Josh Safdie’s ping-pong odyssey “Marty Supreme” has plenty of bizarre moments — including one where Mr. Wonderful from “Shark Tank” spanks Timothée Chalamet with a ping-pong paddle. But this one just might take the cake.
Near the end of the film, business tycoon Milton Rockwell (“Shark Tank” star Kevin O’Leary) tells Timothée Chalamet’s ping-pong hustler Marty Mauser that he’s a vampire.
“I was born in 1601. I’m a vampire. I’ve been around forever,” Rockwell tells Mauser as a warning, sensing that Mauser is about to double-cross him and not throw a ping-pong match against his rival as he’d agreed to.
“I’ve met many Marty Mausers over the centuries. Some of them crossed me, some of them weren’t straight. They weren’t honest. And those are the ones that are still here,” Rockwell continues. “You go out and win that game, you’re gonna be here forever, too. And you’ll never be happy.”
In the context of the film, the speech comes across as the older, more successful Rockwell giving some colorful life advice to the young, egotistical Mauser.
But actually, there was a moment during the making of “Marty Supreme” when director Josh Safdie and co-writer Ronald Bronstein considered having Rockwell actually be a vampire, fangs and all.
O’Leary told Business Insider that from the moment he was offered the role, he told Safdie and Bronstein he didn’t believe Marty Mauser was being punished enough for screwing over almost everyone he encounters in the movie.
“I have to be a vampire in this movie, and I have to give him eternity in misery,” O’Leary said he told the filmmakers.
A few weeks later, O’Leary said Safdie and Bronstein were heavily considering making him an actual vampire in the movie.
“We made a mold of my teeth at a dentist, and we started working on fangs,” O’Leary said, adding that the plan was for Rockwell to suddenly have fangs during his “I was born in 1601” speech.
Eventually, the fang idea was scrapped, but they kept the vampire line. “They didn’t go the full way,” O’Leary said.
This is not the first time O’Leary, 71, has compared himself to a vampire. In a 2025 interview with Business Insider, he said this about considering retirement: “I’m never going to retire. That’s because I’m a vampire.”
“Marty Supreme” is currently playing in theaters nationwide.
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