While the old gang were prepared to go balls-to-the-wall for Jackass Forever, they still wanted to evolve the crew by roping in some new Jackass team members. Yet the alchemy of the crew was so spot-on, it was tough to imagine fitting anyone else into that mix. How did the original cast feel about sharing the spotlight? “Part of me was like, ‘okay, I’m not gonna get so fucked up this time,’” says McGhehey. “The other part of me was like, ‘What, dude? That’s my movie, bro.’”
That sentiment was shared across the cast: “Being an attention whore, I didn’t care to share the spotlight,” says Steve-O. Pretty quickly, however, it was shaping up to be the right decision: “Within one minute of us getting together with the new guys, it was already working,” says Steve-O. “In hindsight, like every other decision that Knoxville, Spike Jonze and Jeff Tremaine have collectively made, they were right, man.” Lacey adds: “I think a lot of people are gonna be jealous of the new guys to start with. They want to be that person, but once they get to meet these kids, they’re going to fall in love with them.” Wee Man is confident that, however jealous the fans might be, they’re going to love the new gang: “The fans are gonna love that we brought new guys onboard. It shows we’re with the times, which we’ve always been.” But who are these brave, stupid new soldiers looking to get fucked up jackass-style? So who are the new Jackass team members?
RACHEL WOLFSON – Coming as it does from the world of skateboarding, jackass has always had a very fraternal energy. Still, it’s 2022, and it was time to bring some new, female energy to challenge the jackass crew. New Jackass team member addition Rachel Wolfson, who lives in LA, is an actor and standup comedian. Like most people her age, she grew up with jackass: “I was an MTV kid, so I grew up watching Jackass in my living room every single day. I had just never seen comedy or anything that funny before in my life. It was an escape and I loved it. Every time I went to Home Depot, I checked the toilets. ‘Is there a shit in there? Is this happening to all Home Depots?’” she laughs. “I was doing stupid shit, like my friends were pushing around shopping carts and anytime they would do something we’d be like, ‘Jackass!’ So I participated in that,” she says. She was inducted into jackass history via Instagram, where she posts comedy bits regularly. Tremaine says, “Knoxville sent me her Instagram and we just started clicking through and found a bunch of her pieces and I thought, ‘Let’s bring her on.’” She marks another first for the group: they’ve never had a stand-up comedian in the crew. The rules, says Wolfson, are pretty similar: “Pontius taught me that, ‘Pride is the death of jackass.’ It’s the same for comedy,” she says. “I just followed her on Instagram and thought she was really funny. I didn’t really know her outside of that. She is so funny, and we are really lucky to have her,” says Knoxville. “I thought it was a joke when he messaged me. I was like, ‘What is this?’” she says. “My next thought was, ‘Oh, God, I hope they don’t want to see my butthole! And, if they do, I’m totally willing.’” She adds: “When I came in for the meeting, I just remember thinking, ‘Oh, that was the easiest meeting ever.’ Not that I’ve had many meetings, but I didn’t ask any questions.” How did Wolfson handle the toughest stunts, like licking a taser? “I just let the fear kind of fuel me and turn it into adrenaline. I think stand-up helped with that because I do get nervous every time I get on stage,” she says.
JASPER – Jasper, born Davon Lamar Wilson, was always a huge fan of everything the jackass crew put out, from the OG show to Wildboyz. “We used to use this one kid as a stunt guy sometimes. I put him in carts and I pushed him straight into walls or gates. I feel bad for him now,” he laughs. That early influence stuck with Jasper, and he’s excited to a be new Jackass team member. Jasper was one of the founding members of hip-hop collective Odd Future along with Tyler, the Creator in 2007, when he was just 17 years old. In 2011, he and other Odd Future members created Loiter Squad with Knoxville, Tremaine and Jonze’s production company Dickhouse. The show was a unique riff on the jackass format, with skits and pranks. From there, he met his heroes. Jasper was invited to fulfill his destiny with a phone call, and at first he was scared: “I was like, ‘Fuck. This is a good opportunity, but man, this is, it could get darker. My first thought was, ‘Hopefully, I don’t die.’ Then I was like, ‘Hey, at least I’ll die on camera!’” Being brought into the fold was a huge deal for Jasper: “I grew up watching jackass, so it feels really great to be invited into the crew and everything. When I got the news I was being asked to join, a little thug tear fell out, I ain’t gonna lie,” he says. “I don’t play it cool, you know what I’m saying?” Jasper wasn’t the only new addition from his family. His dad, known as Dark Shark, was also recruited. “He’s an OG gangbanger from the real streets of LA. He’s an older black guy who grew up in gang culture and all that, and it’s good to see him do new things. His whole life was just gun violence, gangbanging, prison and now he’s in TV and movies. So I’m happy for that guy,” says Jasper. That didn’t mean they went easy on Dark Shark–he got pranked just as hard as everyone else.
SEAN “POOPIES” MCINERNEY Sean “Poopies” McInerney got his nickname the way you might expect: “I first watched jackass on MTV. We were super bored. I lived in Carlsbad at the time, and there were no waves but we wanted to do something stupid. So, I went in the street and took a shit in the main intersection of my town. That’s how I got my nickname,” he says. To call Poopies a surfer isn’t really to do his work justice: “It’s more like: find a 20-foot shore break and get your water skis and your inflatable and go over the falls and wipe out and almost drown,” he says. Poopies was introduced to the jackass crew via Trip Taylor when he was working on a Red Bull TV series. “They said, ‘Poopies, we want you to come and test out for jackass.’ We had a Skype call in Hawaii and within 10 minutes they were flying me to LA for the test shoot.’” he says. “Our first shoot was the hot sauce challenge, [where] someone has to put it in their ass, their dick, and their nose. So, I got picked to put it in my ass. That’s when I knew, I can never turn back. I’m jackass forever,” he says. Getting discovered by the gang to be a new Jackass team member was a big deal: “I was starstruck when I first showed up. It was a dream come true. I remember sometimes doing intros and I was like, ‘Dude, I have to pinch myself,” he says. It turns out that the guys are just as big fans of him, too: “Poopies is very sweet, he’s very gullible, but he’s pretty tough. He was doing jackass stuff already in the surf world,” says Wee Man. Knoxville adds: “Poopies was a godsend from Trip Taylor. Within the first two minutes, we were just like, ‘He is perfect.’”
ERIC MANAKA The youngest addition to be a new Jackass team member is Eric Manaka. In fact, he is younger than the OG cast ever was in the original series. Hailing from South London, he’s also the first British cast member. Manaka met Knoxville and Pontius when he was cast in the movie Action Point in 2017 at 17 years old. “I love skating and I love getting a bit hurt,” he says, which made him the perfect fit for jackass. “My cousin and I got to see jackass on MTV when we were kids, and I’d watch clips on YouTube. I’d watch Spike’s videos, too. It was our world of skate culture,” he says. Meeting the gang was exciting for Manaka: “I met Johnny the first time in the audition for the film. It blew my mind. He brought me onto this film. I had no acting credits before and he just gave me this chance. He said, ‘I see something in this kid. He’s a skater, he’s got the kind of energy that we’re looking for.’ It gave me a bit of impostor syndrome. I’m not a technical skater, but at the end of the day, it’s energy, and it’s spirit.” “He was a skateboarder and a filmmaker. He’s a really smart, really laidback, nice guy.” says Knoxville. Manaka immediately clicked with the rest of the crew: Says Wee Man. “I remember the first day when Eric came on and we rode the bus to set. He was like, ‘Man, you guys are so awesome. You guys make me feel at home already.’ If you don’t click with us, it, it’s not gonna happen. I always think of it like a band. If you come and try out for a band and you’re just not playing the same music as us, it ain’t gonna work.”
ZACH “ZACKASS” HOLMES While all of the new crew members grew up as fans of jackass, not all of them were allowed to be. Zach “Zackass” Holmes, hailing from the Midwest, says that jackass impacted his life “so much,” but it was strictly forbidden in his home. “I loved watching jackass. I grew up in a super Christian household, so I wasn’t allowed to watch it. I would sneak and watch it on TV and change it back to Nickelodeon really fast if anyone walked in the room. I was really secretive about it or I watched it at a friend’s house,” he says, adding that it didn’t stop him: “I fucking loved it. It’s the reason I made a lot of my friends growing up.” Zackass started filming his own stunts as a teenager: “I got in trouble in school for filming dumb things. I ended up actually dropping out of high school because they were gonna expel me for doing it,” he says. From there, he got big both at home and online for posting videos of himself doing the most gnarly things imaginable. He epitomized the energy of mid-00s jackass fans growing up in the middle of nowhere, and soon caught the eye of his heroes. “I learned about Zack from the World Wide Web. I’d seen gnarly videos of a larger fellow doing really outrageous stunts. I saw the one where he’s doing some skate trick and he compound fractures his leg. He’s surprisingly athletic,” says Knoxville. When Zackass got the call to be a new Jackass team member it was a no-brainer: “I was pretty nervous getting brought into this movie because I’m doing crazy shit in this stupid movie with all these people I’ve looked up to my entire life,” says Holmes. “On the test shoot day, Jeff came up to me and said, ‘You drove a motorcycle before?’ I was, like, ‘Yeah, I have.’ I don’t normally ride a motorcycle, or dirt bikes, or anything, so I decided to hope for the best and I just gunned it,” he says.
So there you have the new Jackass team members!
