‘Furious 7’s’ Vin Diesel: Paul Walker Was Like A Brother To Me

Nearly 16 months since the death of Paul Walker, Vin Diesel is still mourning the loss of his friend and “Furious 7” co-star.

“One of the things that has made this franchise so successful is how this mythology bleeds into reality. And I have a lot of friends and I have a lot of family, but my most prized relationship in some ways was always Paul because we started as unknowns and we became iconic together over 15 years and dealt with the pressure of that and we were free people back in 2000 and then as the fame came, we both became more and more recluse,” he told Access Hollywood‘s Stephanie Bauer at the film’s press junket on Sunday.

The actor fondly recalled when Paul – who died on November 30, 2013 in a car accident – began looking up to him as a big brother figure.

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“We did this kind of disastrous read through at Universal and we were on one of the stages. There [were] about 50 people there – writers, producers, executives – and we were just beating up the script. I felt bad for the writer. I felt bad for the director. We were just questioning everything and I remember Paul, after every other line that he was concerned about, he’d look across the room and go, ‘What do you think Vin?’ And the director and writers were looking at him like, ‘Why are you asking Vin?'” he said. “He knew I was the big brother. It’s how that relationship started. He knew that I was gonna fight for him for the rest of my life.”

In fact, Vin said that Paul reminded him of his real twin brother in a way, who coincidentally is also named Paul.

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“We’re from two different places. I’m from the east coast. He’s from California. We couldn’t be further apart in some ways and yet we were so much alike,” he said. “I have a twin brother with blond hair and blue eyes named Paul, so if you were to ask my mother, she would say that my relationship with Paul Walker, for me and for my own spiritual growth, was a representation of this person that is my twin brother.”

Vin explained how he plans to keep Paul’s memory alive for his son Vincent.

“I will tell him that there’s only one Paul Walker in the universe. I will tell him that I’m lucky and those 15 years of that unique kind of bond I’ll cherish forever. I’ll tell him that it was Paul Walker that made me get up to the hospital in time to receive him,” he said.

The actor elaborated on how his friend made sure he made it to the delivery room in time to witness the birth of his baby boy.

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“We were filming a scene… on the bridge in Puerto Rico, the ending scene of ‘Fast 5,’ and because it was raining so much we were, we kept on having to wait for the rain and the clouds to go by and so I had a plane on the tarmac, the water had broken up in New York, I had to get up to New York and I remember telling him, you know, ‘The water just broke,'” he said of learning his girlfriend Paloma Jimenez had gone in to labor. “And he said, ‘What! You gotta get out of here. You gotta get out of here. It’s not even a deal. You gotta get outta here. It’s a closed deal. We can film this later.’ And he basically pushed me off the set and got me up to New York just in time for my son.”

When filming the emotional final scene of “Furious 7” (which opens April 3), Vin said the crew was reduced to tears by his delivery of the dialogue.

“Some of that was off script, as you could imagine. It was so powerful that when I was done saying it and [director] James Wan kept the camera rolling,” he said. “I looked around the studio and everyone was crying. You didn’t know where fiction began and reality ended in a way.”

— Paige Feigenbaum