"Speaking of crashing cars—how much of the driving did you actually do yourself? Did you have to go to racing school?"
"The studio hooked me up with a stunt driving coach," Raphael answered smoothly. "Taught me how to drift, how to draft, how to hold half a car length between two vehicles going eighty. After three weeks, the coach pulled the director aside and asked, 'Has this kid been stealing cars his whole life?'"
The audience roared.
Jay Leno's shoulders shook as he laughed. "Was that supposed to be a compliment?"
"I chose to take it as one," Raphael nodded solemnly. "Though getting praised for your grand theft auto potential by a professional stuntman is definitely a mixed bag of emotions."
The interview segment wrapped up on a high, energetic note.
Following the show's format, it was time for the game segment. The producers had rigged up a Fast and Furious-themed obstacle course.
The stage floor was taped out like a miniature racetrack, with several life-sized oil drums scattered around as obstacles.
The rules were simple: Raphael had to navigate a shopping cart through the course, avoiding the drums, and grab a checkered flag at the finish line while being timed.
"Hold on," Raphael said, eyeing the plastic shopping cart. "Am I supposed to drive this thing or push it?"
"Push it!" Leno laughed. "Our insurance policy won't let you actually race in here."
"Then at least give me a cart with some rims on it."
Leno waved to the wings, and a stagehand wheeled out a different shopping cart. One of the front casters was completely bent, letting out an ear-piercing squeal every time it moved.
The audience was already losing it.
Raphael took a deep breath and grabbed the handle of the busted cart.
He could have used the Force. He could have stabilized the wheels with a single thought, making the cart glide as smoothly as a maglev train.
But he didn't.
Instead, he leaned into the bit. He deliberately made the bad wheel screech like a dying pig. He purposely swung wide on the turns, narrowly missing the oil drums. As he approached the finish line, he violently threw the cart sideways, executing a hilariously clumsy "drift" into the final zone. He slammed into the podium, and the checkered flag toppled over, smacking him right on top of the head.
The studio audience exploded.
Leno had to grip his desk to keep from falling over laughing. "You... you swear you don't know how to steal cars?"
"Still don't," Raphael said, rubbing his head. "But I've got shopping carts figured out. If anyone needs one boosted from a Ralphs, give me a call."
That specific clip was uploaded as a standalone video on NBC's website later that night. Within three days, it racked up over two million views.
The comment section was flooded with people calling him "a comedian trapped in an action star's body."
Ari called him the next morning, sounding utterly baffled. "I had no idea you could be funny."
"Neither did I," Raphael replied. "But that cart was legitimately awful to push."
---
A week later, Raphael flew to New York.
NBC Headquarters. Studio 8H. Saturday Night Live.
It hadn't been on the original itinerary. The SNL producers sent an emergency invite the morning after his Tonight Show appearance aired.
They were putting together a "Summer Blockbuster Special" and needed a young face who could drive, deliver a joke, and didn't look terrible on camera.
"What exactly are they having you do?" Philip asked over the phone.
"Used car salesman," Raphael answered. "I'm playing half of a sleazy brother duo with one of the cast members."
"Is that a real acting role?"
"On SNL, it's considered an honor."
The live broadcast kicked off at 11:30 PM on Saturday.
Raphael wore a cheap, shiny polyester suit, his hair slicked back with an obscene amount of gel. For seven minutes, he and his scene partner ran through a rapid-fire sketch about hustling lemons to unsuspecting buyers.
He didn't have a ton of dialogue, but he managed to infuse every line with the perfect comedic balance of "trying way too hard to sound sincere while obviously lying through his teeth."
Right in the middle of the sketch, his partner threw out an unscripted line: "You actually drive this thing?"
Raphael paused for a fraction of a second.
He thought back to the scene in Fast where Brian first meets Dom. Dom asks him, You know how to fight? and Brian answers, A little.
Back then, he really did only know a little.
But right now?
"I drove it," Raphael deadpanned, sounding like the most earnest con man on the planet. "Drives like a dream. Previous owner was a street racer. Swapped the engine block, raised the chassis. You want to outrun the cops, this is your chariot."
His partner blinked. That definitely wasn't in the script.
But the cast member rolled with it: "And how do you plan on proving that?"
Raphael slapped the roof of the prop car without breaking eye contact. "The fact that this car hasn't exploded yet is all the proof you need."
The audience roared with laughter.
At the afterparty, one of the SNL head writers tracked Raphael down to ask where he came up with that ad-lib.
"Nowhere, really. It just felt like something the guy would say."
The writer nodded slowly, looking at him with sudden respect, and walked away.
Ari sidled up next to him. "That was improv?"
"Yeah."
"Jesus," Ari muttered, downing half a glass of champagne. "Do you have any idea how many comedy scripts I could book you on right now because of those three seconds?"
"I'm not doing comedies," Raphael shook his head. "As soon as this press tour wraps, I'm heading back to LA. The lightsaber training for Star Wars starts next week."
Ari sighed and didn't push it.
He was quickly realizing that this nineteen-year-old kid already had a master plan mapped out in his head. He knew exactly what he wanted to do, and more importantly, what he didn't want to do. He didn't need anyone steering the ship.
---
Day ten of the press tour. Raphael was back on the Universal lot for a supplemental photo shoot.
The primary posters and stills for Fast had been locked in months before release. But with the movie completely shattering opening weekend projections, the marketing department demanded a fresh batch of character-focused portraits to feed to various media outlets.
The soundstage was divided into three distinct setups.
The first was the "Street Grit" setup: a grimy garage backdrop, faded racing posters taped to the brick wall, tires and toolboxes scattered across the concrete. Raphael wore the same dark brown tee Brian wore at the end of the movie, leaning casually against a black Dodge Challenger.
The photographer was a young woman named Chloe. Word was she specialized in intimate portraiture.
She didn't give much direction; she just kept the shutter clicking, occasionally tweaking a light stand.
After twenty minutes, she lowered her camera.
"What are you thinking about right now?" she asked.
"Nothing. Just zoning out," Raphael answered reflexively.
"Don't zone out." Chloe tilted her head. "Brian O'Conner doesn't zone out. He's constantly calculating, constantly evaluating. He's always caught in a choice: Does he keep up the lie, or does he confess? Does he do his job, or does he save his friend?"
Raphael paused.
She was right.
He reset his posture. He tightened his shoulders slightly and shifted his gaze just off-camera—like something had caught his eye, but he was actively forcing himself not to look directly at it.
The shutter started firing rapidly.
"Yes!" Chloe's voice picked up speed. "Right there! He has to leave, but part of him wants to stay. Hold that."
The second setup was the "Speed" setup. Green screen in the back, massive industrial fans blasting him from the front to blow his hair and jacket back. The prop department had mounted the front half of a black Toyota Supra on a rig so it looked like he was flying down the highway.
"Imagine you're driving," Chloe instructed gently. "It's not a race. You're running. Someone is hunting you, or maybe you're hunting them."
Raphael gripped the steering wheel.
He had actually driven that car—in the dream world, tearing down the empty, pre-dawn streets of Los Angeles.
He hadn't been running from anyone then. He'd just been cruising through the industrial park outside Dom's garage, listening to the deep, guttural hum of the V6 engine in the dead of night.
He turned his head slightly, his eyes flicking to the side mirror.
It wasn't a look of panic or paranoia.
It was the instinctual habit of checking to see if the passenger seat was really empty.
The shutter clicked endlessly.
When they finally wrapped the shot, Chloe walked over. "You've lived a lot of life," she said quietly. "That's not acting. That's real history in your eyes. For someone your age... that's rare."
Raphael didn't say a word.
The final setup was the "Quiet" setup. A basic apartment interior: a cheap sofa, a floor lamp, a window looking out at nothing.
Raphael changed into the plain white tee Brian wore at the very beginning of the film. He perched on the arm of the sofa, holding a prop mug of coffee.
This was meant to capture one of Brian's rare, private moments—not the cop, not the racer, just a young guy waking up, drinking terrible instant coffee, and figuring out what to do with his day.
Chloe only took a handful of shots before lowering her camera completely.
"I don't even need to direct you for this one," she said. "You look exactly like you're sitting in your own living room."
Raphael stayed silent.
He was thinking about his living room. He was thinking about the white house in Malibu, the Tupperware container of beef stew that was probably empty by now, and making a mental note to get his mom a center seat in the front row for his next premiere.
On the final day of the press tour, Raphael sat in a green room at Universal, waiting for his last radio interview.
Outside the window, the eternal July sun of Los Angeles was blinding, reflecting off the white walls of the soundstages.
His phone lit up. Philip.
[Mom saw the preview for your Empire cover online. She saved the picture and made it the wallpaper on her work computer.]
[She also wants to know if you ruined that jacket on purpose, and if the oil stains will come out in the wash.]
Raphael typed back.
[Tell her the stunt driver's car had an oil leak.]
Send.
He sent another text immediately.
[Never mind, I'll tell her myself. Coming home this weekend.]
Philip instantly replied with a thumbs-up emoji.
---
Outside the window, a commercial jet carved a long, white contrail across the blue sky.
Raphael sank deeper into the couch and closed his eyes.
Starting tomorrow, he was Anakin Skywalker.
Sword training, table reads, and a flight to the set in Australia.
A brand new universe was waiting.
July 16, 2001. Sydney, Australia.
The winter rain of the Southern Hemisphere hammered against the corrugated metal roof of Soundstage 7 at Fox Studios Australia, sounding like a stampede of horses.
Raphael stood in the center of the makeshift training area. Standing opposite him was a 57-year-old British man with snow-white hair, holding a practice sword with the relaxed, lethal grip of someone who had done it for forty years.
Bob Anderson.
The man was an industry legend. He was the stunt double inside the Darth Vader suit for the lightsaber duels in the original Star Wars trilogy. He had choreographed the fights for The Princess Bride and The Mask of Zorro. Half the actors in Hollywood who had ever swung a sword owed their skills to him.
Anderson studied Raphael closely, his tone perfectly even. "George told me you've never had any formal sword training."
"That's correct, sir," Raphael replied.
"The fighting you see in movies is stage choreography. It has very little to do with actual fencing or combat."
"I understand."
"Then we'll start from the absolute beginning."