Wednesday, June 25, 2003
Splish-Splash: Rocking out with Ang Lee.
A common complaint about the QV is that I've had this little online newsletter since April and I have not done any posts about producer, screenwriter, and frequent Ang Lee collaborator Jim Schamus. This e-mail was particularly impactful (ha ha):
----- Original Message -----
From: David Tash
To: Quo Vadimus
Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2003 1:48 PM
Subject: your blog.
Hi. I found your blog by doing a Google search. It was ok. Nothing on Schamus? Disappointing. Bye.
--------------------
Ask and you shall receive!
More Ang Lee? Ok! This week's The New Yorker features "Becoming The Hulk," a profile of Lee by John Lahr. Last week, Lee was on that Chuck Rose show talking about his "inner Hulk" and they cut to a clip of of some guy in the sensor suit. At first, I thought nothing of it since it seemed like the standard making-of clip with someone stomping around and growling, pretending to be a big, angry superhero picking up heavy things, holding them aloft, and smashing them on unsuspecting things below, but then I realized: that's Ang. Hulking it up! And here's this from the profile:
[Twice a week for nine months, in sessions that lasted up to eight hours, Lee donned a body suit studded with sensors that allowed computers to read and catalogue his movements, and went through the arduous task of enacting the Hulk's every possible gesture and facial expression. Lee had begun by using other actors, but for key emotional moments he took over the job himself. The work had some side benefits. "I got to yell and let aggression out," Lee says. "It was very therapeutic." Frederick Elmes, his cinematographer, says, "Something inside him allowed him to let go. He would actually roar a little bit, look up at the ceiling and scream. There was one point when he did such a good job that the second take was sort of just for him, because it felt good."]
And one more fun bit from the piece: that band that has most of the guys from GNR, plus the one lead singer that may be less reliable than Axl, recorded a song for the Hulk end credits. Lee attended a studio session where the band were filmed playing this song:
[Eventually, a collection of thin, tattooed, long-haired men of a certain middle age swaggered in. "So how's it going?" a frizzy-haired rocker with leather pants, sneakers, and what looked like a key chain attached to his nose asked Lee. "I hope you're gonna get the song out there," he added. "Gonna sit in with us? Maybe play some cowbells?" Lee smiled and turned to me. "That's Splash," he said. "Slash," his assistant said. While the members of the band performed the song four times with their backs to Lee, and Weiland tried to situate himself as close as possible to the handheld camera, the sound engineer stood at his console, like Little Richard at the piano, his long hair juddering to the drummer's ear-splitting downbeat. Lee seemed unfazed. The next morning, at the scoring studio, where Elfman was quietly making adjustments to the sound, Lee suddenly pushed his chair back, waved his arms, and started bouncing to the music like the Conway Studio engineer. "You're, like, boring," he said to Elfman.]
posted by Linus |
6:33 PM
|
|
|
|
|
