I don't do interviews, so you'll pardon the messy edges. But I was lucky enough to attend a screening of Young Adult (review) two weeks ago where writer Diablo Cody and actor Patton Oswalt were in attendance. Long story short, I ended up getting some phone time with Ms. Cody, in what was supposed to tie in with that rambling essay I wrote on Wednesday. Anyway, thanks to a slightly curtailed time and my desire to talk about the movie itself, the questions below mainly deal with Young Adult. Point being, I asked her half-a-dozen questions and got half-a-dozen worthwhile answers, all of which are paraphrased to the best of my ability unless there are actual quotes. Just don't look for a pattern or any narrative coherence. My fault, not hers, and if I do this again I'll be sure to get a phone recorder that actually works. But here we go...
As usual, it's harder to import audio files than video files, so you'll just have to click on the photo to go straight to the /Film site. But I did about an hour worth of chit-chat with the fine folks at Slashfilm, where we discussed Scream 4 both as a stand-alone film and as part of the series. My part comes in right at the 44-minute mark and continues right till the end. The first half of the discussion is spoiler free, while the second half dives into pure spoiler territory. As usual, I sound a bit nasaly and you can tell that I recorded this in my office. This will likely take the place of a spoiler-filled essay on Scream 4, since most of the points I wanted to cover are discussed in this hour of discussion. Enjoy...
A review of this title will be coming very soon. But in the meantime, here is a transcript of the Comic-Con session with actor Kevin Conroy that Warner Home Video has provided.
Kevin Conroy returns to seminal role as the definitive voice of Batman in Superman/Batman: Public Enemies. Batman: The Animated Series star reunites with Tim Daly and Clancy Brown brings in all-new DC Universe Animated Original PG-13 Movie for distribution Sept. 29 While the debate rages among fans over who might be the best live-action actor to play Batman, there is no such controversy when it comes to the voice of The Dark Knight – Kevin Conroy stands unchallenged for that title.
As the voice behind the landmark series Batman: The Animated Series, Conroy set a standard that has cast a wide shadow over any other actor attempting to fill the role for nearly two decades. Conroy once again dons the animated cowl for the September 29 Warner Home Video release of Superman/Batman: Public Enemies. So pleased with his return to the role is Conroy that he made his first appearance in six years at Comic-Con International this past summer to promote Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, and the crowd greeted their beloved Batman voice with multiple standing ovations. For those fans that couldn’t hear Conroy’s words in person, here’s the recap of a chat with the actor during that weekend…
QUESTION: You’ve been doing this role for nearly 19 years. Are there still challenges to doing the voice of Batman?
KEVIN CONROY I guess the biggest challenge to doing any kind of animation voice work is that you only have your voice to tell the story. And you want to keep it real and you don't want to get cartoony, especially now because the audiences are much more sophisticated. Anything over the top is going to read over the top. So it's a very fine line that people walk. For Batman, I think the biggest challenge is the timber of the voice that I established early on. I just kind of improvised it and it stuck. It's very deep in my register – very throaty – and whenever it gets emotional, it’s a difficult sound to create with a lot of volume technically without blowing your chords out. So there's all kinds of tricks you learn along the way of how to produce a sound, how to produce it without injuring yourself, and how to juice it enough. It's a delicate, funny balancing act.
Recording Superman/Batman: Public Enemies was actually easy because of the cast that Andrea (Romano) put together. Tim (Daly) and Clancy (Brown) – all of us have worked together a lot over the years, and there's a real shorthand when you're dealing with people who have done a lot of it and know what they're doing. Which is really a pleasure. Andrea doesn't have to say very much for me to know what she wants.
QUESTION: What do Tim Daly and Clancy Brown bring to their respective roles?
KEVIN CONROY: Tim brings to Superman that strong voice, but there's also a real humanity to Tim as an actor and that really comes through. So there’s strength but there's a great sensitivity, and that's unique about his take on Superman.
Clancy is great at being crazy. He's a very talented actor. He's got that great sound, that resonate voice. And yet when you've got that kind of power under you, you can afford to be very casual with it. It makes his sinister quality so much more frightening when this guy with this voice is just being very debonair.
QUESTION: What can people expect to find different about Superman/Batman: Public Enemies than most crossover stories?
KEVIN CONROY There's definitely more humor in this because of the relationship they've created between Superman and Batman. It was really fun doing it with Tim because it almost became like a buddy cop kind of thing. There are not a lot of people that Batman can fool around with like that – that can take it and can dish it back. So I really enjoyed that aspect of the script.
QUESTION: Batman and Superman have all these amazing foes. And yet Lex Luthor has no super powers. What makes Lex a great villain, and how does Clancy make him greater?
KEVIN CONROY: Actors always want to play the villain – they’re a lot more fun. Think about it. The hero is just about being a good guy and, in life, we all want to be good guys. But when you're playing at something other than yourself, it's fun to do what is taboo. I played Edgar in a production of King Lear that John Houseman directed for Lincoln Center. Edgar is the good son in Lear and it's probably the hardest role in the play. I thought I did a pretty good job at it – although one critic was particularly unkind. Years later, I did a production at the San Diego Shakespeare Festival of Lear and I played Edmond, who is the force of evil throughout the play. The plot really revolves around Edmond's machinations. It was so much more fun to play Edmond because of the joy he took out of being evil. This guy is planning the downfall of his family, and laughing about it, and delighting in it. And it was a real blast to me. A couple years earlier I was busting my back for Houseman, doing Edgar every night, working so hard on a role that the audience doesn't care about. They want to cheer Edmond and how evil he is because it's so much fun. Clancy brings that joy to Luthor and the more ease he does it with, the more frightening it becomes. And he's really good at that.
QUESTION: So what does Kevin Conroy bring to Batman?
KEVIN CONROY I guess I am basically most comfortable when I'm alone. As a kid, I was very much a loner. I love long distance running and long distance biking. A director once pointed out that those are all very isolated exercises you do for hours at a time. I think Batman taps into that quality of me, because my initial take on the character was that Batman wasn't the performance. Bruce Wayne was the performance. Batman is where he's most comfortable. The cave is where he's most comfortable. And he puts on this persona of incredible sophistication to be able to deal with the world just like I think everybody puts on a mask to deal with the world. Everyone has a private self and a public self. With him, it's taken to a real extreme. And I think I related to that aspect of him. I am basically a pretty shy person – I think a lot of actors are. That's why they get into acting – because it's easier to be free emotionally when you're pretending to be someone else than to be free emotionally when you have to be yourself. And I think Bruce has the same problem.
QUESTION: Is there still a cool factor for you to be the voice of Batman?
KEVIN CONROY Oh, yeah. It’s something that I'm reminded of a lot from people who enjoy the show. That's a very cool thing. I don't ever take for granted how cool a job it is and how lucky I am to have landed in it. It was the first animation job I ever auditioned for – and it just happened to all come together so well. But it was just pure chance.
QUESTION: Were you a comics reader as a kid?
KEVIN CONROY I had an interesting childhood in that my parents were older. I was a late child, and they were children of immigrants. So the connection of the family to Ireland was very close. I have an Irish passport – I went to school there a bit when I was younger. So my parents were very old world, and they grew up during the Depression. They were kind of like my friends' grandparents – my family kind of skipped a generation that way. I was put in very conservative Catholic schools – the nuns had habits to the ground, and the boys and the girls were separated. It was very old school. And comic books just weren't allowed. It just wasn't part of my world. I didn’t read them because I didn't like them – I didn't even know about them. (he laughs). Comic books weren’t part of the planet that I was raised on. Of course, once I heard about them, I liked them a lot. (he laughs)
QUESTION: Do you have a collection of Batman paraphernalia?
KEVIN CONROY: I'm no dumb actor (he laughs). Do you remember the Warner Brother stores? One of the most lucrative parts of those stores was the galleries – they ran them like real art galleries. They'd have people who did the voices come in and do so signings, and when they asked me, I said, “Do I get some kind of compensation?” They were trying to get us on the cheap, but I thought there had to be something to make it worth my while. I said “Why don't you give me a cell?” And they said “Oh, that's a great idea.” So I said, “Why don't we make it two?” (he laughs) And so I started doing appearances at the stores and my compensation was two cells – and now I've got about 60 or 70 cells. It's very cool. I have a great apartment in New York and they're all on this wall. Everyone who walks into that apartment turns into a 12-year-old boy. They all walk in and say, “Oh. Wow. Cool.” And it is. (he laughs)
QUESTION: What makes Batman the greatest super hero?
KEVIN CONROY Oh, that's easy. The thing that makes Batman unique as a super hero is that he has no super powers, and the darkness of his personal story. Everyone relates to having a personal dark story – his is just much more dramatic than most people's. Everyone is handed adversity in life. No one's journey is easy. It's how they handle it that makes people unique. Batman took adversity and turned it into something enormously powerful and positive without any superpowers.
For more information, images and updates, please visit the film’s official website.
You know the drill... WB PR sends these interviews out, I post them for you. Previous interviews are with Victor Garber, director Lauren Montgomery, Juliet Landau, screenwriter Alan Burnett, and Michael Madsen. This new one is with actor Michael Madsen, who will be playing Kilowog. Green Lantern: First Flight will be released in a single disc DVD, two-disc DVD set, and a Blu Ray (plus OnDemand) from Warner Home Video on July 28th. Next up is a chat with voice-directing goddess Andrea Romano. Enjoy...
Andrea Romano knows how to pick ‘em.
For Green Lantern: First Flight, Romano – arguably the best known casting/dialogue director on the animation scene for more than 25 years – has brought together a pair of voiceover novices in the lead roles, along with assorted veterans of feature film and primetime television, including an 82-year-old character actor whose screen appearances date back to Mighty Joe Young.
Romano has been one of the driving forces in animation voiceovers for more than a quarter century, her credit list reading like the honor roll for the Saturday morning cartoon Hall of Fame. From dramatic (Batman: The Animated Series) to silly (Animaniacs), contemporary (The Boondocks) to timeless (Smurfs), Romano has set the standard for matching actor to character with absolute savvy. Along the way, she has become a household name to legions of animation fans. The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences has listed her name 20 times among their annual nominations, Romano taking home six of those Emmy Awards – and promptly attiring those statuettes in Barbie clothes. It’s a Romano tradition. Green Lantern: First Flight, an all-new DC Universe animated original movie, is set for distribution July 28, 2009 by Warner Home Video.
Somewhere between recordings for new DC Universe films and her weekly chores at the helm of sessions for Batman: The Brave and the Bold, SpongeBob SquarePants and The Boondocks, Romano found a few moments to discuss the casting and performances of the voices within Green Lantern: First Flight. Fortunately, she speaks very quickly …
QUESTION:
Did Christopher Meloni’s rave reviews as a detective on Law & Order: SVU lead you to casting him as the ultimate space cop, Hal Jordan?
ANDREA ROMANO:
Given the age range and the character type, and the fact that he is a very good actor, I thought Christopher Meloni would be the right voice. His voice has a nice strength and honesty to it, and his acting is really wonderful.
This is a role that requires the character to come off as very smart, but he also gets duped when he probably should’ve have seen it coming. That’s a tough tightrope to walk, but I found Christopher so incredibly believable. Every note in his acting was true, and real, and organic, and believable. He had not done much voiceover, if any, but he learned so fast that he sprang forth fully formed. He had it down. I don't think he ever had a technical problem.
QUESTION:
From Broadway to primetime to major motion pictures like Titanic and Milk, Victor Garber has quite the resume. What made him right for Sinestro, and how did you talk him into doing his first voiceover for animation?
ANDREA ROMANO:
I have known Victor Garber's work since Godspell, and there have been several connections over the years. Carl Lumbly played J’onn J’onzz for us on Justice League while he was doing Alias with Victor Garber, and I tried many times to hire Victor to do an episode with Carl as a fun crossover – but he was never available. I had met Victor a few times and I met him again at Diedrich Bader's surprise birthday party. We spoke about him coming to work for me again, and this time his schedule worked out.
Sinestro needed to be elegant. There are many, many different Green Lanterns – some females, some male, some alien, some looking more human. They’re all different. This particular Green Lantern – Sinestro – is a bad guy. But we, as audience members, are not supposed to know that he’s a bad guy in this particular film. So I needed someone who could seem egotistical and strong, but not tip us off that he’s got an ulterior motive all the way through the piece.
Victor hit every note perfectly. There was a musicality to his delivery. You don’t even have to tell someone like Victor Garber to do that – he just naturally finds the vocal music and brings it to the character.
QUESTION:
Were you at all worried about casting two actors who had not done voiceovers for animation, and having them record together?
ANDREA ROMANO:
You would have thought they had worked together for years and years. They play well together, and it was a dream for me. When you're a casting director, you never really know how it's going to work out until you're in the room doing the gig. This was one of those instances where I thought, “I know what the heck I'm doing!”I actually cast exactly the two right actors – they were perfect for the roles. They knew exactly what they needed to do and they did it. And they had fun in the process.
We struck this nice combination of Victor Garber playing this sort of duplicitous, sophisticated, elegant, eloquent guy and Christopher Meloni playing this kind of not necessarily blue collar, but much more down to earth, real guy that your everyman can relate to. Putting them together and having them play off each other was wonderful. Absolutely wonderful. I sat in that recording session and smiled. They needed me fix and finesse a few things here and there, and explain certain bits of action. But as far as the acting beats, I didn’t have to tell them one thing. For the most part, I just got out of their way – because they knew exactly what they were doing.
QUESTION:
Michael Madsen is another voiceover novice, but that voice is made for character animation. What prompted you to cast him as Kilowog?
ANDREA ROMANO
Kilowog is an alien Green Lantern, and we really wanted a voice with texture and character and some edges to it; a voice that sounded gruff and big and strong, but also smart. I did not want someone who sounded like a big dopey guy. For years and years, I wanted to hire Michael Madsen and this was just the perfect marriage of role, actor and availability.
It’s a lot about availability, and Michael is a great example. He hadn’t done any animated roles before Green Lantern, and yet when I finally got him in the room, we found out how much he had wanted to do it and, now, how much he loves doing voiceover work. He loves this whole world of animation, and characters like Batman and Superman.
You need an actor who has an enthusiasm for the project, for the role, and for the process – and Michael was there, in the moment, he understood, and wanted to do more takes than we needed. That is very generous and brought some really beautiful texture. I love those raspy, deep, dark voices – that sound that tells you that there’s been some life experience there, whether it’s been smoking cigarettes or drinking booze or just living. I don’t think I’m the only person that responds to that kind of voice with character. That’s a voice that's lived.
QUESTION:
And how was the final member of your lead quartet, Tricia Helfer as Boodikka?
ANDREA ROMANO:
We really needed Boodikka to be smart, sexy and strong. Tricia Helfer was interested and available and we were lucky to get her. She is such a very nice person, and such a good actress – especially for this kind of piece. She really understands it. She’s big in the Sci-Fi world, and she gets it. She plays this character so that you never know what twists are coming. You think it’s very straightforward and then something happens and you’re surprised because she never tips it off ahead of time. She was spot on with her performance and I loved working with her. She was just a joy.
You know the drill... WB PR sends these interviews out, I post them for you. Previous interviews are with Victor Garber, director Lauren Montgomery, Juliet Landau, and screenwriter Alan Burnett. This new one is with actor Michael Madsen, who will be playing Kilowog. Green Lantern: First Flight will be released in a single disc DVD, two-disc DVD set, and a Blu Ray (plus OnDemand) from Warner Home Video on July 28th. This is a pretty lengthy interview, but it's also a pretty entertaining read, delving into his early life and career in general. Enjoy.
QUESTION:
What did you see in Kilowog and how did you try to portray those characteristics?
MICHAEL MADSEN:
I liked the idea that Kilowog was forceful, yet has a gentle nature. I’m often thought of as playing villainous characters in movies.Everyone forgets that I was the father in Free Willy – they only like to remember that I cut off a policeman’s ear in Reservoir Dogs. There’s me in the middle somewhere and I think that’s kind of like Kilowog, He’s dangerous, yet he has a heart. That’s what attracted me to the part.Also, I was quite humbled by being asked to play Kilowog in the first place. I don’t often get asked to voice animated characters, and I’ve always wanted to do something like that – it’s great fun for me.
QUESTION:
Do you have a real-life human character that you possibly inspired your portrayal of Kilowog?
MICHAEL MADSEN:
I guess, perhaps, I thought of my father.My father a very forceful man, a bit of a brute, and stubborn. Yet I remember when my first son was born and my father met me at the airport, and I let him hold the boy. I saw a little tear come down from his eye. It was one of the only times I ever saw him break emotionally – and I knew there was something in there.
QUESTION:
Kilowog uses the word “poozer” frequently in describing other individuals in a variety of situations. Can you define that word by Kilowog’s standards?
MICHAEL MADSEN:
I’ve heard that it’s closely associated with somewhat of a bungler or a misfit or someone who’s annoying … to put it mildly (laughs).
QUESTION:
Was there anything particularly special or enticing about playing Kilowog?
MICHAEL MADSEN:
I don’t want to go off here into another planet, but when I was younger, I read a biography of James Cagney and he said that if you ever play a dark character, you need to find something noble within that guy; and if you ever play someone who’s very noble, you need to find something dark within him. Otherwise, your character’s going to be one-dimensional.I knew exactly what he was talking about, even though I was probably about 14, and it’s always stuck with me. Having a character with duality always appeals to me – I never like to do something straight down the road.
QUESTION:
You do bounce between playing the hero and the villain – is there a common thread between those two sides of the coin?
MICHAEL MADSEN:
For a long time, I was pretty much pigeonholed into playing the bad guy. Recently, I did a couple of movies that kind of changed that dynamic. We shot “Strength and Honor” in Ireland and I played an Irish-American prizefighter who unintentionally kills someone in the ring and promises his family that he will never box again.Then he finds out that his son is dying of a terrible illness and the only way to get the money they need is to get back in the ring. I really think it’s one of the best things that I’ve ever been involved in and it gave me a chance to completely go the other way. The guy really has a very deep conscience and an incredible set of values.
Then I did a cop picture with Darryl Hannah called “Vice,” where I played a pretty disturbed guy whose wife is killed and he’s a drunk – he’s a vice cop and he’s just really not in a good mood. And again, it’s one of the best pictures I’ve ever made.So when you take “Strength and Honor” and you take “Vice,” it’s kind of the bookends of Michael Madsen – as a person and, in a lot of ways, of my career. And it’s an interesting kind of a place to be.I don’t know why it took so long, but, little by little, I’m starting to get to play some really interesting parts. Coming in and doing something like Kilowog is part of my moving into a place where I’ve wanted to be for a long time.
QUESTION:
Your sister Virginia Madsen has played in the Warner Bros. animated world several times, including on the last DCU animated original movie, Wonder Woman. Did she offer any tips about recording for the DC Universe?
MICHAEL MADSEN:
Virginia mentioned that she had been around and had a really good time with you guys.My sister was doing singing telegrams when I was stealing cars, so we had a bit of a different upbringing.She had a little head start on me in the business – taking a lot of voice classes and voice lessons and she’s very well studied and did a lot of theater and things I was never able to do. I’m very enamored of her and her talents. I hope she behaved herself and I hope you guys were nice to her. I’m sure you were, or I would have heard about it. Gotta be the big brother, you know.
QUESTION:
Virginia told us that the first time she felt sibling rivalry was when you got a role before she did. Your thoughts?
MICHAEL MADSEN:
That’s true. I went to New York for a while, but ended up in LA. I had 400 bucks and I checked into the Saharan motel. I looked in the newspaper and I got a job at the Union 76 gas station at Crescent Heights and Little Santa Monica, right in the middle of Beverly Hills. I’d watched “The Beverly Hillbillies” on TV, and that’s all I knew about it. I was pumping gas and changing flat tires and driving the wrecker, and everybody came in there – good lord, it was Jack Lemmon and Cicely Tyson, Peter Falk and Warren Beatty. These people would just come in there for gas, and I’d be squeegying their windows, looking in and thinking, “Oh, my God, it’s him.” Fred Astaire came in there on Christmas Eve in a Mercedes with a flat tire. He just got out – he was only about this big (holding his hand chest high) – and he gave me a hundred dollar bill and then just walked away. I was making $2.50 an hour.
What I’m trying to say is, I got thrown into Hollywood without really knowing it. So I finally went for an audition for “St. Elsewhere” and, as I was going to go to work afterwards, I had my Union 76 outfit on – with “Mike” on the chest.I went in and read for the part, and then I went to work. When I got there, my boss says, “Mike, you got a phone call from an agent or something like that – why didn’t you tell us you were an actor?” I’d been there for about nine months, and I was thinking it was none of his business.And then he says, “Listen kid, let me tell you something: you better make up your mind what you want to do, because we need you around here. You know what the chances are of you becoming an actor and being a success in Hollywood?”And I’m like, “Well, I hadn’t really thought of it.”And he says, “About 10 million to 1.” And I said, “Well, thanks for the encouragement.” (he laughs)Anyway, I needed a couple days off to go do the show, so he let me do it.
I do remember that Virginia was not very happy about that, but that was a long time ago and I’ve made about 124 pictures now. I don’t know how many she’s made, but I think being nominated for an Academy Award, well, she’s kind of bumped me off.I mean, she used to be my sister – now I’m Virginia Madsen’s brother.It ain’t over yet though, Virginia (he laughs).
QUESTION:
How did this voice acting experience differ from your past voice over jobs?
MICHAEL MADSEN:
I used to think when you came in to do a voice, you had to make up something with your voice. For this film, I was just myself. I brought my Michael into it.It was a lot easier and it made more sense, and that made the entire experience more natural and I was a little bit more comfortable than I have been in past sessions. For the video game recordings, they always want the tough guy, and there’s nothing fun about it. It’s just one-dimensional. This was work, and I appreciate that. I take acting seriously, and I had a good time working on this film.
QUESTION:
You’re a busy actor working in every genre, but with films like Sin City, Species and Kill Bill, you’ve got a pretty noteworthy cult following within the fanboy arena. What’s your reaction to that devout legion of fans?
MICHAEL MADSEN:
I’ve got a pretty eclectic group of fans.It’s funny, I can walk down the street in New York City or through a shopping mall and if I don’t make eye contact with anybody, I can go anywhere. I stand in line at Subway, and if I’m casual nobody even knows I’m there, nobody bothers me at all.But if I go into a room and look at people or in anyway appear aware of myself, suddenly I’m surrounded by people who want to either take a picture with me with their cell phone or sign an autograph.
I don’t mind that at all, because I consider myself lucky. If I’ve done something on this planet that’s decent enough that someone cares or would want to pay any attention to me at all, that’s great.But it isn’t the reason I got into the business. I read an interview Robert Mitchum did toward the end of his life where he said that acting was an embarrassing and humiliating profession that they pay you to do nothing and, in the end, it all means nothing. I guess it also embodies who he actually was as a person, because he never really took it all very seriously.I do take it seriously and I do think it means something because I’ve had some moments and times in my life that I know the average guy doesn’t have.And I feel very blessed and fortunate for that.
It’s a tricky business and it can be a very weird existence. I’ve had people hesitate to get on elevators with me.I know that if I can walk in a room, there will be people very fearful of me sometimes – just because of the parts I play. I am not a pussycat, but let’s just take a family where the father knows me from “Reservoir Dogs,” and he’s thinking, “Oh, crap, there’s that guy.”And the kid knows me from “Free Willy,” and he says, “Dad, it’s Glen!”And, suddenly, there’s a family dilemma. It’s freaky. I had a guy come up to me in the airport in New Orleans, and he says, “My girlfriend says you’re Michael Madsen, I say you’re not.” Like I said, it can be kind of weird some times.
QUESTION:
A lot of folks don’t realize that you’ve been an active writer of poetry. What’s the essence of your writing?
MICHAEL MADSEN:
I wouldn’t necessarily call what I write poetry.I would say that it’s a social observance.I’ve seen a lot of things and I’ve been a lot of places, and I’ve done a lot of things, I’ve seen certain people do certain things and I’ve been in certain situations and circumstances and I wrote it down.I wrote things on matchbooks, I wrote things on paper bags. I wrote a poem on my leg one time in the back of a taxi in New York City, because I didn’t have paper. When you get a thought, you’ve got to write it down.Funny thing about writing is that, if you’re a film actor and you have to play a role, you get in front of the camera and that’s what you’ve got to do, whether you like it or not. But you can’t just sit down and start writing, you have to have a thought first and it doesn’t always come. But when it does, you’ve got to take advantage of it. You’ve got to write it down. I didn’t intend on writing any books, but I would write about certain things I saw or certain things I remember growing up. Then it all eventually ended up being published in one book, “The Complete Poetic Works” – which is on Amazon, by the way. Gotta pay the rent.
This is the fourth of several interviews with the cast and crew of the upcoming DC Animated Universe feature Green Lantern: First Flight. It's a bit long, but some of my essays have been longer so I suppose I'll humor WB for the sake of getting a screener of this thing when the time comes (Green Lantern: First Flight will be released on DVD and Blu Ray on July 28th). The first interview was with actor Victor Garber. The second interview was with director Lauren Montgomery. The third one was with Juliet Landau. This fourth interview is with writer Alan Burnett (who, along with pioneers Bruce Timm and Eric Radomski, is probably singlehandedly responsible for the success of the DC Animated Universe as we know it). Enjoy.
QUESTION:
What made Alan Burnett the perfect choice to write Green Lantern: First Flight?
ALAN BURNETT:
They had been going through some ideas for Green Lantern stories and none of them were quite working out and I came up with this notion that I thought would be interesting. So, I just pitched it to them in one line. “Have you ever done Green Lantern as Training Day?” with the idea of the Denzel Washington role being Sinestro. They said, “That sounds pretty good – start writing.” And that’s how it began.
QUESTION:
So this is a police story?
ALAN BURNETT:
We’re treating all the sectors of the universe as precincts and there's, I believe, about 3,600 Green Lanterns – one for every precinct. Hal Jordan covers our section. The story is essentially Hal Jordan’s first day on the beat as a cop and he's partnered with Sinestro. He's seeing the universe for the first time, and we get to look at the universe through his eyes. It’s a bizarre place, but it's also pretty recognizable.
QUESTION:
Is there a message within this film?
ALAN BURNETT:
Well, one of the messages is that I like lots of fights (he laughs). I suppose it's the old “Don’t judge a book” thing. Appearances are deceiving. Those who you think might be your greatest friend can be your greatest enemy, and those you might think are of no use to you could be the most important person in your life.
QUESTION:
Did the origin story development of Hal Jordan in Justice League: The New Frontier influence your approach to this first Green Lantern film?
ALAN BURNETT:
I’d originally treated the origin story by going back to the very first Hal Jordan/Green Lantern comic book.But ultimately, my script was about 20 minutes longer than it should’ve been. Bruce Timm came up with the idea of getting the origin done as quickly as possible, so that’s where some cuts were made. Now we get the origin story done before the opening credits, and we leap right into the adventure from there.
QUESTION;
What makes Green Lantern a great super hero?
ALAN BURNETT:
Green Lantern is sort of a unique super hero.When you’re writing his powers, they do seem a bit odd – at times, they’re very sci-fi and at other times very magical. It's like that old saying about the technology being so advanced that it looks like magic. He has a ring that allows him to construct anything he can imagine. One of the tricks to writing about those powers is that, when you come up with something he does with the ring, the audience is expecting to be amazed, but also – and this is odd to say about a comics/science fiction story – they need it to be in context, and it needs to be believable. Hal is also a very colorful character and he’s in the middle of this big soap opera in space. It’s a very involving backdrop that opens the door to telling a million stories with him.He also has one of the great costumes – that great Silver Age suit from the 1950s. He was one of the few, and maybe he was the first flying character, who didn't have a cape.So he has this sleek outfit and it’s very striking.
QUESTION:
What makes Sinestro a great villain?
ALAN BURNETT:
We play Sinestro as sort of the bad half of Hal Jordan.As I was writing them, I figured they were pretty close.They both have distaste for authority.But Sinestro is the dark side of the Green Lanterns – he wants absolute control, while Hal Jordan is more about serving the people. The other thing about Sinestro is that he doesn't think of himself as a villain.He has a plan which he thinks is going to benefit everyone, but unfortunately what this plan does is give him absolute power.And, of course, absolute power corrupts absolutely – and you can see that it's corrupting him even as he tries to wield it.
QUESTION:
When did you first fall in love with comic books?
ALAN BURNETT:
I had read comic books like “Little Lulu” when I was young, but when I was nine years old we took a vacation – and I always saved up comic books for the vacation because it was a long trip from Ohio to Florida.Into my stack that year I got the super hero comics and I particularly remember bringing Batman. Somewhere around Kentucky, I started reading my first super hero comic and it was like I lost my virginity. It was just the most amazing thing. I was suddenly in an adult world that I sort of understood and it was sort of made for me.And I was hooked. I've been hooked ever since.
QUESTION:
Did you have childhood aspirations of writing those comics and cartoons?
ALAN BURNETT:
When I was a kid reading this stuff, I never thought that I'd be writing it. But you know, it’s because I did read this stuff then that I write it now.When I started working at Hanna Barbara in 1981, they were looking for someone to take over the Super Friends show and they knew that I was a big comic book fan.Before that, I don't think the story editors or the writers cared about super heroes. So I have two degrees from college, and they don't mean as much to my career as those four or five really intense comic book reading years between the ages of 9 and 14.
QUESTION:
Who are your greatest writing influences?
ALAN BURNETT:
I have two major influences and it’s kind of strange to say them together, but those would be Alfred Hitchcock and Woody Allen.Hitchcock wasn't a writer, of course, but in a way he was because he sat down with his writers and worked his way through the script with them. I think there’s a lot of Hitchcock influence in some of the action-adventure things I’ve done.It's just little things, certain scenes or actions, that remind me of something he would’ve put in a film. I think Woody Allen has influenced the way I interject comedy into the action adventure.That’s my favorite genre: action-adventure comedy. Like North By Northwest.That’s just a beautiful, beautiful movie, and it’s as funny as it is thrilling.That's my favorite type of entertainment.
