For his New Year's resolution, actor Liam Neeson, who stars in the "Taken" franchise in which various family members are kidnapped, has pledged to write letters to American parents to let them know that their children will be safe if they travel to Europe,
reports News Corp. Australia.
"I was shocked by that," Neeson said referring to letter he received from a South Texas teacher a few years ago expressing concern that a planned school trip to Europe was in jeopardy because parents were concerned their children might be, as happened in the first "Taken" movie, kidnapped while traveling through Europe.
In the first two films in the “Taken” series, one or more of the main characters were abducted while traveling in Europe, requiring Neeson, who plays a former CIA operative, to rescue them.
In December, Neeson received another letter from the same teacher saying that another group of parents had seen "Taken 2" and had similar concerns about letting their children travel abroad.
“Just the other day I got a letter from a school teacher in Texas who had tried to take 60 students to Europe and the families of 40 of them got the kids out of it because they had seen 'Taken 2'. And then this year she wanted to take 20 of them and the parents all said, ‘No because we’ve seen that movie,' " said the 62-year old actor during an appearance on The Graham Norton Show,
according to UK's The Independent.
“These kids had never been outside the state and she was desperate to get some assurance but what I am doing is writing her a letter or a to-whom-it-may-concern letter that she can print out or send to these parents that this is a movie. The chance of your kids being taken in Europe are one in 20 million or something," Neeson told News Corp. Australia.
Ironically, the Irish actor said he hesitated to do a third "Taken" movie because he did not want to insult the intelligence of his audience.
"I said the second one wouldn't happen and I said I wouldn't do a third one if someone got taken. It's insulting to an audience as well as me," said Neeson on Norton's New Year's Eve special,
reported Ireland's Independent.
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