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It’s said that the original pitch for this film was to feature pirates, could you tell us about that?
Jeffrey Katzenberg (JK): I don’t remember that.
Sam Fell (SF): It was before we got to you when we were just kicking ideas around. In truth it wasn’t going to be pirates, it was just where we started.
JK: You mean we had Pirates of the Caribbean before them?
SF: We did!
Shane Richie (SR): Not quite the same set in Bristol, but the idea was there!
What was the thing about this pitch that grabbed you?
JK: There’s a great long tradition in animation about mice and rats that has become quite popular. I think the thing for this film that was very compelling was the design of the characters, the look that came from Aardman. I think Aardman is incapable of designing a character that isn’t charming no matter what it is. An aardvark would be charming when designed by Aardman. They have a way of putting a smile on our faces. So I think from the outset I thought it was a very clever story and to take the great look and sensibility of Aardman and use state of art computer animation to make this movie was both a challenge and an opportunity for us.
Sam - Aaardman is now almost a British iconic title and you’re obviously all very proud of British roots because the film is redolent with British imagery – was that always there from the beginning?
SF: Oh definitely, we always wanted to make it a tribute to London more specifically – we wanted to build London under London – a sort of mini version of it. That was a central idea from the beginning. We’ve stuffed it full of mad, little references to British culture, but we’ve made sure it works on lots of levels for everybody and there’s plenty there for people who don’t get it. But we got our favourite Larry Grayson tribute joke in there and stuff like that. It’s a love letter to London.
Dave, at one point it was impossible to make a film like this because of the amount of water involved. How come you managed to get water so successfully? Is it through the development in animation of tackling that problem by developing new software?
Dave Bowers (DB): Well, I think we were very lucky to have an incredibly talented effects crew in Glendale where we made the movie. They produced a really amazing, quite stylised, not 100% realistic, but a kind of Aardman CGI version of water which is what we wanted.
Shane - at what point did you realise the volume of work necessary and the fact you had to come back months afterwards for more recording sessions and hit the same level?
SR: I’ve never done something where the process takes so long. For me it seems the best part of eighteen months. At least. And that was one studio day. But I enjoyed the process. A lot of actors say they find it quite daunting being on your own in a studio, but I found it quite liberating after doing some of the stuff I’ve done in the past, being surrounded by a lot of actors. The strange thing for me was being filmed. I was never aware that you got filmed when you’re doing animation. Of course I was quite animated when I was doing it, wanting to get into the part. Then four months later you’d come back and they’d show you very early animation of what you’d done and you’d go ‘wow, that’s me! That’s me up there.’ So I enjoyed seeing it all come together like that. Then once you see it in the cinema in its entirety then you go ‘wow, that really is me’.
Hugh - you’ve been self-deprecating about your efforts in this movie. You said you didn’t get to grips with the whole voice thing to begin with and you weren’t all that happy with what you were doing in the early days…
Hugh Jackman (HJ): I think it took me, without trying to sound unfairly modest or whatever, about three or four sessions before we really found the character. And the character did change. The character originally had servants – these hamsters called Gilbert and Sullivan who I really loved – and he was more of an upper class toff, a little snobby. It just took me a little while. I remember the session when we went in there and I was like ‘ah, I got it now’ and we ended up going back and revoicing most of the stuff we did even if there weren’t changes. If you think about it, it’s a character like any other. With animation on one hand you have the freedom to go in there, flick the switch and you’re away. From the first second you’re recording and I think the guys were really helpful – all the guys – in finding who this character was and for me to really make it my own. Then we sort of went back and got into it. But I really enjoyed it. It’s fair to say it was more challenging than expected. Sometimes I remember getting some notes like ‘we need this scene with more of this emotion coming through’ and I’m like ‘wow, I thought I was doing that’. But you get used to film where you have so much more available to you to convey thoughts and emotion. I loved it, I did find it challenging but I remember laughing a lot. In terms of the look, my son is six and a half and he knows exactly what animation is, what live-action drama is and that sort of thing - and he looked at me about halfway through the movie and said ‘that is you daddy isn’t it? That’s not animation.’ I was slightly depressed about that!
SF: He did become more and more like you as we went on actually. It was so wonderful because you were so patient and endlessly optimistic every time you came in and you really helped us find him too. I think that was the real breakthrough, when we decided he was actually more like you than we originally thought.
HJ: I’m really like a pet rat. That’s really who I am. It was like therapy to me.
Shane, you said you saw a lot of yourself in it, but how did you find playing your character?
SR: I just shouted a lot. When they first approached me I had this great vision of steeping away from anything Cockney or being a Londoner and I thought ‘ok, Sid. Sidney in Kensington – right. Okay, my name is Sidney and I’m a rat from Kensington.’ They said ‘no, no, no that’s not what we want you to do Shane.’ Then they showed me this picture of a dirty, big, fat rat with buckteeth and a quiff. I knew what they were looking for then. First up I was doing a lot of shouting wasn’t I? Then they said ‘try and pull it back a little bit’ and I went ‘okay’. Then, like anything, after a while you get to see the early animation and you go ‘ahh, I see what you’re doing now'. I remember Hugh said there were another two characters that were servants and Sid did quite a bit with these two, but sadly it’s been cut. But it will be available on DVD!
SF: There’s a great tradition now for putting good comic actors in front of a microphone for animation and letting rip and being spontaneous and make stuff up.
SR: There was a lot of improv wasn’t there? There’s an adult version which you’ll love!
Hugh, was the likeness of your character to Prince Charles intentional?
HJ: You see, that’s another part of me I didn’t realise! That I’m quite like Prince Charles.
SF: Well he’s upper class isn’t he?
HJ: But no, there’s no intentional reference, unless that helps you guys! I think Roddy thinks of himself as more of a James Bond. In the beginning he has this great life, he’s surrounded by this cool sort of car and Barbie is his girlfriend, he plays volleyball with G.I. Joe…
SR: Action Man! Please, come on. G.I. Joe? Of course it’s Action Man!
HJ: You see it’s Action Jackson in Australia.
SR: Action Jackson? They’ve brought a Michael Jackson doll out now?
Dave and Sam – how did you find taking on the role of director in your first feature film? And who was responsible for the slugs?
SF: To be honest it’s a joy to be given such a big canvas and the amazing facilities of Dreamworks – all the CGI people – and to be able to work with top acting talent. So it’s just like a dream come true.
DB: We’re very lucky to have such marvellous resources at our disposal. It’s a huge job as well and was great working with Sam. We spent most of our time trying to make each other laugh and hopefully that’s reflected in the movie.
SF: The slugs just got bigger and bigger. There was one joke with one slug. Then we thought ‘can we push this?’ so we kept sticking some more in. I think it was Nick Park who suggested ‘why don’t you make them sing?’ So we did that and kept doing more and more and more slug stuff. We thought we’d get sick of it but we didn’t.
DB: We were a hair away from calling it Slug: The Movie.
SF: It’s going to be the big pet for Christmas, we predict.
Jeffrey, what was your input during the process of making of this film?
JK: Truthfully, the team were on a great track from the outset of this. The movie was a pretty happy production and I think that in the process of previewing a movie you learn, because the audience talks back and I think there were things that surprised us in how well they work – the slugs are a perfect example of that. And also in terms of adjusting along the way. Some of the adjustments that were made to Hugh’s character when we got feedback. You know, how to give the audience the best ride…
HJ: He’s being self-deprecating. By the way I’m one of those actors that if you want to give me a line reading then I’m totally all for it. A lot of actors get very offended by it but I’m thrilled. With these guys I’d sometimes say ‘how should I say this line – I have no idea?’ And I remember one occasion – we did sessions at like 8 o’ clock in the morning on Sunday. Jeffrey was there – there’s not many people in his position who turn up at 8 o’ clock in the morning on Sunday – and he came in with some great line readings. There’s an actor in there.
Can you compare and contrast working at Bristol and Glendale and tell us what you missed most about working away?
SF: I missed the glamour of Bristol really. The babes and the weather. And the roller-blading. Strangely, when you do animation you tend to spend most of your time indoors with people that are obsessed by detail and it’s the same in Bristol as it is in Glendale. So it wasn’t quite as glamorous. When I first heard that we were going to go over there and do it I thought ‘great, I’m going to be a big-shot Hollywood director’ and I had my big swimming shorts and my martini glass all packed. But Glendale’s a bit more like Slough I suppose.
DB: Things move more quickly in Glendale. When we were working on Wallace and Gromit and Chicken Run it was quite leisurely, but working in Glendale is like being strapped to the front of a train shooting across the country at a thousands miles per hour.
SF: I never counted on the American work ethic actually. It was quite shocking. They have this massive ball of flame in the sky that seems to power them on. It was quite exhausting really.
Next thing you guys will tell us is that you stopped for tea...
SF: I had tea shipped over and I always had my pockets full of bags of PG Tips so I was ready to make a cup of tea at any moment.
SR: They insisted I send them Albert Square signs!
Hugh, you sing a couple of songs in the movie and I was wondering if the Tom Jones one was a favourite of yours?
HJ: I think he’s great but, erm, we tried a couple of songs actually – one which I didn’t even know. So I wouldn’t say I’m like a die-hard fan but I think he’s amazing. It was great fun to do it. The thing I loved about the singing is that the guys were like ‘just have a go’. The thing is that someone turns on the switch, you have a go and even though it’s Sunday morning at 9.30 you think ‘well, this will never be in the movie.’ Then I’ll actually go and see it and think ‘holy crap, that was at 9.30 in the morning! I’ve got to go and redo this!’ The thing about playing Roddy, a pet, is that it doesn’t have to be like Michael Crawford.
Hugh and Shane – you are both steeped in classical musical theatre. If you could pick a musical that you could perform in the West End for four months what would it be?
HJ: You sound like a producer!
SR: There’s talk of me doing something.
HJ: Are you doing the talking?
SR: I was doing Grease or Boogie Nights when you were here doing Oklahoma and we spoke briefly about musical theatre and what great standing it keeps you in as an actor, you know, nine shows a week. There’s talk of doing Willy Wonka and turning it into a stage musical, which my name’s been attached to for not next year, but the year after. I’d kind of like to do something like that. Something new. I’m too old for Grease!
HJ: I’d kind of like to do something new to but I think that if I was doing one of the classics it would be Carousel.
Hugh, when you started out, in your wildest dreams did you think you’d be standing on top of a 25 foot inflatable toilet in Leicester Square?
HJ: When I started out I was trying to make ends meet by being a really average, bad clown at kids party and when I finally went to a six-year-old kid’s birthday party and the kid stood up and says ‘mummy, this clown is crap’ and so I used to juggle eggs and occasionally smashed them. So I got out the eggs and said ‘guys, do you want to just throw eggs at me?’ You know, just to keep the parents happy. They said ‘yeah, cool, that’s great.’ So really, going down a toilet is probably a step up. I actually had a blast doing it. It was great fun. Wasn’t it?
SR: He was stood at the top and said ‘right mate, let’s do a somersault.’ I thought I can’t let him do it and me not do it. When I hit the bottom I thought I was going to throw up.
HJ: But having kids, seriously, it is an absolute thrill to do a movie, and I’m not being facetious at all here, when I was in the theatre with my son, sitting next to him – the look on his face – and he said to me it was his favourite movie ever and he can’t stop talking about it. And he was watching the thing and just kept looking at me, it was probably one of the great moments for me in the business. He absolutely adores the movie. If anyone’s got kids here, you know that if your kid likes a movie you’re seeing it a hundred times. They watch it over and over again. And this is one of those movies where there’s a lot in it for adults. I find it very funny.
Sam and Dave – do you think animated movies have become stale of late?
DB: I don’t know if animated movies have become stale. There have been an awful lot of animated movies lately, but when we were making the movie we weren’t concerned in any way and tried to make the best movie we could for ourselves and we think it does stand out. It certainly looks different from the other movies that are out there. The humour is different to the other movies.
SF: I think there’ll be a great future for the animated feature in that this year has been interesting because a number of them have landed in similar places, in similar styles of story and similar types of characters. But there’s a lot of amazing invention in this industry and I’m sure people will be looking for new and different stories and to spread out and make more diverse things in the future. So I think it will be great.
DB: I think animation is healthy and people want to see it. Animation has made a lot of money this year.
Hugh and Shane – what attracted you to the project in the first place?
HJ: With most movies you get a script, but the way I recall it is that I had a phone call from Jeffrey and I knew it was DreamWorks, who I think are the best in America at doing animated movies and I’d been a huge Aardman fan since – in fact I felt I discovered them, I used to give out videos of their shorts to people since I discovered them on TV in the early nineties. Obviously I hadn’t discovered them as they’d won Academy Awards by this point! But it took me about three seconds to say ‘yes’. So that was really the attraction for me.
SR: What attracted me was when they said you can have a week in LA and get out of Albert Square for a while. Lovely! I’m a big fan but I didn’t know much about Wallace and Gromit other than my kids playing with the memorabilia which goes for a fair price at fairs now. But I was a big fan of Creature Comforts which I loved very much – I’ve got the DVDs. And when they said it’s DreamWorks, you just go ‘wow’. How can you say no? So I ended up paying them! Which I need to talk to Jeffrey about later…
Flushed Away is in cinemas across the UK now.
