February 10, 2010

On Tuesday evening, February 9th, the Arclight Cinema in Hollywood hosted the American premiere of The Wolfman, Universal’s remake of their classic creature flick and Shock Till You Drop were on hand to chat with the director and cast on the red carpet.

“I was a big fan of the original,” confesses director Joe Johnston. “The Wolf Man was my favorite Universal monster.”

Doing a remake of what many genre fans consider a horror classic is always tricky. We asked the director if there was anything specific he was aiming for with his modern interpretation. “I wanted to make sure that you could see Benicio (Del Toro) underneath the make-up. I didn’t want it to be a mask where it could be anyone under there. I wanted Rick (Baker) to be able to give him enough flexibility with various pieces of the make-up so that Benicio could perform and act and express himself, and not feel like he was stuck behind this mask. He did a fantastic job with it. I think you can see it’s Benicio underneath the make-up.”

Emily Blunt agrees, especially when she stared face to face with Del Toro in full Wolfman make-up. “It was terrifying,” she says. “But terrifying in the best way, because it gives you so much to react from rather then doing it with a green screen or a moving tennis ball. That’s tedious, but I think it helped all of us get a sense of the film seeing Benicio in the Wolfman make-up in front of us, and it was very atmospheric to be on the other end of a scene with him.”

Even Hugo Weaving, who’s an intimidating presence himself couldn’t help but marvel at the fully made-up Del Toro. “The make-up was extraordinary. Benny’s about the same height as me, he’s rather tall, but then (as the Wolfman) he’s on these stilts and he’s a lot taller and intimidating!”

Speaking of that extraordinary make-up, Shock got a few minutes to chat with the man behind the make-up Rick Baker and we weren’t surprised to discover that the FX artist had plenty of practice time when it came to this opportunity to create a new Wolfman. “Well, I’ve been making myself up as the Wolfman since I was 10 years old and now I’m almost 60, so I’ve done it a lot and a lot of different ways. But the Lon Chaney Jr. Wolfman is the Wolf Man! My fear initially was that they were going to do a CG Wolfman because it’s the digital age. To me, the Wolfman is a make-up and it should be a make-up. You have an actor like Benecio Del Toro, it’d be a crime for him to suddenly be digital.”

It terms of making this a period piece, screenwriter David Self said, “When I got involved, it was really interesting, because the original film was a contemporary film in its day and I think (co-writer) Andrew (Kevin Walker) made this cool aesthetic choice to set it in 1890 during Victorian England. A story about our nature, of the beast within, it felt somewhat appropriate to set it in this period.”

Hugo Weaving plays Frederick Abberline in The Wolfman, the real life Chief Inspector who worked on the Jack The Ripper case. “I think the Jack The Ripper reference is really important, perhaps not to the character, but certainly in the viewers mind, because suddenly they’re referencing a whole other world and it brings a certain level of prestige,” explains Weaving. In terms of influences to how he played the character? “I obviously delved into the real Abberline and I tried to find out a little bit about him and what was relevant. Things like Jekyll and Hyde, Jack The Ripper, Hounds of the Baskervilles were also what I was looking at, also Sleepy Hollow a bit in terms of other films, but I try not to reference other films, I try to go with what’s on the page to get working. But all those examples play into a little bit of what we were doing.”

When asked what his favorite scene of the movies is, director Johnston doesn’t hesitate with his response. “My favorite sequence is probably the asylum sequence, the whole transformation in the asylum. I love that sequence, because as soon as he gets wheeled down the corridor and into that room, you know exactly what’s going to happen. And it’s just a matter of waiting for it to happen, you know its coming. That’s always been my favorite sequence, even in the first draft of the script that I read, I always thought ‘this is going to be a great scene’.”

Considering Lon Chaney Jr. returned multiple times as The Wolf Man, despite meeting his demise at the end of every one of those movies, I asked if it’d be possible to get away with something like that in today’s day and age. Screenwriter David Self laughs, “Well, in the second Wolf Man movie, Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man from 1943, he literally starts out in a coffin and literally opens the coffin and gets out. I think we can probably figure out an alternative to that.”

“I’m sure we can figure out a way,” Baker also agrees. “But we also do kind of set it up for a few possibilities at the end of this movie.”

Lastly, with Del Toro openly such a big fan of the original Universal monster movies, we asked his lovely co-star Emily Blunt if these films played into her upbringing at all. “I didn’t really grow up on these films, but I always remember my dad talking about them, because he’s a huge fan. He was so excited when I told him I was doing this movie. I did go back and watch the original Wolf Man. It was really cool, because then I realized what we were making was very much an homage movie and a noble nod hopefully to those Universal monster movies.”

The Wolfman opens in theaters this Friday, February 12th.