till Dawn."

I took my daughter and my son.
Danielle was six.

He like,
melts into the pool table

and his eyes
go into the pool sockets,

and I distinctly remember
jumping out of my seat like,

"That was the coolest thing.."

"Oh, that was so cool!"

"Your eyes went into
the pool pockets!"

All, all the people
looked at me like, "Whoa!"

He jumps on an elevator
to chase a hero

and he's on the roof of the
elevator and he shoots it up,

but then the hero
hits the up button,

and it squishes him and like,
blood comes through the holes

and I remember seeing that
as a kid, you know,

I was just like, damn.

TV in "Halloween..."

smashed over his head by Mikey.

There's a badger
or something that

is at crotch level in a cage
or something, you know?

Basically, his genitalia
is eaten off by a crazy badger.

Dang.

You see the one
where his head is on a turtle?

I remember when Gloria
called me into the office

and said, "Hey, Dan, you wanna
do a Hollywood's first?"

'Cause we love
doing a Hollywood's first.

"You're gonna cross the desert
on a tortoise."

And I'm thinking
it must be like a... a cartoon

'cause it's gotta be
a pretty big tortoise.

I was,
"Well, I'll ride a tortoise."

"Well, you don't
exactly ride it,

your head is."

"Oh, so they're
decapitating me?" "Yeah."

"And, and how much
are they paying me?"

"Okay, I'll do it."

"Hey, we saw you get killed."

"Yeah, what, did you see me
go to the bank?"

Kill me, kill me, kill me!

As the movies
started coming out,

the crowds started
getting bigger.

There was this character
that Robert had come up with,

Machete, the wrong Mexican.

When I went
to do "Grindhouse,"

Quentin and I were coming up
with a bunch of fake trailers,

and I said, "I got a fake
trailer, it's 'Machete.'"

There's Blaxploitation
films from the '70s,

but there was no Mexploitation
movies. Huh, why not?

Let's go back in time
and pretend

there were
Mexploitation movies,

and it'll be a Mexploitation
film called "Machete."

You're flying, you know,
in the air with

this motorcycle
that's got a machine gun on it,

you don't have to see where
you land, you cut out of it.

It got such a huge reaction
in the theater,

but we thought that was it.

We didn't think
we were gonna make a film.

By 2010,
I'd gotten so much comments

from people saying,
"When's that movie coming out?"

They thought
it was a real movie,

they were excited to see it.

Danny was like
"The white people have Superman

"and the black people
have Hancock

and the Mexicans need Machete!"

I was like, "Oh, my God."

"This is freaking insane.
Seriously?"

"I'm in."

Danny Trejo's going to be
the leag, lead,

and he gets the girl? Girls?
Ah, I'm in for that.

You ain't gotta tell me twice,
I played a fucking dude

in a movie, like, I don't care.

I like the crazier the better.

And then
Robert called me and said

"I want you to come in
and play a priest

and you're his brother."
So, okay, cool.

Oh, crucifixion.
Yeah, that's a novel twist.

And the cast
just kept growing.

De Niro signed on
and Jessica Alba signed on,

you know, I guess it's not
a $5 million movie anymore.

We had some bad dudes
in that thing, we had...

Don Johnson.
You know what I mean?

Like, come on, "Miami Vice."

De Niro shows up,
he's there, and Danny's like,

"Oh, Robert De Niro's here." He
goes like, "How are you, sir?"

We're between the two trailers
and I'm like this and we walked

and, oh, he goes like,

"You, hey, you. Huh. You."

"Number one on the call sheet."

That means you're lead,
"You're number one, huh, you."

And all I could think
of saying was,

"Can I get you some coffee,
Mr. De Niro?"

How can you say you're the lead
with Robert De Niro

in the movie? You know what
I mean? It's like, he's the man.

At the time it was a,
it was a big deal.

- It was a big deal for Danny.
- He was a fuckin' doll.

The coolest dude,
the, the sweetest man.

It's that kid spirit
that keeps him like, rawr.

I kill Steven Seagal.

I was the first one
to ever kill him.

The first ten minutes
of "Machete,"

I've never laughed so hard
and wanted to throw up

at the same time.

It was an exploitation film,

so it needed to be
really over the top.

I mean, the ideas
had to be really crazy,

everything, all the kills
had to be really crazy.

Uh, he's in the hospital
and he needs to go down a floor

and he just heard a doctor say
that the human intestine

is 60 feet long.

He's gonna cut the guy open,

use his intestine
to repel down.

And the most famous line
he has,

I think Stephen King called it
the line of the year

that year
in "Entertainment Weekly"

came from Danny,
'cause Danny calls me

all the time,
he's always calling me.

I say, "Danny, you call me
all the time. Just text me."

"It's easier 'cause
then I can look at the text

and I can just answer back."

He said, "Machete don't text."

And I said, "Oh, shit, I'm gonna
put that in the movie."

You could have
at least texted me!

Machete don't text.

It was great
to take somebody who's

a character actor, who's
worked in that many movies

and give a role that he defined.

It changed the paradigm
of who could be a leading man,

who can be
the... the star of this movie.

Who at the time was 69,

69-year-old badass.

Can't make this stuff up,
it's weirder than the movies.

That would never have happened
in Hollywood before.

"Machete" represented freedom

for Danny,

liberation from...

the old stereotype
of the prisoner.

You're done with that.
You're a hero now.

You're gonna be Machete.

He made it
to that last step...

Everybody
from here to Mexico

knows who Machete is.

I had no idea,
I never did

until, until people started
passing my house,

screaming, "Machete!"

And now it's like
everywhere I go,

it's Machete still.

Former President
Barack Obama sees Danny,

"Machete!"

Hey, what's up?

Uncle Machete says
do good in school!

He's got a machete
in his pool.

This Mexican became
a big actor all of a sudden.

He was so
in the zeitgeist,

there was even
like a Snickers commercial.

Shut up! I've got to teach
Peter a lesson.

- Marsha, eat a Snickers.
- Why?

You get a little hostile
when you're hungry. Better?

Better.

He's become this brand.

Trejo's Tacos. Unbelievable,
La Brea, n... near Olympic...

Yeah,
they're really, really healthy.

Action figures to memes,

to people getting
the Machete face

with the thing out
and tattooed on their backs.

This guy comes up and said,
"Will you sign my back?"

And I say, "What?"
And he says, "Yeah."

And he turns around
and he has this,

the big picture of Machete.

I signed his back, and he,
you know, tattooed my name,

and I told him, "We're still not
taking a shower together,

I don't care."

"Don't try to snuggle."

It's insane the amount of films
that he does.

He might do
two or three films a month.

I'll crush you

like the rest of you!

Once in a while
I have a script there,

and I go, "What's the name
of this movie?"

He goes, "I don't know,
I just know my part."

Just tell us where
we are and what we're doing.

- Okay. Uh, Mikey, where are we?
- Outlaw Studios.

We're at, right now
we're at Outlaw Studios

and we're getting to do,
getting ready to do

a cartoon called "Country Club."

"Hey, Robert,
I'm in, I'm in Dallas, Texas,

filming a movie
with Mickey Rourke."

"Oh, that's great man.
What's it called?"

"Man, I work!"

He didn't know
what it was called,

he doesn't know where he is.

2002, you appeared
in nine films.

True or false.

Oh, false.

I think I ap... appeared in 11.

IMDB has me
at 360 or something.

I have no idea, I don't count.

No shit! Fucker.

But a lot of those are
porno movies, right, you know?

Eddie's widow
texted us recently,

and she texted us
that my dad had reached

over 300 movies,

and that John Wayne
had only done,

I think, it was like 200?

She was like, so, you know,

it's time to stop saluting
John Wayne.

De Niro told him,

"Take everything they offer you
because they forget quick."

"I'm on the cover
of 'Prison Life!'"

I don't know if that was a joke
or not or if there

really is something called
"Prison Life."

"Robert, I'm on the cover
of 'Prison Life!'"

It was like he made it.

I have to look up and see if
there really is a "Prison Life"

or if that was a joke,
sometimes I can't tell.

When Danny's mom died...

I get a call,
it was his agent Gloria.

She calls me, she goes,
"Craig, I have some bad news."

"Danny's mom passed away."

I say, "Danny, I have to tell
you something." He goes "What?"

I said, "Your mom passed away."

I could actually
feel myself shut down,

boom, boom, boom,
just like at all levels.

He looks at me and he goes,

"I... is this real? Am I awake?"

This is somebody who had
their mother for 70 years.

It had a big, big impact
on his life.

I think more so than
his father.

When Alice died,
it was really heavy.

He was in London
doing the Muppet movie.

He was standing
pretty strong.

He had convinced himself
that he was gonna

push himself through this.

I was just fine

until that little... green frog

came up to me,
and I'll never forget it,

the guy's like this,
and he goes,

"Danny, I'm, I'm really sorry
about your mommy."

I go, "Fuck!" I just baw...

And I ran to the bathroom.

My mom had something
to do with me

because when my dad died,
nothing,

I showed nothing

'cause I had to take care
of my mom,

and I couldn't take care of her

feeling my dad's death.

And she says,
I'll never forget it,

"Well, you better not do that
when I die."

I said, "Shut up, mom,
you're not gonna die."

So I think when, when,

when I, like, locked up,

I could see her going, "No, no,
no, you're not going to,

I'll send the frog."

When I flew back, they had...

they had put together
the most beautifulest funeral

that my mom could have.

I think
he really has seen,

especially in the last
probably eight to ten years,

the value of life,
and the value of his,

and... and morbidity,
and as you get older

and his friends have passed,
and you really see

how precious life is,
and he has.

A lot of Danny's
friends are gone, you know?

But he has us.

Tonight you'll be speaking

to about 500 people
of all walks.

One of the reasons
I'm here today

is that I'm gonna be speaking
to a, a lot of, uh, students

that are going into the,
I would say, service, you know,

like, helping addicts
and helping alcoholics,

and then I'm speaking
with at-risk youth tonight.

I wanna invite anybody
and everybody

that wants to come tonight,
tell 'em you know me,

you can get in.

Thank you.

Danny still speaks
at prisons and schools

in whatever city we're at.

It's very strange.

He feels like
the day he stops doing that

is when he's, he's dead,
he's gone.

- How you doing? Good.
- I'm okay.

I'm Danny Trejo.

Can I see your program
for a second?

This is the flier
I was telling you about.

- Have you seen it?
- Oh, that's me.

Go straight ahead,
we're like 30 seconds away.

Straight ahead.

Boy.

- Hey!
- Hi.

Um, you all know
who Danny Trejo is,

so I'm gonna let him
tell you his story now.

Danny Trejo.

I sure hope you don't mind,
but...

I fall off of chairs like that.

My name's Danny Trejo and
I'm an addict and an alcoholic.

Hey, Danny.

Newcomers
to being clean and sober,

we talk about
expecting a miracle,

and people wait for a miracle.

If you're an addict,
or an alcoholic,

if you wake up clean and sober,

you're already in the miracle,

and so the miracle starts
the minute I wake up.

Hey, what's up, boys?
What's up? How you doing?

He's been through
a lot of shit.

That's a guy who understands
like hell, you know?

He knows what it looks like,
what it smells like,

what it tastes like.

They found a ten-centimeter
tumor on my liver.

I don't care who you are,
you get cancer,

start feeling sorry for
yourself, you're like, Why me?"

And then all of a sudden
the thought hit me,

"Man, imagine if I had this
in prison."

"Thank God I didn't get this
while I was in prison."

I beat it, I'm cancer-free.

Wow, what a journey.
What an unbelievable journey.

That means open the gate.

Wow.

What does
the psychological effect

of being in prison, how does it
affect you later in life?

We're gonna get you
through the scanner.

- I'm Danny Trejo.
- Any metal.

Uh, watch, belts.

In your head
you're brought right back

to everything you went through.

No one in their right mind
wants to do that.

No one.

I don't, I wouldn't want to,
but Danny does it.

- Alright, sir, thank you.
- Thank you.

This is a hot, hot place.

Not a lot of weight lifting
right now.

- Thank you, ma'am.
- Mm-hmm.

What's up? What's up?

- Hey.
- Hey, Machete.

What's up, fellas?

I think
that everybody

has a turning point in life.

My name's Danny Trejo.

A marker that says
either I'm gonna grow

or I'm gonna
stay this way forever.

I love to catch them
movie stars

coming out of their trailer
like this.

"Hey,
did you do coke?"

"Oh, fuck! Fuck you!"

Oh, hey, hey!

Hey, how good, how good is it?

Really? Hey, come on, man!

Oh, fuck 'em. You know what I
mean? Don't do drugs around me.

'Cause they don't have
the problem.

Me, I use drugs, alcohol,
I break out penitentiaries.

Them fuckers go home.

Everything good that's happened
to me has happened

as a direct result
of helping someone else.

Remember that. Everything.

The little guys in whatever
neighborhood you're from

are looking up at you

because their picture
of the penitentiary

is not the real deal.

These guys
are in juvenile hall saying,

"Gee, when I get
to the band home,

"I'll be running shit, yeah,

like my Uncle Choo Choo,
I'll be running shit."

You know, and with you guys,
no, no, no,

you gotta shower with
50 fuckers, do you understand?

Try not to brush up
against anybody.

And then you gotta shower
trying not to look.

If you don't...

you tarnish that image
of where you've been.

One day, that's all I got,
all I got is one day.

Do you understand?
Now how do I wanna live today?

That's it.
Just what do I wanna do today?

Man,
if, if you're doing time going,

"Fuck, I got five years, fuck,
I got.."

"Oh, fuck, now I got four years,
366 days,

364 days, 360, oh, my..."

You... you're not gonna
make it home.

So I say you gotta take
one day at a time, you know?

Just one day at a time,

let me see what I can accomplish
in one day.

And life's gonna get better
and better and better.

That's a promise,
you stay clean and sober,

your life will get
progressively better.

I really wanna thank you guys.
I mean that.

This was a pleasure for me
and a...

Thanks, guys.

I would rather
shoot for the moon and miss

than aim for the gutter
and make it.

A lot of these guys, they shot
for the gutter. They made it.

For me to come out and to say,
"Wait a minute,

there's a better way,"
people listen.

Not so much Danny Trejo,
but the guy from "Spy Kids,"

the guy from "Heat,"
the guy from "Desperado."

If they're Mexican, the guy
from "Blood In Blood Out."

When they hear somebody
that's been through it say,

"Help somebody every day,"
it sticks to their mind.

I know that I gave these guys
just, just a day, you know,

they got to do another day,
it was just break the monotony.

If that's all it was for 'em,
good, I did my job, you know,

I mean, I gave 'em a day.

They're letting us pick up
Gilbert Trejo right here.

They wouldn't let us pick him up
at the front gate.

That's shitty.

Thirty-eight years! Damn!

What were you doing in 1979?

To be able to stay alive
that long in prison?

That's a miracle.

♪ Having broke down ♪

♪ Having left out ♪

♪ Then I looked down ♪

♪ Walk out of here ♪

♪ As I walk out... ♪

What up, homie?

♪ I walked out ♪

♪ As I walk out... ♪

- How you doing?
- How you doing? I'm Mario.

Alright, Mario.

I told 'em, "You know what,
fuck that,

I'm leaving everything."

Thank you.

♪ I looked out ♪

- How's that?
- It's perfect.

I still owe a lot,
you know, and,

and I don't think
I'll ever be paid up,

but it sure is fun
getting there.

He still
lives in Pacoima.

He didn't move out,
he didn't go somewhere else.

He came back here.

He still supports
the neighborhood,

the mechanics
in the neighborhood,

the stores
in the neighborhood.

This is basically
every Latin's dream.

- Oh, get down, get down.
- Oh, yeah. Really.

To have a '64 Chevy in Pacoima
is like the dream come true.

Christmas,
he goes downtown,

he buys a bunch of toys
and he literally drives around

stopping people on the street
and giving them toys.

Right now
in the trunk of his car

there's
stacks of thermal underwear

and socks and you can,
sometimes you're like,

"Ah, I can't even fit my stuff
in there."

Whether
it's dogs being neutered...

I've been locked up
about three months.

That's 15 days human time.

Or teenagers,
he'll show up.

...is that you're not listening
to them, they'll come up...

What does the community
of Pacoima mean to you?

Everything, everything,
like family... Hi, Benz!

That's Chubby's wife,
she's awesome.

Wow, nobody was grateful
to have Danny around,

nobody was happy to have
Danny around at one time,

and now they're thrilled.

I remember a time
that they wouldn't let me

in their house,
you know, and the cops,

they'd stop me all the time
and up against the wall,

"We know you got something,
search the car..."

And nine times out of ten,
I did. You know what I mean?

And usually they'd stop me
with guns drawn.

Now it's like a completely
different thing, it's like,

you know, some of them are
like actually friends of mine.

They started work
on this giant mural of him

right here,
right up the street.

And I go, "You see, homie,

in Hollywood
they give you stars."

"In Pacoima
they give you murals, man."

And he was like, "Yay!"
You know what I mean?

I think he probably
tagged that wall at one time,

and they covered it
with his mural.

The town
that he terrorized in his youth

now has a mural of him because
of all the good that he did

that outweighed everything.

We're talking
about the guy who's mom

didn't unlock the screen door
when he, when he got out.

I don't think
he ever, he ever thought

that he'd have
something like that. Not here.

Even though
he comes from that lifestyle,

he went all the way
around the block,

and this is him now
and this is who he represents.

So that mural on the wall
don't only represent him,

it represents a lot of Latinos,

a lot of people
that changed their lives.

It's hope,
it's the idea

that I don't have to be
a product

of everything
that I am at the moment.

I can evolve.

I can change.

I can dream now,
and it's okay.

And that's what anybody
who makes it out of the ghetto

into the spotlight
of public life

is doing for their people.

And now I think
he knows who he is completely.

Pound that. Boom.

Wow, I love it,
I love seeing families, man.

Yeah?

See what we were talking about

about parents having time?

There, those parents
are making time,

and that's what's
the most important thing

in the kid's lives
is their time.

I'm not supposed to be living
this life of mine

and neither is he.

If we don't take this
to pass it on to somebody else

so they can pass it on
to somebody else...

what good is it?

How easy
would it have been

to just completely write off
that guy

who hit a rock
over a guard's head

in 1968?

Addicted to heroin
since he was 12.

More robberies under his belt
than stories we could tell.

How easy would it have been
to write that guy off?

That's what Danny represents.

He represents what happens
if you let your heart open

and decide
to let love conquer hate.

It's that chess piece
that starts off as a pawn

and makes it all the way
to the other side

of the chess board,
and now you get to choose

between all of these parts
that you wanna be.

My grandfather, Dionisio Trejo,

right now is saying
"He finally made it."

He's my idol, you know?
I mean, I look up to him.

I want to be like him
when I grow up.

People will make
their judgments

about famous people
however they want.

My dad is someone
I'm proud to call my dad.

You're either
gonna stay, come what may,

and have a better life,
or die, go insane, go to jail.

It's that simple.

Today I choose a better life,

and my life is a dream.

Well...