Ian Ziering on Sharknado: “Sometimes you have to take one for the team.”

Sharknado, like The Room and Plan 9 from Outer Space before it, has become synonymous with wonderfully terrible movies.

The picture – for which we surely don’t need to spell out the plot – became so popular after its broadcast in the United States, its stars Ian Ziering and Tara Reid have been awarded a new kind of notoriety.

We caught up with Ziering to talk about Sharknado’s fervent fanbase, and how he ended up taking the role.

The former 90210 actor revealed he would likely have passed if he didn’t have a growing family to feed.

“As I read [the script] I realised this probably wasn’t going to be a groundbreaking, career-making movie. I said to my wife, as I’m only halfway through, ‘Honey, there are scripts out there that can make a career and scripts out there that can break a career, and I’m not so sure this is something I want to do.’

“She looked at me as she held our baby Mia on her hip, and my other daughter in her belly and said, ‘Look, you’re going to have two kids. You need to go to work.’ As a father and a husband, I’m also a provider, so I realised that she was right and begrudgingly I kept reading the script. Luckily, it started to get really good.

“As a single guy, I probably would pass on those things I really didn’t feel would aggrandise my career. Seriously, there’s things out there that can ruin you. But again, as a husband and a father, sometimes you have to take one for the team.”

Listen to the entire interview here.

Subscribe to the Talk Hard podcast – which features all our interviews – on iTunes.

Sharknado is now available to stream on Quickflix, and arrives on DVD October 9.