TROUT   [5]

Sam Gaoa and Aidan: [1, 2, 3, 4]
 
ORPHEUS WINS… AT LAST
 
S: You’ve got a very big cast in there with Cuba Gooding Jr and Max von Sydow and Annabella Sciorra. Did you have any influence as to this main core group?

V:Absolutely. But I’d been on the film for 3 years and before we could even make the film I had to find a way that it would work as a film before it could even get financed. We developed a figure with MGM, and then we went to a company I’d been in business with on another script with this guy from Polygram and they went ahead with it. I’d never do a film I couldn’t cast, though the studio has approval rights.
   I wanted Robin; he responded to the script; it just came together surprisingly easily. The way it works is the studio had to be completely behind it and prepared to make what they call a pay-or-play offer, so whatever happens they have to pay him a
 

'August 12, 1996… Robin Williams has signed [to read for] the lead, scoop correspondent ‘Lumiere’ reports to CA. The scooper also reports that Vincent Ward is slated to direct, while the production designer is Eugenio Zennetti. Filming is scheduled to commence September 1997.
‘ “All I can say about the story is that it’s the ultimate love story… surreal and beautiful,” ‘Lumiere’ comments.’ [Internet scoop and project announcement sent in by ‘Lumiere’.]

very large amount of money before he can read the script; it’s like putting your money down in a poker game. And they did, and he read it, and he loved it, and he
said yes. We had to meet a couple of times and we even read the script together and so on, imagining if we would work together well.
 
 

March 11, 1997… Robin Williams is officially announced in the project. Budgeted at $US65-70 million.
‘ “Comments: Although at first glance the film’s premise sounds suspiciously reminiscent of 1990’s Ghost, the What Dreams May Come script veers away from being a typical romantic- or fantasy-themed film. While the love shared by the two main characters (a husband and wife) centres the story, the framework surrounding the tale is about what destinations lay beyond the grave and how the choices we make shape our destiny.
‘ “The script ranges from moments of extreme beauty to ones of sheer nightmarish horror. If fully realised, the effect sequences could [literally] knock one’s socks off. As the project stands right now, director Vincent Ward (The Navigator) and actor Robin Williams (The Birdcage) are attached to the project.” ’ [Internet scoop by FraggleMom, Maverick, H.B. and anon’.] 

Cuba wanted to be in the film. I tried casting the part as it was originally written, with a Caucasian role in it; none of those actors seemed to be able to pull it off - it was almost too straight-ahead, the way it was written - and I found the same thing with Max’s role: it was originally written for an American Clint Eastwood type, and I thought that that was too cliched, so I cast it by having Max von Sydow in that case. And when I brought in African-American actors and Puerto Rican actors, Hispanic actors, it seemed to lift the character more, and gave it a little spin and had a little more character to it, and I really didn’t want the character to be a goody-two-shoes that it could have been; I didn’t want it to be a higher-than-thou character, I wanted it to be kind of funny, have a sense of humour, have a kind of puckish, mercurial quality, all of which Cuba has. He actually wanted to be another part. And I said, “You know, Cuba, that’s way too small for you;” he wanted to be Max’s part, and I said, “You’re completely wrong for that, but this part you could be fantastic for.” And we worked together and I was very pleased with what he did. He’s a good guy; he’s a very good-natured guy to work with. He comes with what he calls his ‘pozzy’, it’s all this baggage from school; they hang out in the trailer. If I want a beer at lunchtime it was the only place I could sneak into… particularly with the Californian wholesome lifestyle. The man is just someone I wanted.
 
 

Two scoopers tells us Gooding has signed on to play Williams’ tracker, who takes him to Hell’s door, for $1.5 mil. Apparently “Show me the money!” worked! [Internet scoop by ‘Sylvester’ and ‘Josh the Sandman’.]

S: Since Map of the Human Heart there was Alien 3-

V: No, that was before that. It must be the press, because everyone keeps saying that. Everyone thinks that, here and in Australia but they don’t anywhere else… Before Map of the Human Heart; while I was developing it, in fact.

S: You did Map of the Human Heart; after that there seemed to be a brief respite.

V:It always seems to be 4 or 5 years. It was perhaps a year longer than normal. I get offered a lot of material, working in Los Angeles, always have, but most of it’s not very good - it maybe has a technical or generic ability but it never has any originality, and there’s not a lot of drama that’s written, not a lot of drama gets made.

S: Do you find yourself still gauging the territory, just waiting for the right projects to come?

V:Yeah, and also you develop material yourself; it’s hard to find good material; it’s hard to develop good material. And I’d rather just hold out for things… I only want to do stuff that I really believe in. There are some film-makers who do a film every year or two and inherently you’ve got to be much more of a ‘gun for hire’ and I really don’t want to do that.

S: You also did a cameo in Leaving Las Vegas.

V: Yeah, I did three films. I started off with one of the four leads in an independent film: I played a kamikaze screenwriter that kills the producer, which was a comedy, I’d a lot of fun with it.

A: Self-criticism?

V: In a comic way, although at the time I thought it had its tragic. I work as a film producer some times, so it could be self-criticism. I had to audition for it; I had to do everything else everyone else has to do.
 

'The New Zealand Listener reported that Vincent Ward was finding it hard to make ends meet in Hollywood following the so-so box-office returns of Map of the Human Heart. He had for some time been attempting to develop a film of the Beowulf legend without success and had been resisting more commercial offers. (Another source reported to the scooper that some of the projects that Ward had turned down had been Robocop sequels and The Never Ending Story III). Ward had been forced to take on directing commercials and even a bit acting part in Leaving Las Vegas to make ends meet. It was only due to the A-list name of Robin Williams that Ward was able to get Dreams off the ground.’ [Internet scoop by Roogulator.]

It was very independent, low-budget, much more low-budget than even Vigil was: when we film on the streets of L.A., cops would come, we’d move quickly, we’d move comma quickly – because we didn’t have any permits – and you get two takes, generally. You know if you’re half-way through your second take and you’re not happy with what you’re doing, you have to do some really bad thing so you’ll get a third take: the strategy for a low-budget screen-actor. A stunt-guy told me that: if you’re going to screw it up, really screw it up. Oddly enough, I find myself that I’m respectful of what other directors do; I find generally I’m the most supportive person of the director on the set, because I just want them to have their chance in every way. Mike Figgis – I went up for an audition and he said, “Look you don’t have to read,” when I came in, and he gave me this small part in Leaving Las Vegas, which was fun. I walked into the scene; it was a lot more intimate than certainly the lines had indicated… and I think the two actresses and myself got a real surprise - none of us knew each other, and the scene becomes more intimate; that took ten hours, that one line.

A: Mucking that one up on purpose?

V:That was certainly not my intention. But it was fun. The actresses in that scene I had in the opening scene of What Dreams May Come, in the paediatrician’s office: she’s the kid’s mother, and she’s been in a lot of films. What was that Ridley Scott film about the two women that go on the road–?

S: Thelma and Louise.

V: I had quite a good part in that. I did another part in another film by Mike Figgis, and the main thing about it - One Night Stand - is I feel it makes me more empathetic with my actors and more available to them and it keeps me on my toes, it forces me to work on accents, it forces me to be somewhat more knowledgeable about them as a director. I used to do improvisation when I was 15, in classes – I found I’d done just on 2 years’ worth of them at 3 hours a week; but this is not like before, this time I was really putting myself in the front line; it’s scarey.

S: Is there any contemplation of you doing something like Clint Eastwood and Kenneth Branagh where you direct and star?

 V:I thought of doing that; I don’t know if I’d ever do it now. If I maybe got into it another 5 years ago, maybe I would. I don’t see myself with those inflated— in that illustrious company.
 
Continued...

  © 1998

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