Jeff Goldblum ... motorcycle guy? | The Autoblog interview

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Interesting guy, Jeff Goldblum. With a wildly successful career as an actor stretching from 1974, when he debuted in his first role as Freak #1 in the film "Death Wish," to several pre-production credits in 2022 (thanks, IMDb!), Goldblum has 139 acting credits on his résumé. We know him best for unforgettable roles in blockbuster films like "Jurassic Park," "Independence Day" and "The Fly," and with such a diverse background, maybe we shouldn’t be surprised that Goldblum isn’t just interesting, he’s also interested. In just about everything, it turns out.

That’s where the National Geographic series “The World According to Jeff Goldblum” comes into play. Currently on season 2 and airing on Disney+, the documentary series follows Goldblum as he satisfies his curiosity on a wide variety of topics. The one we’re most interested in is slated to air on January 19, simply titled “Motorcycles.”

We briefly sat down on the phone with Goldblum to dig into the details of the upcoming episode and why his eccentric nature led him down a two-wheeled path in the first place.

The following interview has been edited for clarity.

Autoblog: You really seem to have a lot of trepidation when it comes to dangerous activities in general — and that would include riding motorcycles. What made you interested in the topic of motorcycles to start with?

Jeff Goldblum: Well, the great people at Nat Geo and Nutopia had a list of things, and I talked about my past histories with them. And having to ride them in a couple of movies … most prominently in my memory in my professional life, “Nashville.” And that was a crazy experience, I didn’t know how to ride, so I took up lessons in New York and was riding around the streets of Manhattan, and finally found out once I got in Nashville that I’d failed the test. But then the contraption that they had me on, that three-wheeled thing, was really like a stick shift — like a stick-shift car — which I also didn’t know how to drive. So I started to learn how to do that!

So I had a little experience with it. And then I remembered in the course of thinking about motorcycles it came back to me that my cousin seemed to be part of that counter culture in the mid-Sixties — he had a big beard, and was in this exotic atmosphere — and he said, "Jeff, come down here," and I was like 11 or something like that, "and ride on the back of my motorcycle." And I went around the block with him or something like that, and I think that was my first experience.

I had my own particular areas of adventurousness. You might say that going into acting was adventurous and kind of risky for me. But driving, even driving cars, I was never hankering or chomping at the bit at it before I left Pittsburgh. And then once I got to New York, you know I was getting around by subway and all that. It wasn’t until I got to California in my early- to mid-twenties that I started really driving a car.

So yeah, it’s not something that thrilled me, and I didn’t want to get hurt. That’s for sure. Statistics will tell you that it’s a little riskier to drive around on a motorcycle. I had another friend who got into an accident on his bicycle, for heaven’s sakes, and I was like, ‘Hey, you know, you might want to rethink the thing … I know it’s a lot of fun for you, but one of these days … it’s always a trade-off I guess.

Autoblog: Yeah, for sure. I definitely got that sentiment from your episode. You know, I just read a new statistic that riding motorcycles is actually less dangerous than riding horses. That actually surprised me as someone who has ridden motorcycles for 30 years now. Because motorcycle riding is in fact thought of as a dangerous activity.

Jeff Goldblum: Yes.

Autoblog: And that actually leads me to my next question. In the show, you did actually get on a bike and ride, starting with a dirt bike, albeit at low speeds and in first gear, but you did ride it. And then toward the end of the episode you got on a trike. It looked like maybe that was a Volkswagen-powered, or was it a proper Harley-Davidson-powered trike?

Jeff Goldblum: Yeah, I’m not sure. It was a little bit like the one I rode in Nashville, I think, but yeah, it was fun to be on those again.

Autoblog: So you did get on a bike and ride again. How did it make you feel? Did you actually enjoy that?