THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2™
Production Information
We’ve always known that Spider-Man’s most important conflict has been
within himself: the struggle between the ordinary obligations of Peter
Parker and the extraordinary responsibilities of Spider-Man. But in The Amazing Spider-Man 2™, Peter Parker finds that his greatest battle is about to begin.
It’s great to be Spider-Man (Andrew Garfield). For
Peter Parker, there’s no feeling quite like swinging between skyscrapers,
embracing being the hero, and spending time with Gwen (Emma Stone). But
being Spider-Man comes at a price: only Spider-Man can protect his fellow New
Yorkers from the formidable villains that threaten the city. With the
emergence of Electro (Jamie Foxx), Peter must confront a foe far more powerful
than he. And as his old friend, Harry Osborn (Dane DeHaan), returns, Peter
comes to realize that all of his enemies have one thing in common: Oscorp.
Columbia Pictures presents a Marvel Entertainment / Avi Arad
/ Matt Tolmach production, The Amazing
Spider-Man 2™. Starring Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Jamie
Foxx, Dane DeHaan, Campbell Scott, Embeth Davidtz, Colm Feore, with Paul
Giamatti and Sally Field. Directed by
Marc Webb. Produced by Avi Arad and Matt
Tolmach. Screenplay by Alex Kurtzman
& Roberto Orci & Jeff Pinkner. Screen Story by Alex Kurtzman
& Roberto Orci & Jeff Pinkner and James Vanderbilt. Based on the
Marvel Comic Book by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko.
The Executive Producers are E. Bennett Walsh, Stan Lee, Alex Kurtzman,
and Roberto Orci. The Director of
Photography is Dan Mindel, ASC BSC. The Production
Designer is Mark Friedberg. The Editor is Pietro Scalia, A.C.E. The Special Visual Effects are by Sony
Pictures Imageworks Inc. The Visual
Effects Supervisor is Jerome Chen. The Costume
Designer is Deborah L. Scott. Music is
by Hans Zimmer and The Magnificent Six featuring Pharrell Williams and Johnny
Marr.
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is not yet rated by the Motion
Picture Association of America. For
future ratings information, please visit www.filmratings.com. The film will
be released in theaters internationally beginning April 16, 2014, and in the
U.S. on May 2, 2014.
ABOUT THE FILM
“It’s hard to be Peter Parker, but
it’s great to be Spider-Man,” says Andrew Garfield, who returns to the role in The Amazing Spider-Man 2™, after launching a new chapter in the
hero’s story in 2012 with The Amazing
Spider-Man™, a worldwide hit that went on to take in over $750 million at
the worldwide box office. “As Peter
Parker, he has all of the same problems that we all have – girl problems, money
problems. But when he puts on the suit,
it’s a massive release. He can
breathe. Spider-Man always knows the
right thing to do – he’s a vessel for good, heroic energy and saving people. He takes joy and pleasure in it, and a
playfulness comes out of him.”
“We wanted this film to be more
playful, more fun,” says director Marc Webb, who returns to the helm. Capturing Peter Parker’s natural wit –
especially as Spider-Man – was one of the keys to the film that Webb wanted to
make. “You look at the comic books and
you see it – his quips, his funniness, his lighthearted qualities. That’s part of what so many people love about
Spider-Man – and certainly what I love about him.”
But it’s not all
fun and games for Peter. His vow to keep
his fellow New Yorkers safe will lead him right into the heart of the most
powerful and important company in New York: Oscorp. The company that once employed Peter’s father
and played a role in his parents’ disappearance now seems to be behind new
enemies that are emerging, all of whom have advanced technology and powers. “The stakes have never been higher for both Spider-Man
and Peter than they are in this movie,” says producer Matt Tolmach. “Spider-Man, because he is facing enemies
that have joined forces against him – all with some connection to Oscorp – and
Peter, because the choices he makes and the promises he tries to keep have real
consequences.”
“In this
Spider-Man film, it’s clear that Spider-Man loves being Spider-Man,” says
producer Avi Arad. “As in all Spider-Man
movies, being a hero clashes with Peter Parker’s everyday life and wishes. A major villain emerges and it is
Oscorp. His life, his father’s life,
Harry’s life and all the villains emanate from this tower of evil. The stakes are higher as Peter finds himself
up against an institution that is all-powerful.”
“Oscorp was built for a single
purpose – to preserve Norman Osborn’s life,” says Webb. “He has a terrible disease, and the wealth of
the company has been used to create the company’s Special Projects division –
crazy solutions to a very simple problem.
But Norman Osborn is not an ethical man, and in Special Projects there
exist a lot of hidden, dark, nasty things that the rest of us do not want to
see unleashed on the world.”
When it comes to
Electro and the Green Goblin – two of the enemies that Spider-Man will take on –
not only do the villains have different motivations for taking on the
wall-crawler, but in some ways, they consider themselves fighting a different
enemy. “You’ve got two guys, one who
hates Spider-Man, and one who hates Peter Parker,” says one of the screenwriters,
Alex Kurtzman. “They want to kill the
same person, but for different reasons.
That’s why the two of them team up – they are driven by their emotions.”
Jamie Foxx, who plays Electro, says
that joining the Spider-Man franchise isn’t quite like taking on any other
role. “It’s a great feeling to come to
work on a Spider-Man movie,” he says. “I
remember the moment I first stepped on to the set and I saw Andrew in the
suit. For me, it was like a moment in
history. We’re doing something that
people really love. It’s a part of our
fabric, part of our culture. That was
very meaningful to me and it was a responsibility I took seriously – in
crafting Electro, I wanted to be a formidable opponent.”
For Webb and his fellow filmmakers,
it was important to keep in mind that even as Spider-Man takes on these
villains, it is the boy behind the mask that makes Spider-Man who he is. “As Spider-Man, Peter thrives on fighting
crime, trouncing bullies and swinging from the high rises of New York – but as
Peter Parker his challenges are more familiar,” Webb continues. “Peter is just a kid who loves a girl. And when Gwen gets an opportunity to fulfill
a lifelong dream, Peter has to confront a difficult truth that we all
understand: that sometimes the most difficult part of loving someone means
letting them go.”
“As always, Peter Parker is trying
to balance being a young man, a boyfriend, and a superhero – he’s trying to
make it all work. He thinks he can have
it all. But life is about having to make
choices and compromises,” says Tolmach. “This
is fundamental to any Spider-Man story.
This is always going to be his dilemma.
And in this movie, events are going to conspire to force Peter to make
some big choices that are not necessarily in his control.”
Though Peter promised Gwen’s dying
father that he would protect Gwen by staying away from her, it’s clear that the
two share a romantic bond deeper than any promise. Simply put, she’s his match, in intellect and
in emotion. “This is what should be a
wonderful moment in Gwen’s life – she’s valedictorian, she’s about to go to
Columbia, she has an offer to go to Oxford – but in the midst of that, she’s
dealing with the loss of her father and trying to find her way with this boy
who clearly has a lot going on,” says Emma Stone, who returns as Gwen Stacy. “I’m so glad that the audience is getting the
Gwen story – it’s so rich and exciting to play.”
Part of the reason the Gwen Stacy
story was so interesting to the filmmakers was that it marked a turning point
in comic book history. The chance to go
back to the comic books, to present that story on the big screen in an
emotionally honest way, was very appealing.
“The Spider-Man movies have paid cinematic reference to this story
before, but we wanted to pay homage to it in a different way,” says Webb. “We’re taking some cinematic liberties, but
we’re going back to the comic books for our inspiration. Amazing Spider-Man #121 is one of the
most profound issues in the canon – profound in the way it affects Peter
Parker. Gwen’s fate directly derives
from the choices of the hero. It’s the
story that allowed comic books to take a more complex turn, and from that, we
were able to give the movie a tone that is Shakespearean or operatic.”
*
* *
Marc Webb returns to the director’s
chair after helming The Amazing
Spider-Man and the indie romance (500)
Days of Summer. Arad says that Webb
has proven that he is a master of all of the aspects of directing that a Spider-Man
film demands. “One of the many aspects
of Marc’s genius is his love of character and storytelling, but he also has a
genuine understanding of how to make an action movie, a big popcorn story,”
says Arad. “He also has the skills and
the ability to make a very large, action-filled Super Hero movie. He never loses sight of what’s happening for
the characters, even in the most crushingly enormous action sequence. And that gives these movies a whole other
layer. Recognizing that at the heart of a Spider-Man movie is the character’s
story has to be in every frame, even the big action ones. Marc’s keen sense of humor gives us the true
Spider-Man story in which we enjoy one of the most famous characteristics of
Spidey. Fun and a funny sense of humor.”
“The superhero genre is built on
creating extremes – physical extremes, but also emotional extremes,” says
Webb. “The thing about Spider-Man that I
most identify with is that he’s not stoic – he’s a kid. I think it’s important for heroes to express
their emotions, to let that flow in a way that is true, and authentic, and
honest. In my films, I like to see
people crack open, when life is at its most brutal but also at its most joyful.”
“At the heart of this film is Peter
Parker’s relationship with Gwen,” Webb continues. “Spider-Man’s destiny is crucial, but it
comes at the expense of Peter Parker’s identity, and that’s a really tricky
thing for Peter to deal with. As Peter
fights the growing specter of Oscorp, the power of which he doesn’t even fully
comprehend, the real difficulty he’s going to have to face is how to handle his
love for Gwen. That’s the most relatable
and important part of the film.”
For Webb, that is what separates
out the Spider-Man films. “Our film has
as much or more spectacle and action as any film out there. It is extraordinary in its scope. But none of that dynamic visual conflict,
action, means anything if you don’t care about the characters. The conflicts that surround Peter Parker create
an incredibly tender, human story about a kid trying to grow up in the
world. We expand that into an epic,
operatic form, but the heart is alive and well, protected, beautiful, funny,
and entertaining in its own right.”
Put another way, Webb says, “Peter’s
powers are only part of his heroism – and not even the most important
part. It’s his character, his integrity,
that makes him who he is.”
For this film, the filmmakers have
turned to the screenwriting team of Alex Kurtzman & Roberto Orci & Jeff
Pinkner – writers who have been responsible for such franchises and
groundbreaking television programs as Star
Trek, Transformers, “Alias,” “Fringe,”
and many others. (The screen story is by Alex Kurtzman & Roberto Orci &
Jeff Pinkner and James Vanderbilt.)
Arad says that the screenwriter trio
brought a new vitality to the franchise. “This movie is very different from any
other Spider-Man movie – different in scope, different in intensity, but most
important, different in humanity,” says Arad. “It’s in the way people really
behave, in the humor – think of the scene in which Peter and Gwen are making
the rules for their relationship. It’s
not about what is said; people fall in love with a gesture. This team of writers created a story of hope,
a story that will relate to all of us and make us wanting more.”
“When we started developing the
story, we talked about where Peter Parker is in his life,” Webb says. “The
writers are brilliant at delving deeply into parts of the character we haven’t
seen before.”
Still, as Kurtzman, Orci, and
Pinkner joined the franchise team, they took care to ensure that their screenplay
felt like part of the same world that was established in the first Amazing Spider-Man film. “We loved that movie for its tone,” Kurtzman
says. “It feels grounded in the real
world, entirely fresh, and yet it didn’t betray at all what Spider-Man is; in
fact, it only enhanced it in a new way.
So our challenge was to live up to that and build it to new and exciting
places. There were so many unanswered
questions from the first movie – that was a real drive for us.”
Pinkner adds, “This movie is very
much a maturing process for Peter – not only in his relationship with Gwen, but
also what it means to go from being a young man to a young adult. One of the things that Peter is going to have
to face is that life is short, and always transient; relationships are coming
and going, and the best we can do is try to enjoy the journey and make the most
of the time we have.”
Kurtzman notes that though the
screenwriters took some liberties in telling the story, some basic elements
from the canon are immutable, and they paid homage to those. “It was an interesting challenge – how do you
stay totally truthful to the spirit and origin of the characters, while also
updating it? We’re standing on the shoulders of giants – we have to honor what
came before. For us, Marvel’s ‘Ultimate’
series helped us a lot – they laid the path.”
ABOUT THE CHARACTERS
Peter Parker / Spider-Man
Returning to the role of Peter
Parker is Andrew Garfield, the BAFTA-winning actor who created a new vision for
the role in The Amazing Spider-Man.
Producer Avi Arad says that the
role is quite complicated. Spider-Man is
capable of so much that Peter Parker couldn’t do, but the heart of the
character is always Peter. “Stan Lee and
Steve Ditko created an incredibly complex character – the actor basically has
to play two roles, Peter Parker and Spider-Man,” says Arad. “But Andrew can do it all – he’s the best
actor I’ve seen in years. He has all of
the humanity, he can create the conflict and the drama, he can even do all of
the stunts that we’ll let him do. He’s
such an amazing young man. To top it all
off, Andrew has both a mental and a physical sense of humor, which is the true
embodiment of Spider-Man.”
Garfield was eager to return to the
role for many reasons – not least of which is the fact that he’s a huge fan of
the character. “I know how important it
is to be a fan. I know what Spider-Man can do for kids – and for people who
aren’t kids anymore,” he says. “For
anyone who encounters the character, who has an affinity for him, it’s so
reassuring when it’s done right. No
matter what problems you have in your life, Spider-Man is there as evidence
that you can get through it – because Peter Parker has all the problems of a
kid, and he’s getting through it, too.
He’s reaching out his hand to tell you it’ll be okay.”
Garfield sees Spider-Man as the
ultimate protector of the underdog. “He
has an overdeveloped sense of responsibility and heroic impulse, but he has
this deeply felt sense of justice,” Garfield explains. “That’s not something you can learn – you’re
born that way.”
Garfield says that the filmmakers
opened up the character much more in this film – harking back to the original
characterization in the comic books. “Peter
Parker trips over his own two feet, but Spider-Man can trip anybody up. He’s a trickster,” says Garfield. “One of the defining characteristics of the
trickster is they turn their enemies’ weaknesses against themselves – rather
than throwing punches and kicks, they are making their opponents beat
themselves.”
To pull it off, Garfield trained
and practiced and studied the masters. “Cal
McCrystal was our ‘Clown Deviser’ – our name for a physical comedy
consultant. There were certain scenes,
certain ideas, that came directly out of conversations that I’d had with
Cal. And I love Charlie Chaplin and
Buster Keaton – I admire that skill. We
had an opportunity to explore that as Spider-Man has the same kind of physical
foolishness.”
Still, even as Spider-Man has to
face the prospect of multiple villains uniting against him, Peter is sorting
out what he’s going to do about the most important part of his life – Gwen
Stacy. Peter hasn’t forgotten the
promise he made to Captain Stacy, but that’s a promise he just can’t keep. “Peter and Gwen are giving it a go,” says
Garfield. “For better or worse, Peter
has an overdeveloped sense of responsibility.
It’s hard for him to live with himself by breaking that promise, but
impossible for him to live without her. He’s dealing with the guilt of a broken
promise, but there’s also a destiny between them that they can’t deny. He’s a
torn, confused young man trying to figure out the best thing to do.”
Gwen Stacy
Garfield was excited by the chance
to re-team with Emma Stone, who reprises her role as Gwen Stacy. “She keeps you on your toes and makes sure
you’ve done your homework so that you can keep up,” says Garfield. “You can throw anything at her and she will
move with it. She’s the most talented
actress I know.”
Stone returns the compliment: “Before
we shot the first movie, I hadn’t seen much of his work. Now I know: he’s capable of so much,” she
says. “It’s an honor to work with an
actor like that. I learn so much by
working with him – he’s incredibly prepared, meticulous, and really brave, all
at the same time. He’s able to bring so much depth to the character.”
“Emma Stone is Gwen,” says
Arad. “The most amazing actress, who
brings the movie charm, love, light, and a spirit of independence. She is the epitome of what we want our women
to be: smart, ambitious, and loyal.”
“Gwen is such a powerful woman, a
powerful character in her own right,” says Tolmach. “She is not waiting around for Peter Parker
to decide whether he can or cannot be with her.
Her dreams are every bit as significant as Peter’s.”
The film opens on graduation day,
with Gwen taking her rightful place as the class valedictorian. “At the end of the first film, Gwen and Peter
broke up – but it obviously didn’t stick,” says Stone. “She has a lot to figure out. She’s set to go to Columbia, she’s got this
great opportunity to maybe go to Oxford, and she’s trying to find her way with
this boy who has a lot going on in his life.”
Stone says that she was excited to
be returning to her role – one of the mythic, most powerful characters in the
canon. “Gwen Stacy is such an important
character in the Spider-Man world,” she says.
“The fate of her character is something everyone loves to talk about and
Marc is really embracing the storyline and telling his version over the course
of these movies. Before my audition for
the first film, I read about her story, and the more I read, the more I wanted
to play her.”
Stone says that Gwen has a much
different outlook on their relationship than Peter does – an empowered
outlook. Gwen is a woman determined to
make her own choices and does not feel the need to be protected by any man,
even Spider-Man. “Peter had sworn to
stay away from Gwen – which she knows – but she’s more open to being with Peter
anyway,” Stone explains. “It’s not just
because they’re in love. Her father
died, but that’s given her a huge awareness of time – that everything is
fleeting. Peter is more conflicted about
it, and there’s a lot of tension between them throughout this movie.”
At the same time, Webb says, there’s
a sense of trouble ahead in their relationship.
“Gwen has her own life to lead,” says the director. “She gets an opportunity to go study in
England. She’s going to be a doctor, she’s
going to save lives. There’s such great
possibility to her life. Peter wants to
let her go – he’s happy for her – but he can’t, because he loves her and that’s
who he is – he’s bound up in her soul, in only the way that teenage love can
bind people.”
Max Dillon / Electro
Set against this love story, of
course, is Spider-Man’s vow to protect New York. As the hero’s greatest battle begins in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, it was
important to the filmmakers to put in his way the toughest obstacle the hero
has yet faced. At the same time, they
wanted a villain deeply rooted in Spider-Man lore: a tragic figure, even
sympathetic in some ways, but one who makes the wrong choices that lead him
into evil and opposition against Spider-Man.
“Marvel villains are also victims
of circumstance. They deal with their issues and pain by doing the wrong
things, hence, becoming villains,” says Arad.
“Although they have their everyday problems like everybody else, unlike
Spider-Man, they cannot tell right from wrong.
Electro is a prime example. Max
Dillon is an underdog, not a villain – you want to feel badly for him. He’s a man who has been ignored his whole
life. But when he becomes Electro, he
wants recognition, at all costs. Electro,
the villain, is taking out his frustration and anger on humanity, specifically
targeting Spider-Man. No good deed goes
unpunished.”
“Spider-Man is
the most visible person in New York – you pit that against Max Dillon, who is
quite literally almost invisible,” Kurtzman explains. “He says, ‘I wish everybody could see me the
way they see Spider-Man.’ He fantasizes
about Spider-Man – even thinking that they’re best friends, based on one
interaction. All he wants is to be
recognized for what he does well – which is what we all want.”
Max was once Spider-Man’s greatest
fan, but, as Electro, becomes his greatest foe.
“No one remembers his name, no one cares if he comes to work, he has no
family, no one to care about or to care about him,” Arad continues. “He has one role model, one friend in his
mind, and it’s Spider-Man. But when he
misinterprets one of Spider-Man’s actions, he feels betrayed. It hardens him. Things fall apart. And he becomes Electro. Max was living in the dark, unnoticed; as
Electro, he’ll take away everyone’s power, and they will know what it was like
to live that way. That’s a great villain.”
“Max is a very, very smart guy, a guy who should be
celebrated for building big things for Oscorp,” explains Jamie Foxx, who takes
on the role. “Max should be getting a
company car and an expense account – and instead, he gets nothing. He resents it, but he doesn’t know how to
react. He’s ready to lash out, but he
doesn’t know how.”
Max finds a way to lash out –
against the very person who was once his idol.
“Spider-Man was the one person who did seem to notice Max, who said his
name,” Foxx points out. “As Max, he
feels that Spider-Man was his friend.
Actually, because of that, he becomes obsessed – pictures on his wall,
that kind of thing. He takes it very
seriously. But later, after Max gets his
powers and comes to Times Square, Spider-Man tries to stop Max from hurting
himself and innocent New Yorkers. Max
feels betrayed by his hero. He tragically misinterprets what Spider-Man is
trying to do. He sees Spider-Man getting
all the glory, at his expense – even though it’s not what Spider-Man
intended. But it doesn’t matter – to
Max, that’s a betrayal.”
Tolmach explains why Jamie Foxx was
the actor that was ideal for the role. “The
character called for someone who could break your heart – a guy who could be
genuinely sympathetic and quiet, a guy you’d bump into on the street and pay no
attention to – the guy who has so much inside but is overlooked by everybody,” Tolmach
explains. “But the character also called
for someone who could embody this powerful force when everything goes terribly
wrong – the alter ego of that quiet, sympathetic man – an extrovert, loud and
bombastic. Jamie Foxx was perfect for
that.”
Continuing, Tolmach recalls Foxx’s
performance in the 2001 film Ali as
part of the reason he was so sure that Foxx was the man for the job. “He played Bundini Brown, a beautifully
soft-spoken, sympathetic, and vulnerable man,” he says. “I always remembered that magical
performance. We’ve all seen Jamie filled
with bravado and his voice is so powerful, and he’s unbelievably charismatic
and funny, but that performance showed the other side. It’s an incredibly rare combination of
qualities.”
Still, before taking the role, Foxx
was counseled by one of his closest advisors about what would be in store for
him as Electro. “When I told my daughter
that I was going to be in a Spider-Man movie, she said, ‘Who are you gonna
play?’ I said, ‘Electro.’ She said, ‘Oh, Dad, you know you’re gonna get
beat up. You know that, right?’”
Harry Osborn / Green Goblin
Joining the cast in the pivotal role of Harry
Osborn is Dane DeHaan, who has turned heads through his performances in such
films as Chronicle, Lawless, Kill Your Darlings, and The
Place Beyond the Pines.
In this vision for the character, Harry is Peter’s long-lost
friend. “Their fathers had been partners
– but when everything went down between Norman Osborn and Richard Parker, and
Richard disappeared, Peter and Harry were split. They haven’t talked to each other in a very
long time – until now,” DeHaan explains.
After years at boarding school, Harry is called
back to New York – to his father’s deathbed.
“He thinks his father is going to say ‘I love you, goodbye,’ but
instead, it’s very different. Harry
finds out he has the same disease that is killing his father, and his father
says, basically, ‘Deal with it,’” DeHaan continues.
“That’s when Peter comes back into Harry’s life,”
says DeHaan. “At the heart of it, they
remember the loving friendship they had as children.”
Harry has grown to be a very different person than
Peter has. “My take going in was that
Harry was a trust fund baby – a hipster New York kid,” says DeHaan. “That’s a very specific place, a very
specific type of person – right down to the way he looks. Harry latches on to his material possessions,
because they are the only things that he’s not afraid of showing – he can use
this materialistic quality to hide what’s on the inside. Marc was very responsive to that, and then,
hearing my ideas, Marc guided me on a specific path to help create Harry.”
That path takes Harry from
privileged trust fund kid to the most menacing villain in New York. In taking the reins at Oscorp, Harry – like
his father before him – marshals the vast resources of the company in an effort
to save his own life. Through his discovery
of Oscorp’s secret lair of Special Projects, he comes to believe that
Spider-Man’s blood is the answer to all his prayers – and that belief becomes
an obsession that eventually leads Harry on a transformation to becoming the
Green Goblin.
“Harry Osborn represents a unique
Peter Parker/Spider-Man classic conflict,” says Arad. “Harry was his best friend, and again, due to
circumstances, Harry becomes an enemy who sets out to destroy Spider-Man. What makes it most difficult is Spider-Man is
feeling the need to help his friend and stop him from becoming this
self-destructive villain.”
“There have been many iterations of
the Goblin within the Spider-Man canon,” says DeHaan. “We did the research about how these
characters have become the Goblin, what the Goblin was. We had a responsibility to honor the material
and to make it our own. Even though we
took some liberties, it was of utmost
importance to honor the classic elements of the Green Goblin that everyone
knows and loves.”
Marc Webb says that in many ways,
Peter and Harry face the same choices – only to have very different responses
to those choices. “Harry is a foil for
Peter,” says Webb. “He’s intelligent
like Peter is. Peter and Harry were both
abandoned by their fathers, though in different ways – one physically, and the
other emotionally. But Harry didn’t have
a May and Ben in his life to comfort him and guide him, as Peter did. And because of that, he’s developed a rasher,
more abrasive quality. That’s how he
endures his life; he’s become a little hardened. They start off as best friends, and end up as
mortal enemies, driven apart by jealousy and rage.”
The sense of betrayal that Harry
feels becomes very personal after Harry comes to think that Spider-Man’s blood
could provide the cure he’s anxious to receive.
“But Peter knows that Spider-Man’s blood turned Dr. Curt Connors into
the Lizard,” says one of the screenwriters, Jeff Pinkner. “If he were to give Harry the same blood, it
might do the same or worse to Harry.
Peter desperately wants to do anything he can to help his best friend,
but his blood might do something far worse than kill him. Of course, Peter can’t explain all of that to
Harry – and even if he could, it’s not clear that Harry would accept that. It’s a real problem for Peter, and
ultimately, it leads Harry to unite with Electro.”
“Harry and Electro form a deal over
their mutual hatred of Spider-Man,” says Kurtzman. “That’s a great moment – two villains who
hate the hero, but for different reasons.
And it results in Harry turning the full resources of Oscorp against
Spider-Man.”
Tolmach says that when casting the
role, DeHaan wasn’t necessarily the first name that Webb and the producers
dreamt up. “We’d seen Dane in a couple
of movies, but we just didn’t know the breadth of his work,” says Tolmach. “But something magical happened. He was wholly original and unique and
different. He forced us to see the
character in a way we didn’t before – an extraordinary way. We were mesmerized. There’s something about his eyes; he has a
searing intensity and there’s enormous heart, but there’s also a lot of pain
and room for darkness. That’s Harry
Osborn.”
“Dane is a fantastic actor. He looks like no one else,” says Arad. “Those eyes are his. He’s vulnerable; he can show you his journey,
or awkwardness, or insanity, or whatever the scene calls for. And he’s a perfect match for Marc Webb, who
often directs his actors to let go and show him whatever comes to mind – Dane
can go haywire and give you scenes that are very different.”
“It was exciting to be cast as
Harry, because it’s such a full, dynamic, crazy arc of a character,” DeHaan
concludes. “I knew it was something I
could really sink my teeth into.”
DeHaan would spend four hours in
makeup and wardrobe to transform into the villain. “The makeup designer, Sarah Rubano, and I
developed together a whole evolution of the makeup,” says DeHaan. “It starts from a pimple on my neck and
starts to spread to his face – something Harry tries to hide but can’t. And
then, once he takes the spider venom in this desperate attempt to save himself,
it accelerates the disease to an almost fatal stage – the same stage that Norman
Osborn is at when he dies. I wore a few
prosthetics – ears and a nose tip – but it was mostly individual sores and
wounds that we fairly specifically chose. I also wore teeth and contacts
– he has the Goblin’s menacing smile and those big eyes. The shape of my
hair pays homage to the purple hood that the Green Goblin wears in the comics.”
Aleksei Sytsevich / The Rhino
As the enemies begin to unite in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, one enemy to
join the sinister cause is the Russian gangster Aleksei Sytsevich. Stopped and sent packing by Spider-Man early
in the film, he returns as a highly mechanized Oscorp invention – the Rhino.
The Rhino was in fact Paul Giamatti’s favorite
Marvel character when he was growing up.
“He’s just brute force, and a little kid loves that sort of thing,” the
actor says, describing the Rhino’s appeal.
“You can just destroy everything, go through a brick wall. The Rhino had that great mean face all the
time and was cool-looking.”
An appearance on Conan O’Brien’s late night talk
show in 2011 led to Giamatti being cast as the Rhino in The Amazing Spider-Man 2. “As
a joke, Conan asked me if I could be in one of the Spider-Man movies, what
would I want to play, and I said the Rhino,” says Giamatti. “I guess Marc Webb saw it, and when they were
coming around to do this one, I met him and he asked, ‘Would you seriously want
to play the Rhino?’ It’s such a weird
fantasy thing – I feel like I’m seven!”
ABOUT THE
SINISTER SIX
Of course, even as Spider-Man takes on Electro, the
Green Goblin, and the Rhino, a sinister new era is just beginning. In The
Amazing Spider-Man 2, moviegoers will receive their first clues to what
Spider-Man’s enemies are plotting against him.
“This movie seal the fate as Oscorp as the tower of evil,
as science at its worst,” says Arad.
“The Sinister Six are the creation of this sinister
organization. These villains are
there to attack humanity. There is
only one hero out there that can stop them, and it’s Spider-Man. One can only imagine what they will do to
stop him so they can have free rein over the city. They are united over their deep hatred
for Spider-Man.”
Tolmach added, “Until now,
we have approached each film as a separate, self-contained entity, but now,
we have the opportunity to grow the franchise by looking to the future as
we develop a continuous arc for the story.”
|
Aunt May
Two-time Oscar® winner
Sally Field reprises her role as Peter’s Aunt May. “She’s Peter’s moral compass,” says the
actress. “She is the one who keeps
things in perspective, but also understands what he’s going through. She’s his
biggest supporter. But she also knows
things he doesn’t – secrets that she’ll share when the time is right.”
ABOUT
THE PRODUCTION AND SHOOTING IN NEW YORK
“New York City always was and always will be Peter
Parker/Spider-Man’s domain – through birth, through growing up, through high
school and the famous Empire State University,” says Arad. “Shooting the entire movie in New York was a
unique opportunity to capture the sights and sounds of Peter’s world. The idea was to use authenticity and make
audiences the world over feel as they themselves are joining in his journey in
the city.”
The
Amazing Spider-Man 2 is the first film in the Spider-Man franchise to
shoot entirely in New York State. “Spider-Man
is from New York City and his story is a story of New York City,” says
Webb. “So to be able to shoot in our
actual locations, instead of doubling it on a backlot, was really appealing.”
In addition to filming on location in New York City
and Rochester, New York, the production shot on stages on Long Island and
Brooklyn – comprising the largest stage footprint ever seen in the Empire
State. In fact, according to the
Governor of the State of New York, Andrew Cuomo, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was the largest film to ever shoot in New
York State.
The film’s production designer, Mark Friedberg – a
New Yorker himself – was especially excited by the prospect of shooting on his
home turf. “I believe in the crews. I believe it brings a lot of energy to our
creative process. And I believe it help
us tell this story – it’s a New York story and we were able to make New York
part of the storytelling. Spider-Man is
a particular kind of superhero for the kinds of people that we are,” he says.
While shooting all over New York, the production
drew thousands of spectators who were eager to spot their local hero in
action. “New Yorkers respond to
Spider-Man with such love and joy,” says Andrew Garfield. “It just gets everyone out. Out of their apartments, out of their houses,
out of their shops, and it gets everyone screaming and dancing. Spider-Man their character. He belongs to them. He belongs to the city. So it felt right to be there.”
“People come from far and wide to see a Spider-Man
movie being shot, because it’s such a New York story, and such a big
production,” adds Emma Stone. “He’s
such a beloved character and you really feel that in the city.”
Garfield also took the opportunity, when he could, to
get out among the New Yorkers. “There was a great moment in between takes. I went and played some basketball with some
kids in my Spider-Man costume,” Garfield remembers. “That was fun for me. I had half an hour to kill and I saw them
playing a pick-up game on the blacktop, so I thought I’d join them. That was really, really fun – one of my
favorite moments…”
Of course, like all self-respecting New Yorkers,
those kids took it in stride. “They were
just like, ‘Yeah, we’re playing basketball with Spider-Man, whatever,’”
Garfield laughs.
Friedberg says that because Peter Parker’s home is
outside Manhattan, moviegoers will experience a rarely seen side of New
York. “New York is not just Midtown – it’s
Queens, it’s Brooklyn, it’s DUMBO, it’s the bridges and tunnels – in fact,
Spider-Man leaves a message for Gwen on the side of the bridge from under the
FDR. There are neighborhoods that don’t
get a lot of exploration on film – places you’d never think to go if you were
only shooting in New York for two weeks.”
And indeed, the film shot all over New York City,
including outside the Hearst Building, which fills in for Oscorp Industries, on
57th Street at Eighth Avenue; at Lincoln Center on the West Side; in
the Bensonhurst neighborhood in Brooklyn; Manhattan’s Flatiron District; Union
Square; Park Avenue; Chelsea; the Upper East Side; DUMBO in Brooklyn; the
Financial District; Throgs Neck in the Bronx; East River Park on the Lower East
Side; Windsor Terrace in Brooklyn; and Chinatown in Manhattan.
Still, some of the city’s most famous sections get
starring roles. In one of the larger
action sequences of the film, Max Dillon, played by Jamie Foxx, newly
transformed into glowing, blue-skinned Electro, wanders through the streets of
Manhattan, amazed by his newfound power to control electricity. Finding that his strength increases as he
drinks in more voltage, Electro naturally gravitates to Times Square – a
location that runs neck-and-neck with the Las Vegas Strip for using the most
electrical power in the U.S.
The production filmed with Jamie Foxx on location
in busy Times Square for one night, while the majority of the sequence was filmed
on the production’s back lot at Gold Coast Studios in Bethpage, New York. “Out in Long Island we built a huge section
of the northern part of Times Square to have as much control over it as
possible,” says Webb. The replica
included perfect copies of the storefronts along Broadway and Seventh Avenue
from 46th to 47th Streets, including Father Duffy Square,
with its red bleachers and TKTS booth surrounded by the bright billboards of
Times Square.
“We all know what Times Square
looks like – it’s an iconic venue. So
even though we were recreating it, it had to look and feel exactly like Times
Square,” says Tolmach. “We built a set
that was literally the size of Times Square, with green screens literally as
large as the screens that you see in Times Square – and we lit it up like Times
Square. The scope was simply enormous.”
The reason for re-creating Times Square – rather
than filming in the real location, one of the most highly trafficked on the
planet – will be clear to anyone who has seen the film. The action involves exploding Jumbotrons,
flying police cars, gunfire and panicked mobs.
“I think New York City is glad we built it and didn’t try and do that to
the real one,” laughs Friedberg.
Other huge sets that Friedberg and his team built
were the various interiors of Oscorp Industries, the story’s mega-corporation
that is in forefront of military and genetic research. At Grumman stages on Long Island, the
production built Norman Osborn’s penthouse office, as well as Oscorp’s Special
Projects Division, while Oscorp’s power plant was built on the Gold Coast back
lot.
In Brooklyn’s cavernous Marcy Armory, which the
production used as a stage, Friedberg and his team built the sleek, three-story
tall Oscorp lobby, filled with authentic artwork on loan from some of New York’s
most prestigious galleries. “The
challenge for us was to built the lobby of what should be a half-billion dollar
building, not using a half billion dollars, and try to make good or interesting
architecture,” the designer says.
ABOUT
THE SPIDER-MAN SUIT
“It’s an interesting idea that you have this
continuing character, and in each and every movie the Spider-Man costume has
been different,” says Academy Award®-winning costume designer Deborah L. Scott,
who designs her first Spider-Man suit for The
Amazing Spider-Man 2.
For this film, Marc Webb chose to move in a more
traditional direction for Spider-Man’s look.
“In the first film, I wanted to treat the suit very realistically – as
if we were asking, ‘How would a kid make this costume?’” Webb says. “We used fabrics and designs that a kid in
Queens would have access to. For
example, the eyes – they were literally made out of sunglasses, because that’s
what he would find. This time around, I
wanted to embrace what they did in the comics – the familiar, warm, iconic
elements that we know from Spider-Man.
And again, the eyes are an important part of that – this time, you can
see how big and friendly those eyes are.
When people interact with that costume, there’s a warmth, a feeling of
safety, a connection that people have – and I think it has to do with those
eyes.”
At Webb’s direction, Scott’s research for the
design of the new suit called for going back to specific comic books. “We were very true to the source material,
the original comics,” Scott continues. “And
then we really wanted to take that and then move into the techniques and things
that we have available to us now to make it a sleeker, cooler version.”
“The eyes in this particular suit were a huge focus
for Marc and the filmmakers,” says Scott.
Now white, and larger than in the last film, the eyes are made of a high
tech plastic with real lenses through which to see. “The shape of them is very iconic,” she says.
“The other thing that was really important to me
was to get the particular colors of red and blue,” Scott describes. Spider-Man’s new suit sports a darker blue
than in the last film, featuring intricate webbing on the front and back.
“There are layers and layers of different kinds of
print effects that were done in the computer first, outlined on the pattern,
screen printed in multiple layers, and everything had to be incredibly precise,”
Scott explains.
DESIGNING
ELECTRO
For the look of Electro, Marc Webb chose to go in a
different direction from portrayed in the comics. KNB EFX Group was brought on to develop the
special effects make-up for the character and Sony Pictures Imageworks added
the visual effects layers that brought Electro to life. KNB EFX Group’s Greg Nicotero spearheaded the
design and Academy Award® winning special effects make-up artist Howard Berger
finalized the look in tests prior to production, and then served as on-set
make-up artists for both Foxx and the Electro stunt double.
To create the make-up, KNB did a series of life
casts and body scans of Jamie Foxx, from which they created positives to then
build three-dimensional sculptures. From
there, the artists explored several possible designs and took direction from
Webb. “It ended up being 21 individual
silicone pieces that we glued to Jamie and his double Clay Fontenot every day,”
Berger says. “It was pretty involved,
but I wanted to keep this quality of the skin.”
Electro has visible veins on luminescent blue skin,
through which electricity, rather than blood, appears to course, while his eyes
are glowing white irises.
A key element in the design of Electro for Berger
was to ensure that the make-up did not hinder the performance of Jamie Foxx,
with whom KNB had worked on Django
Unchained and Ray. “I wanted to make sure that Jamie was
able to do what he needed to do, that it didn’t inhibit his performance in any
way,” says Berger. “We sculpted
everything thin enough so that if Jamie furrowed, you really saw the
furrow. Even though it’s this blue guy
with these crazy lenses, you look at him and you know it’s Jamie.”
At Webb’s direction, Berger also worked closely
with Sony Pictures Imageworks Visual Effects Supervisor Jerome Chen, whose work
would add the electricity effect to Electro’s final look. “We studied
clouds on the horizon and lightning storms that occur within clouds,” says
Webb. “You see baffled light, that magical,
ethereal quality. I think it’s really
provocative.”
“I knew that by working with Jerome, the
combination of the two of us could really make this something different, not
your normal blue guy,” adds Berger. “On
top of our design and Imageworks’ visual effects, Jamie Foxx created a pretty
amazing character that’s never been seen before.”
“Marc always said, ‘He needs to glow,’” says
Chen. “At Marc’s direction, we started
to look at research imagery of electrical phenomena. Almost by accident, we found an image of a
skull with a flashlight attached to it – there was a glow coming from inside of
it. And that’s what we started to
explore – the electricity isn’t just on the surface of his skin, but actually
inside of him – it’s become his blood.
He’s an electrical entity, encased in flesh. The electricity is inside his skin, filtering
its light onto the surface of the skin.”
As inspiration, the visual effects team at Sony
Pictures Imageworks looked to the skies.
“At Marc’s direction, we’re referencing nighttime thunderstorms,” says
digital effects supervisor David Alexander Smith. “You can look up during one of those storms
and see it’s mostly clouds, but sometimes the whole sky will light up, or a
bolt or an arc will come through. That
was our inspiration. We combined that
with the neurological network inside the human body – that became our internal
illumination network that carries the electrical charges. So, it starts in Electro’s forehead – there’s
an electric storm going on in there – and we spread that throughout his
body. It’s a really impressive look, and
combined with Jamie Foxx’s performance, it really makes the character something
special.”
“That blue just blew everybody’s mind, the way they
captured it,” agrees Jamie Foxx. “So
once I got into the blue, even my voice changed – I figured Electro’s vocal
cords had been burned.”
In the end, it took a year for approximately 150
artists to bring this element of the character to the screen.
The filmmakers wanted the first
reveal of Electro – in Times Square – to feel real. “He stumbles into Times Square in a hoodie
and baggy pants – and it had to look like the light was coming off of his body,”
says Tolmach. “We did it largely
practically – we built lights into the hoodie, but the way they cast the light
onto his face, it looked light the light was coming from him. It was an amazing thing to do.”
Later, Electro steals one of the
skintight black uniforms from his guards at the Ravencroft Institute for the
Criminally Insane. It was a choice that
came about through a long process of investigation. “Deb’s costumes have a mythology to them,”
says Tolmach. “You have to understand
why a character would wear that costume; it has to have authenticity and
believability and credibility. We all
love the look of Electro in the comic books, but there’s no real-world
applicability to that costume. So the
question that Deb asked was, what would he do?
What are the storytelling options? Well, what are the people wearing at
Ravencroft? What would you wear if you
were working around someone who was electrically charged? How would you protect
yourself?” The costume came from these
questions and others.
ABOUT
THE TRAINING, STUNTS, AND ACTION
The
Amazing Spider-Man 2 kicks off in high gear, with Peter Parker having
mastered his skills as Spider-Man. “He’s
a virtuoso at being Spider-Man,” says Webb.
“He’s whipping through the air, flying toward us. There’s a really vibrant wish fulfillment
going on there – we want to give the audience, and especially kids, that
feeling of what it’s like to fly through the air. We spent a lot of time trying to perfect that
sense of flight with the stuntmen and the animators – there’s something
thrilling about this kid, jumping off the tops of buildings and flying through
the air with an enormous amount of velocity… and having a blast doing it.”
To help bring innovative and memorable action
sequences to the screen, the filmmakers returned to the Armstrong Action Team,
the renowned family of stunt coordinators who had also designed and created the
stunts for The Amazing Spider-Man.
“We tried to make the stunts very big and very
real, resorting to CG only where we really thought we couldn’t do it better
real,” says stunt coordinator Andy Armstrong.
The idea that that as much of the film’s action as
was possible would be performed practically was a decision that came at the
direction of Marc Webb, according to Matt Tolmach. “Audiences intuitively know when they
are seeing something real,” he says. “We
have tons of visual effects shots – Spider-Man does some things that no human
being can do – but we wanted the world to have weight, believability, and
gravitas. So wherever we could, doing it
for real was a very big part of Marc’s vision for Spider-Man.”
A good example is one of the film’s
opening sequences, as Spider-Man chases down a stolen truck full of plutonium
driven by a Russian madman, Aleksei Sytsevich.
“We had cameras in the street, getting run over,” says Arad. “We had a massive truck, colliding with the
camera. We wanted it to feel visceral,
like you were really there, like there was real danger. We had the amazing Armstrong stunt team on
the backs of cars and on wires. And when
you see it, you just know we did it practically, not in the computer. It feels real because it was shot real.”
“None of the action scenes is just
for the sake of action,” says Arad continues.
“Action drives the story, but the story is about character and
conflict. For example, the opening scene
isn’t only about how it’s hard to stop this crazy Russian who has hijacked a
truck – though it’s that, too – it’s also about how much fun it is to be
Spider-Man. As he’s flying through the
canyons, we wanted to make the experience magnificent, elegant – to bring up
your spirits. We found ways to make it
different and interesting. And then, when
he catches his man, he taunts the villain, he laughs at him, and we can
laugh. You can crack up, because
Spider-Man is going to pull it off.”
“We went through the city with a speeding convoy of
twenty-five police cars, a SWAT truck, a huge tow truck towing an armored car,
all at speed, and crashed cars out of the way,” says Armstrong. While much of the sequence was shot in
Manhattan and in DUMBO, Brooklyn, the shots at highest speeds were filmed in
Rochester, New York, where the historic downtown’s architecture proved an
excellent match for Manhattan.
“Rochester was absolutely sensational to us,”
according to Armstrong. “They let us do
a huge vehicle action sequence in a big movie in a way that you can’t do in
most American cities.”
The
Amazing Spider-Man 2 kicks off with an action sequence in a G-5 jet,
which was shot on the production’s Gold Coast stage using an innovative
combination of technology to simulate flight in a way never before achieved.
“We built the whole interior of the G-5 airplane,
and then we did something that hasn’t been done before,” says Academy Award®
winner John Frazier, the film’s special effects supervisor. For the first time, the aircraft was combined
with a motion base, the same technology that is used in flight simulators, and
also attached to two huge rings, which could rotate the plane, as if on a
rotisserie. “This is the first time where we’ve combined a motion base, which
will give you the pitch and the yaw, with a roll,” explains Frazier. “As the plane is getting into turbulence, we
could also roll the whole plane and turn it 360 degrees, or any degree we want.”
“Just about every shot of the fight on the plane is
of actors, not stunt people,” says Armstrong. “And we did it very much with gravity on their
side, so they could tip and fall, and be fighting real forces.”
The same technology was also used later in the
production for a scene in which Peter Parker rolls up the wall and onto the
ceiling battling to quickly remove his suit before his Aunt May enters his
bedroom. For this scene, the entire
bedroom set was held by the two massive rings, around which the room would
rotate.
During filming, Andrew Garfield remained mainly upright
as the room and camera turned 360 degrees, using the same technique as the
famous Fred Astaire sequence from the film Royal
Wedding, in which Astaire danced on the walls and ceiling.
“We’re doing a very different take on that, where
Spider-Man can, using his Spidey powers, kind of stumble around the ceiling, so
he can go all the way, three-sixty, around the room,” says Armstrong, who also
worked closely with his co-stunt coordinator and son James Armstrong.
Early discussions with director Marc Webb led Andy
Armstrong to study stunts from the early days of cinema for inspiration. “Marc and I, and Andrew Garfield too, are all
fans of vintage physical action that was done all in camera,” says
Armstrong. “We copied a move – size and
frame, and footstep for footstep – from Buster Keaton, where he grabs a moving
car.”
Moviegoers will recognize the famous move from a
1920s comedy short when, in an escape, Keaton grabs the back of a moving car
and is whisked out of view, flying almost horizontal out of frame. “I studied it frame by frame, and realized
how he did it, and emulated that exactly as he did it,” says Armstrong.
“Andy Armstrong has a such a huge affinity for
Keaton,” adds Andrew Garfield. “We
wanted to hark back to Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin with the physicality
and the physical comedy of Spider-Man in this film – we wanted to capture his playfulness
and pleasure.”
“There are a couple of slapstick things where
Andrew himself does a Spider-Man swing but slams into a wall and sort of slides
down it, which sounds like nothing but is very tough to do,” adds
Armstrong. “You need a very physical
actor that can do that, and in that one he’s as Peter Parker, so there’s no
trick. It’s really Andrew doing it.”
To pull it off required Garfield to begin a strict
training and nutritional regimen that began weeks before the cameras rolled and
continued throughout the production.
“My trainer, Armando Alarcon, is
one of my favorite people in the world,” says Garfield. “He’s a very gentle, powerful taskmaster, and
a passionate person about health and fitness.
The regimen was pretty intense – it has to be, I’m practically naked in
a Spandex suit – so I’m very thankful for Armando. I couldn’t do it with anyone else. It’s a really intimate relationship with your
personal trainer.”
“I wanted to know how this film was
going to differ from the first Amazing Spider-Man film,” says Alarcon, who reprises
his role from the first film. “I learned
that Peter is a little bit older –he’s not the small teen that he was in the
first film. Well, to make him older, you
have to mature the muscles – you have to make them thicker and denser. You can always tell the difference between a
teen boy and a man – the muscle just looks different. And since he’s a superhero, we wanted to do
it in a heightened way: nice wide shoulders, big thick back, but a really
skinny waist.”
Alarcon says that Garfield was a
willing, able, and dedicated pupil – even if he says otherwise. “Andrew will say he’s not a guy who likes to
work out, or not a weights guy, but his physicality and his ability say
otherwise.” And Alarcon also had a hand
in making sure Garfield got the nutrition he needed to build that muscle: “We
had to give him 4,000 to 5,000 calories a day – immediate sources of energy,
like vegetables and simple lean meats.
He sits at four to five percent body fat, so without immediate energy,
his body would burn muscle. Every once
in a while he would have pasta – and then he’d tease me my eating the
occasional piece of cake.”
Of course, certain scenes required highly trained
stuntmen. For these, the filmmakers
turned to Ilram Choi and William Ray Spencer.
“They’re two of my favorite people, they make me look so good,” laughs
Garfield.
“Andrew feels a real ownership of
Spider-Man, and he likes to push boundaries as hard as he can,” says
Tolmach. “If it’s possible for him to be
in the suit for a stunt, he will do it.
But he has such great respect for William and Ilram, who also wore the
suit; there are things they are capable of doing that Andrew can’t.”
“Between the three of us it feels like a true collaboration,
because it’s never about ego, it’s always about who can do the stunt best,
whether that’s me, William or Ilram,” Garfield continues. “It’s all about making sure the character is
served.”
ABOUT THE VISUAL EFFECTS
For the film’s visual effects, the
filmmakers turned to the Academy Award®-winning team at Sony Pictures
Imageworks, which has handled the visual effects work on all of the Spider-Man
films, and to Visual Effects Supervisor Jerome Chen, who reprises his role from
The Amazing Spider-Man. Chen says that he was gratified by the chance
to re-team with Marc Webb. “Marc is a
great collaborator,” says Chen. “He has
a very instinctive understanding of visual effects. It’s like a second language to him. He creates a basic design, a loose framework,
and then allows you to go off, do your research and come back with your own
ideas. Even the craziest idea – he’ll accept it, riff on it, and find a way to
work it into the story.”
Any Spider-Man film will face a
heavy visual effects challenge, and The
Amazing Spider-Man 2 was no exception.
One of the greatest challenges, Chen says, were creating the visual
effects elements of Electro. The
challenge expressed itself in two ways – first, to add an electrical element to
the character himself, and second, to discover the ways that the electricity
the character generates would manifest itself.
(For more information about the
visual effects elements in the character, please see the section “Designing
Electro.”)
It was important to Chen to make
the electricity that Electro is able to fire off as visually exciting as
possible. “We wanted to do something
unexpected,” he says. So, they went to
nature. “We looked at colors and
textures of photos from space and underwater animals,” he says. “We looked at nebulae, we looked at the hues
and ranges of tropical animals. We
introduced those colors into Max’s transformation in the tank, and later, when
Electro starts firing his lightning bolts, it’s not a simple blue arc of
electricity – there are oranges and purples.
We keep the range much more colorful.”
“The direction we were given early
on was that Electro’s electricity should be ‘beautiful but deadly,’” says one of
the film’s CG supervisors, Christopher Waegner.
“We studied high speed video footage of lightning bolts, to see the
cracks and fingers of electricity. We
studied Tesla coils, plasma balls, all of these representations of energy, and
we put them all together. The lightning
bolts are composed of about a dozen different layers of elements, depending on
what type of lightning bolt he’s shooting and how it’s reacting with the
environment.”
The visual effects team was also
responsible for digitally creating much of Times Square. Though the production design team built an
enormous and impressive set, certain elements could only be achieved in the
computer. This included buildings and
building interiors, storefronts, signage, billboards, lighting, and even small
details like planters and lampposts.
To re-create Times Square, the VFX team
started with the real thing. “Well
before main production began, we shot an acquisition of Times Square – we
covered every inch with a motion picture camera, still camera, and a team of
surveyors,” says digital effects supervisor David Alexander Smith. “We captured every detail, brought it back to
the shop, and detail by detail, we built it.
We gave it a complex but efficient geometry that gets us where we need
to be and makes it look authentic.”
“Times Square, obviously, is an
enormous place. For example, there are
140 Jumbotrons – all of which are playing different material,” says Chen. “We had to create our own material for each
Jumbotron. So not only were we creating
a digital environment, we were creating hundreds of clips of video. And later in the sequence, it becomes an
important story point: all of these screens show either Spider-Man or
Electro. For Marc, this is a scene about
how Electro wants to be seen, so when the screens switch to Spider-Man, it’s a
big turning point for Electro, as he realizes that Spider-Man has taken the
attention from him.”
As if building one of the most
iconic landscapes in the world were not enough to complicate the sequence, Webb
and Chen added another element – Spider Sense.
“Electro has destroyed one of Spider-Man’s shooters, and Spider-Man has
to figure out how to save the people on the stands,” Chen explains. “Marc had the idea that it was a frozen
moment in time, with Spider-Man working out all the complexities of saving
these people in a single moment. We
called it the Spider Sense shot – everyone is standing in a frozen moment, and
Spider-Man is moving through it.”
Though there were a number of
solutions in how to pull off the sequence, the filmmakers chose a surprisingly
practical one. “Andy Armstrong found
dancers, athletes – people with very good muscle control – and we had them hold
still, as best as they could, for the five or six minutes it took to get the
camera through,” Chen says. “Everyone
practiced for weeks, holding a pose – whether they were standing still or
running or about to fall over. We built
some stands to help them hold their weight, if they were in a dynamic
pose. Then, in post-production, we could
paint or freeze them the best we could – that was months of effort, to get the
illusion to work.”
The
Amazing Spider-Man 2 also represents a step forward in the way the film
represents Spider-Man swinging through the city. “He has become a kind of a daredevil,” says
Chen. “He swings as high as he can go,
and then falls as close to the ground as possible before he shoots his next
web. So we had some moments when we
allowed him to fall; we even have a shot that’s as if he had a camera strapped
to his chest – what would that look like?
We had a lot of fun coming up with ways for him to interact with the
city – and still had the gravity and physics that would make it believable.”
Still, some things about Spider-Man
will never change, and with the experience of the animators at Sony Pictures
Imageworks, Chen couldn’t have asked for a better team. “Our animators are expert witnesses,” he
says. “They study movements, whether it’s
going to be cartoony or realistic. They
have an ability to mimic, and then they give it their own nuances. They’ll watch Andrew move, and then do their
own tests before animating key frames by hand and giving it their own
touches. It’s quite beautiful to watch
the results.”
The final visual effects element
was the film’s third villain – the Rhino.
“We had some creative license in creating a wonderful villain in the
Rhino – one that would make people laugh and fear at the same time,” says
Smith. “We looked at old Russian tanks
and military equipment. We wanted it to
feel substantial and not rickety, but at the same time it’s kind of a hodgepodge. We ended up with something very strong and
fun at the same time, playing off of the character that Paul Giamatti
established.”
Even though the Rhino costume would
be entirely CG (2,295 pieces of CG geometry, including 263 nuts and bolts),
Giamatti performed on set in a 12-foot-tall, mobile unit. “It was important for a few reasons to have
Paul Giamatti in some sort of physical contraption on the set,” says Chen. “Marc wanted Andrew and Paul to have the
correct eyelines to each other – they had to see and act with each other. Also, because this scene is in daylight on
Park Avenue, we could have the correct lighting on Paul when we put the CG suit
around him. I’m sure that onlookers had
no idea what they were looking at, but it looks great in the final film.”
ABOUT THE
MUSIC
For the film’s music, the
filmmakers are experimenting with a very unusual arrangement. Marc Webb
has turned to Oscar® winning composer Hans Zimmer to form a supergroup,
including Pharrell Williams (possibly the hottest talent in music today, who
had a hand in the two biggest hits of 2013), The Smiths’ Johnny Marr, Incubus’
Michael Einziger and JunkieXL – among others – to work together on the music
for the film.
The result is a score by a band:
Hans Zimmer and The Magnificent Six featuring Pharrell Williams and Johnny
Marr.
Zimmer says, “Marc and I were
talking about Spider-Man, and as the word got out many of our musicians-friends
started calling us up, wanting to be a part of it simply because they love
Spider-Man. That was the thing that united all of us – the great love for
Spider-Man. With all of these hugely talented people wanting to join us, it was
Marc who said, ‘Why not start a band?’”
“Sound and image are inextricably
linked,” says Webb. “I can’t think of one without the other. So
when I was putting this film together, I wanted a musical collaborator who
could bring in a lot of different voices to create a big sonic landscape.
I also wanted rock music – the film takes place in New York, where punk rock started,
where hip-hop started, where there’s a huge electronic music scene, so through
the music, we could make the film feel real and contemporary.”
“I felt that, for me, superhero
movies needed a new approach,” Zimmer continues. “The ideas really came from
a conversation Pharrell and I had over a year ago on the nature of what makes
music resonate in our lives. Spider-Man is a young man, just graduating
college. He has big things going on in his life, but he deals with them
in a different way than someone older, and deals with things with a sense of
youthful humor and a New York young man’s fearless attitude. I don’t think he
hears Wagnerian horns and Mahlerian strings in his head describing his
emotions. He expresses himself through rock ‘n roll.”
With that in mind, Zimmer and his
fellow musicians started from scratch. “Spider-Man didn’t have as much of
a musical identity as we wanted him to have – he deserves an iconic
quality. I wanted to play America but a new America. Marc wanted a
fanfare and it took me a while to figure out how to reconcile that idea in my
head with my ‘band’ approach, which ultimately meant a great soloist – a great ‘front
man,’ not an orchestral section of trumpets. I thought of my favorite trumpet
player, Arturo Sandoval. We took Johnny Marr’s kinetic playing
and juxtaposed it against Arturo’s heroic tone to give wings to the tune.
We did it in a very New York way; two cultures colliding, two strong musical
personalities coming together to give you something fresh.”
So, Zimmer and his band began a
reinvention of film music – an approach 180 degrees from the way it’s usually
done. “We really embraced a rock and roll ethos,” says Zimmer. “We
said, ‘Let’s start by writing an album’s worth of songs, and then derive the
score from the melodies that are in those songs.”
To achieve that, Zimmer pulled
together some of the reigning legends in their fields. “I wanted to
create the chaos where everybody has to get to know each other through playing
together. It’s the easiest thing in the world for musicians to re-capture
the feeling and energy of who you where, as twenty-year-olds and in your first
band (well, Andrew K and Steve Mazzaro are twenty-year olds...). We had Johnny
Marr, Pharrell Williams, and Mike Einziger; Ann Marie Simpson, who’s a fabulous
violinist; Steve Lipson, who was engineering and producing; Junkie XL, who can
do so many things, but quickly realized he should be playing bass, so he
grabbed a bass and now he’s the bass player; Andy Page, a brilliant electronic
musician. We just started jamming with Marc in the room, coming up with
ideas like a garage-band, coming up with the sound of the movie. It was never
about famous names. It was about them all being great musicians and bringing
together that generous, playful spirit that has made them into famous names.” The
Magnificent Six are Pharrell Williams, Johnny Marr, Michael Einziger, Junkie
XL, Andrew Kawczynski, and Steve Mazzaro.
Pharrell Williams notes that Zimmer
is his mentor and the undisputed leader of the band. “Hans was the
nucleus, the impetus,” says Williams. “He led us on the path, like a
general. We all had to look at our own propensities, and figure out what
we would contribute to the direction that Hans brought. Hans doesn’t even
realize how these ideas he has are gigantic gestures for the rest of us.”
“Working on The Amazing Spider-Man 2 has been a good time and very interesting,”
says Johnny Marr. “Hans always keeps me
on my toes and makes everyone think about the music in unusual ways. There are
some themes that will surprise people.”
As an example of the way the band
worked together, Zimmer cites the development of one of the themes. “It
started off with a motive Mikey Einziger came up with. Then Ann
Marie Simpson pushed it a little bit further, in that naughty way that it
became a real challenge for Mikey to play, which he of
course embraced, because he likes a bit of a challenge. He went off
to practice that, and I took that and added some of my notes,
more complications, partly to push his limits and to turn
the motive into more of a theme. This seedthen turned into
a much larger theme once everybody else had added
their ideas to it.”
Or another: “For the love theme,
Johnny came in one morning with a pretty complete set of chords. Johnny
and I were working on those and, as we did that, Pharrell was sitting there
quietly, typing away on his cell phone. When Johnny and I finished
arguing about the chords, Pharrell said, ‘OK, can I get a microphone?’ Of
course, Pharrell wasn’t texting – he was writing the lyrics and the tune to the
song that Johnny and I were working on. And there it was, our love
theme.”
For the Electro theme, the
musicians again went in a different direction. “Pharrell, Marc and I were
looking at the character, and we said, ‘You know what we should do – we should
write him an opera.’ It’s not an opera in the way your father thinks of
an opera. The instrumentation is far more adventurous than you normally
get in a film score – 12 woodwinds with distorted voices (did I mention that
our director is a lapsed bassoonist?) combined with a serious Johnny Marr
guitar riff and JunkieXL electronica. It’s not overtly a song, it’s not
overtly a score cue; it’s something else, and that’s always what you reach for.”
Zimmer says he has another reason
for collaborating with Williams time and again: “One of the reasons I love
working with Pharrell is that I come up with some moody chords, and he comes up
with a beautiful tune.”
Zimmer also points out that the
band had one more full and acknowledged member: director Marc Webb. “He’s
a full-on musician at heart,” says Zimmer. “He pretends that he knows
nothing about classical music, and then he uses words like ostinato and diminuendo in
conversation. He has the enthusiasm and passion of a musician, and then
he can turn around and describe with great articulation what the subtext of a
scene is about for him.”
“There’s never been a score like
this,” says Webb. “It doesn’t sound like any other Hans Zimmer
score. It draws inspiration from Purcell operas and dubstep in the same
piece. The extremes of the musical spectrum that we got to explore is
just extraordinary.”
The music even hints at the threats
to come. The song “It’s On Again,” performed by Alicia Keys featuring
Kendrick Lamar, featured in the film, contains a score theme that was created
by Hans and Pharrell and woven into the song. The filmmakers and
composers plan that this theme will, in future films, become the villainous
theme of the Sinister Six.
“Ultimately, what brought everybody
together was that everybody loves this character,” Zimmer concludes. “Everybody
grew up with the idea of Spider-Man, and it felt really great that we all could
be a part of it.”
ABOUT THE CAST
ANDREW GARFIELD
(Peter Parker/Spider-Man) reprises the title role following his
critically acclaimed performance in Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man™.
Garfield is a BAFTA-winner, a 2011 Golden Globe nominee for his work in The
Social Network, and was a 2012 Tony Award nominee for his role in the
revival of Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman, in 2012.
In 2010, Garfield starred opposite
Keira Knightley and Carey Mulligan in Mark Romanek’s Never Let Me Go.
Other screen projects include Terry Gilliam’s The Imaginarium of Dr
Parnassus; Spike Jonze’s robot love story I’m Here; Robert Redford’s
Lions For Lambs; Revolution Films’ Red Riding Trilogy - 1974,
directed by Julian Jarrold; and John Crowley’s Boy A, for which he
earned the Best Actor BAFTA in 2008.
Garfield’s career began in theatre
and in 2006 his performances in “Beautiful Thing” (Sound Space/Kit
Productions), “The Overwhelming” and “Burn, Chatroom, and Citizenship” (Royal
National Theatre) won him the award for Outstanding Newcomer at the Evening
Standard Awards, and the Jack Tinker Award for Most Promising Newcomer at the
Critics Circle Awards. Other notable theatre credits include “Romeo and Juliet”
(Manchester Royal Exchange) and “Kes” (Manchester Royal Exchange), for which he
received the Most Promising Newcomer Award at the Manchester Evening News
Awards 2004.
In late 2013, Garfield started work
on 99 Homes, opposite Michael Shannon, directed by Ramin Bahrani.
With her striking beauty
and sincere talent, Golden Globe nominated actress EMMA STONE (Gwen Stacy) has claimed her role as one of Hollywood’s
most sought out actresses.
Stone recently wrapped
filming the Untitled Cameron Crowe project for Columbia Pictures
opposite Bradley Cooper and Alec Baldwin; that film will be released on
December 25, 2014. She also recently wrapped production on the Woody
Allen film Magic in the Moonlight in which she stars opposite Collin
Firth, also set for release this year.
In addition to The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Stone will
also soon be seen in the Fox Searchlight dark comedy Birdman, starring opposite Zack Galifinakis, Michael Keaton and
Edward Norton.
Stone recently lent her
voice to the hit animated Dreamworks/20th Century Fox Film, The Croods. To date, The Croods has grossed over $500M. Stone will soon reprise her
role as the voice of Eep for the sequel, which will hit theaters July 2019.
Stone’s additional film
credits include the period drama Gangster
Squad; Easy A, which earned her a Golden Globe nomination and an MTV Movie
Award for Best Comedic Performance; the award winning drama, The Help; the romantic comedy Crazy,
Stupid, Love; Screen Gems’ Friends
with Benefits; the independent
drama Paperman; the Twentieth Century
Fox animated comedy, Marmaduke;
Columbia Pictures’ hit comedy Zombieland; the Warner Bros. romantic
comedy Ghosts of Girlfriends Past; the Columbia Pictures/Happy Madison
hit comedy, The House Bunny; Twentieth Century Fox’s The Rocker;
and the Judd Apatow comedy Superbad.
When she’s not filming,
Stone, is an advocate for Stand Up To Cancer (SU2C), a groundbreaking
initiative created to accelerate innovative cancer research that will get new
therapies to patients quickly and save lives now. Laura Ziskin, the late
producer of The Amazing Spider-Man,
started the organization and got Stone involved. In addition to SU2C, Stone is
also an ambassador for Gilda’s Club New York City. Named for Gilda Radner, the
late comedian and original cast member of SNL, Gilda’s Club offers a place
where people dealing with cancer can join together to build social and
emotional support. Stone has become an active member in the Gilda’s Club
community and continues to do so by engaging with their younger departments for
children and teens.
A native of Arizona, Stone
currently splits her time between New York and LA.
An Academy Award®
winning actor, talented Grammy Award® winning musical artist and
comedian, JAMIE FOXX (Max Dillon/Electro) is one of Hollywood’s rare
elite multi-faceted performers.
Foxx recently
starred in Quentin Tarantino’s critically acclaimed Django Unchained as
the title character, opposite Leonardo DiCaprio, Christoph Waltz, and Samuel L.
Jackson, and in Roland Emmerich’s White House Down opposite Channing
Tatum.
He recently
wrapped production on Columbia Pictures’ Annie, opposite Oscar® nominee
Quvenzhané Wallis and Cameron Diaz, for director Will Gluck. The film
will be released on December 19, 2014.
In 2011, Foxx
appeared in New Line Cinema’s successful comedy, Horrible Bosses, opposite
Jennifer Aniston, Kevin Spacey, and Jason Bateman. Foxx also lent his vocal
talents to 20th Century Fox’s popular animated comedy-adventure Rio
as a canary named Nico. Rio grossed over $450 million worldwide. Rio
2 hits cinemas April 11, 2014 and promises to be another box office hit.
Foxx delivered a
hilarious cameo appearance opposite Robert Downey Jr. and Zach Galifianakis in Due
Date, Todd Phillips’ directorial follow up to The Hangover. Foxx also
appeared in Garry Marshall’s box office hit romantic comedy Valentine’s Day
in February 2010.
In addition to
his outstanding work in film, Foxx has also achieved a thriving career in
music. In December 2010, he released his fourth album, “Best Night of My Life,”
featuring Drake, Justin Timberlake, Rick Ross, T.I., and other artists.
In January 2010, Foxx and T-Pain’s record breaking #1 song “Blame It” off of his previous album, “Intuition,” won Best R&B
Performance by a Duo/Group with Vocals at the 52nd Annual Grammy Awards®.
In 2009, Foxx
starred opposite Gerard Butler in Overture Films’ dramatic thriller Law
Abiding Citizen. Foxx continued to show his powerful affinity and respect
for fictional portrayals with Joe Wright’s inspirational film, The Soloist,
in which he played Nathaniel Anthony Ayers- a real-life musical prodigy who
developed schizophrenia and dropped out of Julliard, becoming a homeless
musician who wonders the streets of Los Angeles. The film is based on a 12-part
series of articles by Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez, played by Robert
Downey Jr.
In September 2007, Foxx appeared in The Kingdom, in which he
portrayed the leader of a counter-terrorist team on the hunt for those
responsible for a deadly bombing attack on Americans working in the Middle
East. Foxx also closed the 2007 Sundance Film Festival with the showing of
his executively produced film Life Support starring Queen Latifah. The
film is an inspirational true-life
story of a mother who overcame a cocaine addiction and became a positive role
model and AIDS activist in the black community.
In December 2006, Foxx was seen in the critically acclaimed screen
adaptation of the Broadway musical, Dreamgirls, opposite Beyonce
Knowles, Jennifer Hudson, and Eddie Murphy. The film won a Golden Globe for
Best Motion Picture Musical Comedy, and received a SAG nomination for Best
Ensemble Cast. The NAACP Image Awards nominated Foxx in the Best Actor category
for his performance as Curtis Taylor Jr., and Dreamgirls received a nomination
for Outstanding Motion Picture.
In January 2006, Foxx announced his partnership with SIRIUS Satellite
Radio to start his own 24/7 radio station called Foxxhole. The station is a
combination of celebrity interviews, comedy, and music.
Foxx’s album “Unpredictable”
topped the charts in late December 2005 and early 2006, as it held the number
one spot for five weeks and sold over one million units in 20 days. Foxx
was nominated for eight Billboard Music Awards, three Grammy Awards®,
one Soul Train Music Award, and two American Music Awards, where Foxx won
Favorite Male Artist. The album was nominated for three Grammy Awards®
in 2006—including Best R&B Album; the track “Love Changes,” featuring Mary
J. Blige, for Best R&B Performance By a Duo or Group; and the track “Unpredictable,”
featuring Ludacris, for Best Rap/Sung Collaboration.
In 2005, Foxx’s
portrayal of the legendary Ray Charles in the Taylor Hackford-directed biopic Ray
garnered him an Academy Award® for Best Actor and proved to be one
of his career’s defining performances. In addition to winning the Oscar®,
Foxx shared in a SAG Award nomination received by the film’s ensemble cast, and
single-handedly swept the Golden Globes, Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards,
BAFTA, and NAACP Image Awards, as well as numerous critical awards for his
performance in Ray, captivating audiences worldwide as the most
accomplished actor of 2005.
Also in 2005,
Foxx earned Oscar®, Golden Globe, SAG Award, BAFTA Award, and Image
Award nominations in the category of Best Supporting Actor for his work in
Michael Mann’s dramatic thriller Collateral, opposite Tom Cruise. But
Foxx’s unwavering momentum in 2005 did not stop there, as Foxx also received
Golden Globe nominations, SAG Award nominations and won an Image Award for Best
Actor in a Television Movie for his portrayal of condemned gang
member-turned-Nobel Peace Prize nominee Stan “Tookie” Williams in the FX
Network’s movie Redemption.
Additional film
credits include: Michael Mann’s Ali, opposite Will Smith, Michael Mann’s
Miami Vice opposite Colin Farrell, Sam Mendes’ Gulf War drama Jarhead,
with Jake Gyllenhaal, Stealth, Bait, Booty Call, The
Truth About Cats and Dogs, and The Great White Hype.
Foxx’s
big-screen break came in 1999 when Oliver Stone cast him as star quarterback
Willie Beamen in Any Given Sunday, with Al Pacino.
Jamie Foxx first rose to fame as a comedian, from which he initiated a
potent career trajectory of ambitious projects. After spending time in the
comedy circuit, he joined Keenan Ivory Wayans, Jim Carrey, Damon Wayans and
Tommy Davidson in the landmark Fox sketch comedy series, “In Living Color,”
creating some of the show’s funniest and most memorable moments. In 1996, he
launched his own series, “The Jamie Foxx Show,” which was one of the top-rated
shows on the WB Network during its five-year run. Foxx not only starred
on the series, but was the co-creator and executive producer of the series,
directing several episodes himself.
Dane
DeHaan (Harry Osborn / Green Goblin) has made a formidable
impression on film audiences and is currently one of the industry’s most sought
after actors of his generation. DeHaan starred in 20th Century Fox’s
box office hit, Chronicle.
DeHaan was recently seen in Kill Your Darlings opposite Daniel Radcliffe. Directed by John Krokidas, Kill
Your Darlings is loosely based on the life of poet Allen Ginsberg.
DeHaan was also seen in Metallica: Through the Never directed by Nimrod Antal and stars
Metallica. The film follows a young roadie for Metallica who is sent on an
urgent mission during the band’s show. He also recently starred in the
critically lauded film The Place Beyond
the Pines, directed by Derek Cianfrance. DeHaan starred opposite Ryan
Gosling and Bradley Cooper as Gosling’s young son, Jason. DeHaan also starred in The Weinstein Company’s
film Lawless, directed by John Hillcoat, starring opposite Shia
LaBeouf, Tom Hardy, Jason Clark, Gary Oldman and Guy Pearce.
DeHaan will also soon be seen in the independent film Devil’s Knot opposite Reese Witherspoon and Colin Firth, which premiered at the 2013
Toronto International Film Festival. The
film is based on the 2002 crime book by Mara Leveritt, Devil’s Knot: The
True Story of the West Memphis Three, about the 1993 savage murders of
three young children and the controversial trial of three teenagers accused of
the killings.
DeHaan will also be seen in independent dark comedy Life After Beth opposite Aubrey Plaza.
Directed by Jeff Baena, Life After Beth
follows Zach (DeHaan), a young man who tries to continue dating his girlfriend
Beth (Plaza), after her death.
He will soon begin production on Life, where he will portray James Dean. Directed by Anton Corbijn,
the film also stars Robert Pattinson.
DeHaan, most known for his portrayal of Jesse on HBO’s
critically acclaimed drama series “In Treatment,” starred in the third season
of the series alongside Gabriel Byrne.
In 2010, DeHaan received an Obie
Award for his performance in the critically acclaimed Off-Broadway production
of “The Aliens,” directed by Annie Baker.
A Rattlestick Theatre production, The Aliens was given the prestigious
honor of “Play of the Year” by The New York Times. DeHaan made his Broadway debut in 2008 with “American
Buffalo.”
DeHaan began his film career under
the direction of two-time Oscar® nominee John Sayles and opposite Chris Cooper
in Amig, released by Variance films in 2011.
A graduate of the University of
North Carolina School of the Arts, Dane currently resides in Los Angeles.
CAMPBELL SCOTT (Richard Parker) studied with Stella Adler and Geraldine Page and
got his first break playing Benvolio in “Romeo and Juliet” in summer stock in
New England. Following that, Scott
understudied in the Broadway production of Tom Stoppard’s “The Real Thing,”
starring Jeremy Irons and later, Nicol Williamson.
He has also appeared
on Broadway in an acclaimed production of “Long Day’s Journey Into Night,” with
Jason Robards and Colleen Dewhust, “Ah! Wilderness,” “Hay Fever,” and “The
Queen and the Rebels.”
Off-Broadway, Scott
has appeared in “The Last Outpost,” “Copperhead,” “A Man for All Seasons,” and “On
the Bum.”
He played the title
role of “Hamlet” at the Old Globe in San Diego, receiving excellent
reviews. He played “Hamlet” again at the
Huntington Theatre in Boston. Scott’s
other Shakespearean roles include Angelo in “Measure for Measure” at Lincoln
Center, the title role of “Pericles” at the New York Shakespeare Festival, and
Iago in “Othello” at the Philadelphia Drama Guild.
Regionally, Campbell
has been seen in “Our Town,” “Gilette,” “School for Wives,” and, for the
Williamstown Theatre Festival, “Miss Julie, ““Dead End,” and “The Atheist.”
His first film role
was in From Hollywood to Deadwood
followed by the highly praised Longtime
Companion, The Feud, and Bernardo
Bertolucci’s The Sheltering Sky. Scott appeared in Dead Again directed by Kenneth Branagh and starred in Dying Young, opposite Julia Roberts,
directed by Joel Schumacher; Singles,
directed by Cameron Crowe; The Innocent,
directed by John Schlesinger; Mrs. Parker
and the Vicious Circle, directed by Alan Rudolph; Only With You; and Let It Be
Me. He co-starred with Steve Martin in David Mamet’s film The Spanish Prisoner. His more recent film appearances include Big Night, The Daytrippers, Ship of Fools,
Hi-Life, Top of the Food Chain, Spring Forward, Other Voices, Lush, Delivering
Milo, Roger Dodger, Secret Lives of Dentists, Loverboy, Marie and Bruce, Duma,
The Exorcism of Emily Rose, and The
Dying Gaul, which he starred in and produced. Most recently Scott appeared in Still Mine, and portrayed Richard
Parker, father of Peter, in Marc Webb’s The
Amazing Spider-Man.
For television Scott
starred in, co-directed and produced “Hamlet” for the Odyssey Network. He also
starred as Joseph Kennedy, Jr. in “The Kennedys of Massachusetts,” co-starred
with Ben Kingsley and Joanna Lumley in “Sweeney Todd” for Showtime, co-starred
with Jennifer Jason Leigh in “The Love Letter” for Hallmark Hall of Fame, “Shot
in the Heart” for HBO and “Follow the Stars Home” for Hallmark Hall of Fame,
again co-starring with Jennifer Jason Leigh.
Scott recently had a recurring role in the FX series “Damages” alongside
Glenn Close.
Scott co-directed the
film Big Night with Stanley Tucci. He
has also directed the feature films Off
the Map and Company Retreat, the
latter of which was also written by Scott. For the stage, he has directed “Miss
Julie,” “Snake Pit,” and “Recruiting Officer.”
Currently, Scott can
be seen in the USA original series “Royal Pains.”
Constantly delivering poignant and
critically applauded performances, EMBETH
DAVIDTZ (Mary Parker) caught the attention of the world for her genuine and
confident portrayal as the Jewish maid who survives both the abuse and
attraction of Ralph Fiennes’ sadistic commander Goeth in Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List. People
who saw her work recognized the future was promising for an actress whose
talent seemed unstoppable. Embeth
Davidtz has delivered on that promise.
Davidtz recently played Dr.
Samantha Unger, part of an elite group of scientists journeying to Jupiter’s
fourth moon in Sebastian Cordero’s The
Europa Report, with Christian Camargo and Michael Nyqvist. She also played Annika Blomkvist in
David Fincher’s adaptation of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo opposite
Daniel Craig. Embeth played the recurring role of Rebecca Pryce, wife of actor
Jared Harris, in the hit AMC television series “Mad Men.” She also played the recurring role of Felicia
Koons, on the hit Showtime series “Californication,” where she portrays a
memorable object of David Duchovny’s affection.
She previously co-starred in the television
drama “In Treatment” opposite Gabriel Byrne and Dianne Wiest. Directed by Rodrigo Garcia, the
critically-acclaimed series focuses on a psychologist who seeks refuge from his
patients by getting his own therapist.
Prior to this, Davidtz appeared in
Eric Mendelsohn’s 3 Backyards, which
was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance in 2010. She also appeared in the thriller Fracture for director Gregory Hoblit,
co-starring Anthony Hopkins, David Strathairn and Ryan Gosling. Davidtz also starred in the critically
acclaimed feature film Junebug
opposite Amy Adams and Alessandro Nivola.
Released by Sony Classics, Junebug
premiered to rave reviews at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival. The drama tells
the tale of a dealer in “outsider” art who travels from Chicago to North
Carolina to meet her new in-laws, and upon arrival, challenges the equilibrium of the middle class Southern
home.
Previous film credits include the
highly successful Bridget Jones’s Diary opposite Hugh Grant and Renee Zellweger, The
Palace Thief, with Kevin Kline and Patrick Dempsey, Nick Hamm’s independent
film, The Hole, the thriller 13 Ghosts, Miramax’s Mansfield Park, Disney’s Bicentennial
Man, Robert Altman’s critically acclaimed thriller The Gingerbread Man, Murder
in the First opposite Kevin Bacon, Feast
of July, Matilda and the supernatural thriller Fallen opposite Denzel Washington.
In addition to her film work,
Davidtz made her debut as a season regular on CBS’s “Citizen Baines,” created
by John Wells. The drama focused on a prominent three-term US senator (James
Cromwell) returning to his Seattle home to join his family following a shocking
loss in his bid for re-election. Davidtz
portrayed his daughter who aspired to follow in her father’s footsteps as a
future congresswoman.
COLM FEORE (Donald Menken) is a veteran talent with a distinguished
catalogue of work. Feore’s talent crosses many borders: an international
success story, he acts in both English and French and has conquered many
mediums, with starring roles in film, television, and on stage.
Feore was most recently seen in Kenneth Branagh’s Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit for Paramount
Pictures, and he will next appear in Matthew Santoro’s Higher Power with Ron Eldard. Previously, he appeared in CBS’ “Revolution”
and Showtime’s “The Borgias” with Jeremy Irons. Other recent film work includes
Paramount Pictures’ Thor with
Anthony Hopkins, Natalie Portman, and Rene Russo, as well as The Trotsky.
Celebrated as a fine stage actor, he recently had a
triumphant return to Canada’s renowned Stratford Shakespeare Festival where he
played two lead roles, “Cyrano de Bergerac,” directed by his wife, Donna Feore,
and “MacBeth.”
On the Canadian big screen, he can be seen in the
Kevin Tierney-produced project entitled Serveuses
Demandees, and in Le Piege Americain
(The American Trap), a feature film about Lucien Rivard who became a leader
of the Canadian drug trade in the 1940s, directed by Charles Binamé. Feore also
co-starred in the hit film Bon Cop Bad
Cop, one of the highest-grossing
Canadian films of all time. On the
small screen, he can be seen in the CTV mini-series “Guns.”
In 2005, Feore starred with Denzel Washington and
received widespread critical acclaim for his portrayal of Cassius in the
Broadway performance of Shakespeare’s “Julius Caesar.” The power of his
performance has earned him the St. Clair Bayfield Award, denoting the best
performance by an actor in a Shakespearean play in the New York metropolitan
area.
Feore’s credits on the big screen include Universal’s
Academy Award nominated Changeling,
for director Clint Eastwood, the Academy Award winner for Best Picture Chicago, which also won the 2003 SAG
Award for Outstanding Performance by the Cast of a Theatrical Motion Picture, The Chronicles of Riddick, The Exorcism of Emily Rose, Paycheck, The Sum of All
Fears, Thirty Two Short Films About
Glenn Gould, which won the Genie
Award for Best Picture and earned him a nomination for his performance, The Insider and Titus.
His list of small screen movie credentials is as long
as it is varied, ranging from historical roles in “Nuremburg,” “The Day Reagan
was Shot,” “And Starring Pancho Villa as Himself,” “Empire,” and “Trudeau,” for
which he won the 2002 Monte Carlo Television Festival Award for Best Actor and
the 2002 Gemini Award for Best Actor in a Mini Series, to classic dramas
including “Romeo and Juliet” and “The Taming of the Shrew.” Feore has also had many roles in such
successful contemporary shows as “24,” “Flashpoint,” “The West Wing,” “Boston
Public,” “Law and Order SVU,” “The Good Wife,” and the Canadian mini-series “Slings
& Arrows II,” a look behind the scenes at the chaotic world of theatre.
Feore was featured in the 2006 Stratford Festival to
star in “Don Juan,” in which he played the title role in both the English and
the French performances of the play. Feore also acted in the title role in “Coriolanus,”
and performed the role of Fagin in “Oliver,” to rave reviews.
He first gained prominence as one of Canada’s
premiere stage actors through thirteen seasons with the prestigious Stratford
Festival, playing virtually all of Shakespeare’s leading men, from Richard III
and Iago to Romeo and Hamlet. Feore was
also on stage at The Public Theatre as “Claudius” in Hamlet in New York and
returned to Stratford for its 50th Anniversary season playing Professors
Higgins in “My Fair Lady.”
Feore was the 2007 recipient of the NBC Universal
Canada Award of Distinction. Most recently, he received the Playback Canadian
Film and TV Hall of Fame Award 2013. He makes his home in Ontario with his
wife, director/choreographer Donna Feore and their three children.
With a diverse roster of finely etched, award-winning and
critically acclaimed performances, PAUL GIAMATTI (Aleksei
Sytsevich/The Rhino) has
established himself as one of the most versatile actors of his generation.
Giamatti has wrapped production on his next project in which
he stars and executive produces. The FX pilot “Hoke” is a darkly comedic drama
that tells the story of a mid-life crisis and murder that features the
hardboiled and possible insane homicide detective Hoke Moseley (Giamatti) in
pre-chic Miami circa 1985.
He recently guest starred in the Season 4 finale of “Downton
Abbey” alongside Shirley MacLaine and the regular cast members as Cora’s
(Elizabeth McGovern) maverick, playboy brother Harold.
This past fall, he was seen in several films: John Lee
Hancock’s Saving Mr. Banks, Peter
Landesman’s Parkland with Zac Efron and Jacki Weaver; Steve McQueen’s Twelve
Years a Slave opposite Brad Pitt, Michael Fassbender, and Chiwetel
Ejiofor; Carlo Carlei’s Romeo and Juliet, as Friar Laurence,
opposite Hailee Steinfeld and Damian Lewis; Phil Morrison’s All is Bright,
which he also produced and stars in alongside Paul Rudd; and Ari Folman’s The
Congress, co-starring Robin Wright and Harvey Keitel.
Other credits for him include Turbo, Rock of Ages,
David Cronenberg’s Cosmopolis, The Ides of March, Curtis Hanson’s HBO
movie “Too Big To Fail,” in
which his performance earned him his third SAG Award for Outstanding
Performance by a Male Actor in a Television Movie or Miniseries as well as an
Emmy® and Golden Globe® nomination. Giamatti also starred in the critically
praised Win Win, a film written and directed by Oscar® nominee
Tom McCarthy.
His performance in 2010’s Barney’s Version earned him
his second Golden Globe® Award. Based on the best-selling novel
of the same name by Mordechai Richler, the film was directed by Richard J.
Lewis and co-starred Dustin Hoffman, Rosamund Pike and Minnie Driver.
In 2008, Giamatti won an Emmy®, SAG and Golden
Globe® Award for Best Actor in a Miniseries for his portrayal of the
title character in the HBO seven-part Emmy® Award Winning
Mini-Series “John Adams.” Directed by Emmy® Award Winning
director Tom Hooper, Giamatti played President John Adams in a cast that also
included award-winning actors Laura Linney, Tom Wilkinson, David Morse and
Stephen Dillane.
In 2006, Giamatti’s performance in Ron Howard’s Cinderella
Man earned him his first SAG Award and a Broadcast Film Critics’ Award
for Best Supporting Actor, as well as Academy Award and Golden Globe® nominations
in the same category.
For his role in Alexander Payne’s critically-lauded Sideways,
Giamatti earned several accolades for his performance including Best Actor from
the Independent Spirit Awards, New York Film Critics Circle as well as a Golden
Globe® and SAG Award nomination.
In 2004, Giamatti garnered outstanding reviews and
commendations (Independent Spirit Award nomination for Best Actor, National
Board of Review Breakthrough performance of the Year) for his portrayal of
Harvey Pekar in Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini’s American
Splendor.
Giamatti first captured the eyes of America in Betty Thomas’
hit comedy Private Parts. His extensive list of film credits also
includes Jonathan English’s Ironclad, Todd Phillips’ The
Hangover 2, The Last Station opposite Christopher Plummer and Helen
Mirren, Tony Gilroy’s Duplicity, Cold Souls, which
Giamatti also executive produced, David Dobkin’s Fred Claus, Shoot
‘Em Up opposite Clive Owen, Shari Springer Berman and Roger Pulcini’s The
Nanny Diaries, M. Night Shyamalan’s Lady in the Water, The
Illusionist, directed by Neil Burger, Milos Forman’s Man on the
Moon, Julian Goldberger’s The Hawk is Dying, Tim Robbins’
Cradle Will Rock, F. Gary Gray’s The Negotiator, Steven
Spielberg’s Saving Private Ryan, Peter Weir’s The Truman
Show, Mike Newell’s Donnie Brasco, Todd Solondz’ Storytelling,
Tim Burton’s Planet of the Apes, Duets, opposite
Gwyneth Paltrow, the animated film Robots and Big Momma’s House,
co-starring Martin Lawrence. Giamatti also appeared in James Foley’s Confidence and John Woo’s Paycheck.
As an accomplished stage actor, Giamatti received a Drama
Desk nomination for Best Supporting Actor as Jimmy Tomorrow in Kevin Spacey’s
Broadway revival of “The Iceman Cometh.”
His other Broadway credits include “The
Three Sisters” directed by Scott Elliot; “Racing Demon” directed by Richard Eyre; and “Arcadia” directed by Trevor Nunn. He
was also seen Off-Broadway in the ensemble cast of “The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui” with Al Pacino.
For television, Giamatti appeared in “The Pentagon Papers” with James Spader, HBO’s “Winchell” opposite Stanley Tucci, and
Jane Anderson’s “If These Walls Could
Talk 2.”
He resides in Brooklyn, NY.
SALLY FIELD (Aunt May) is a two-time Academy Award® winner for
performances in Robert Benton’s Places in
the Heart, for which she also received a Golden Globe, and Martin Ritt’s Norma Rae,
for which she received a Golden Globe, along with the New York Film Critics
prize, the National Board of Review Award, the Los Angeles Film Critics Award,
the National Society of Film Critics honor and Best Actress at the Cannes Film
Festival. Field has also received Golden
Globe nominations for her work in Smokey
and the Bandit, Absence of Malice, Kiss Me Goodbye, Steel Magnolias and Forrest
Gump.
Her many film credits include An Eye for An Eye, Mrs.
Doubtfire, Soapdish, Not Without My Daughter, The End, Hooper, Stay Hungry (her
first major film role), as well as Punchline
and Murphy’s Romance, both of which
were produced by her production company, Fogwood Films. Field played Aunt May in The Amazing Spider-Man released in the summer of 2012. Most recently, Field was nominated for a
Golden Globe, SAG, and an Oscar® for her supporting role as Mary Todd in
Spielberg’s Lincoln alongside Daniel
Day-Lewis and won a New York Critics Film Award.
Born in Pasadena, California and raised in a show
business family, Field began her career in 1964 in the television series Gidget.
She went on to star in the The
Flying Nun in 1967. She starred in
three television series by the age of twenty-five. She received Emmy Awards for
her title role in the landmark miniseries Sybil
and for her performance on ER. She also received Emmy nominations for her
role in Showtime’s A Cooler Climate
and the NBC miniseries A Woman of
Independent Means which she co-produced and for which she received a Golden
Globe nomination. Ms. Field co-starred
in the ABC series drama Brothers &
Sisters from 2006 to 2011 and for her role as “Nora Walker,” Ms. Field
received a Screen Actors Guild Award and an Emmy Award as well as two Golden
Globe nominations.
Field made her directorial debut in 1996 with the
ABC telefilm The Christmas Tree which she co-wrote and which starred Julie
Harris. She directed an episode of the
HBO miniseries From the Earth to the Moon
and in 2000 made her feature film directorial debut with Beautiful starring Minnie Driver.
In 2002, Field made her Broadway debut in Edward
Albee’s The Goat and in 2004,
received rave reviews for her role as “Amanda” in Tennessee Williams’ The Glass Menagerie at The Kennedy
Center.
Field has served on the Board of Directors of Vital
Voices since 2002. She has served as
Mistress of Ceremony at Vital Voices Global Leadership Awards gala held at The
Kennedy Center from 2002 through 20011.
She also served on the Board of Directors of The Sundance Institute from
1995 to 2010.
ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS
MARC WEBB (Director) directed the latest
chapter in the Spider-Man legacy, the critically acclaimed blockbuster The Amazing Spider-Man. Starring Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Rhys
Ifans, Denis Leary, Campbell Scott, Irrfan Khan, Martin Sheen and Sally Field, The Amazing Spider-Man has taken in more
than $751 million worldwide.
Webb made his feature film debut with the acclaimed (500)
Days of Summer, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel.
The film was nominated for two Golden Globe Awards, including Best
Picture - Musical or Comedy. (500) Days of Summer also earned an
Independent Spirit Award for Best Original Screenplay. For his work
on the film, The National Board of Review presented Webb with The Spotlight
Award, which honors outstanding directorial debuts.
Webb began his career as a director for commercials
and for music videos for recording artists such as Green Day, Fergie and My
Chemical Romance. He was honored with several MTV Video Music Awards,
including the 2009 Best Director Award for Green Day’s “21 Guns,” Best Rock
Video in 2006 for AFI’s “Miss Murder” and Best Group Video for The All-American
Rejects’ “Move Along.” Also in 2006, The Music Video Production
Association honored him as Director of the Year for his work with Weezer, AAR
and My Chemical Romance.
Webb attended Colorado College, from which he
graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English, and New York University.
AVI ARAD (Producer) was the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of
Marvel Studios, the film and television division of Marvel Entertainment, and
Chief Creative Officer of Marvel Entertainment. In June of 2006, Arad
branched off to form his own production company – Arad Productions, Inc.
Arad has been a driving force behind bringing many of Marvel’s most famous
comic book characters to the screen, with a track record that has been nothing
short of spectacular, including a string of No. 1 box office openings.
As a producer or executive producer, his credits
include Spider-Man, Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man 3, The
Amazing Spider-Man (Columbia Pictures); X-Men, X2: X-Men United and X-Men:
The Last Stand(Twentieth Century Fox); The Hulk (Universal
Pictures); Daredevil (New Regency); The Punisher (Lions
Gate Entertainment); Blade, Blade II and Blade:
Trinity (New Line Cinema); Elektra (Twentieth Century
Fox); Fantastic Four and its sequel Fantastic Four:
Rise of the Silver Surfer (Twentieth Century Fox); Ghost Rider and Ghost
Rider Spirit of Vengeance (Columbia Pictures); Iron Man (Paramount
Pictures); and The Incredible Hulk (Universal). Mr.
Arad’s current feature film slate includes Ghost In The Shell (DreamWorks), Savage
Planet (Columbia Pictures),Venom (Columbia Pictures),Uncharted:
Drake’s Fortune (Columbia Pictures), Popeye (Sony Pictures
Animation), Infamous (Columbia Pictures), Maximum Ride (Universal), Mass
Effect (Legendary Pictures / Warner Bros.), and many more.
Arad has also been producing animation for over 20 years on
such series such as “X-Men,” “Fantastic Four,” “Silver Surfer,” “Iron Man,”
“Spider-Man,” “Conan the Adventurer,” “King Arthur & the Knights of
Justice,” “Bots Master,” and on direct-to-video animated features such as “Avengers,”
“Iron Man” and many others.
Additionally, Arad created “Mutant X” and produced sixty-six
hours of the live-action TV series for Tribune Entertainment. He also
produced thirteen hours of “Blade”, the live-action TV series for Spike TV.
Currently Arad is producing the Pac-Man 3D CG animated show for Disney XD.
Born in Cyprus and raised in Israel, Arad came to the United
States during his college years and enrolled at Hofstra University to study
industrial management. He earned a bachelor of business administration from the
University in 1972. A long-established expert in youth entertainment, Arad is
one of the world’s top toy designers. He has been involved in the creation and
development of over two hundred successful products, including action figures,
play sets, dolls, toy vehicles, electronic products, educational software and
video games. In fact, virtually every major toy and youth entertainment
manufacturer, including Toy Biz, Hasbro, Mattel, MGA, Nintendo, Tiger, Ideal,
Galoob, Tyco, Sega and THQ, has been selling his products for more than 30
years.
In addition to his toy, animation, and film projects, today,
Arad served as the Executive Advisor of NAMCO BANDAI Holdings and as a
Chairperson of Production I.G’s American affiliate - Production I.G., LLC.
MATT TOLMACH (Producer), president
of Matt Tolmach Productions, has been responsible for many critically and
commercially successful films as a longtime president of Columbia Pictures and
most recently as producer on such films as The Amazing Spider-Man™.
The Amazing Spider-Man™,
which Tolmach produced along with Laura Ziskin and Avi Arad was directed by
Marc Webb and starred Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone. The film has grossed over
$750m worldwide.
In addition to The Amazing
Spider-Man 2, Tolmach recently served as producer on The Armstrong Lie,
which will be released by Sony Pictures Classics this November. The
documentary, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival,
follows cyclist Lance Armstrong as he trains for his eighth Tour de France
victory. Tolmach is currently in post-production on Kitchen Sink, a comedy directed by Robbie Pickering and written by
Oren Uziel about a teenager who teams up with a vampire and zombie. The film
stars Nicholas Braun, Denis Leary, Bob Odenkirk, Keegan-Michael Key, Joan
Cusack, Ian Roberts, Patton Oswalt and Vanessa Hudgens, among others.
Tolmach launched his company in
late 2010 and is currently developing several high-profile projects for
Columbia Pictures, including Royal Wedding by Nancy Meyers, Dodge and
Twist by Simon Beaufoy and a remake of Jumanji.
Tolmach joined Columbia Pictures in
1997 as Senior VP of Production. He was named Executive Vice President of
Production in November 1999. From 2003
through 2010, Tolmach oversaw all production activity at Columbia Pictures, a
post shared with Doug Belgrad. In 2008, Tolmach was named President of the
historic label. Prior to his appointment as president of Columbia
Pictures, Tolmach previously served as president of production for the
studio. During his tenure as President of Sony Pictures Entertainment,
Tolmach oversaw some of the most successful blockbusters in Columbia Pictures
history, including the Spider-Man franchise; the worldwide hits The
Da Vinci Code and Angels & Demons; Salt, The Other
Guys, Zombieland; 2012; Step Brothers; Pineapple
Express; Panic Room; Superbad; and Talladega Nights: The Ballad
of Ricky Bobby, among many others.
Tolmach graduated from Beloit
College with a B.A. in English Literature. He began his career as an agent
trainee at the William Morris Agency and later ran Michael J. Fox’s production
company before joining Amy Pascal as Vice President of Production and eventually
Senior Vice President of Production at Turner Pictures.
For over eighteen years, ALEX
KURTZMAN & ROBERTO ORCI (Executive Producers / Screenplay by / Screen
Story by) have established themselves
as one of the leading writing/producing teams working in film and television.
Last year, Paramount released the blockbuster Star Trek: Into
Darkness, which Kurtzman and Orci co-wrote and produced, and Summit
released Ender’s Game produced through their company K/O Paper Products,
as well as the surprise summer hit Now You See Me, also produced through
K/O Paper Products.
Kurtzman and Orci have recently signed on to work with Jeff Pinkner, Ed
Solomon and Drew Goddard to expand the Spider-Man universe, including a
third and fourth installment of The Amazing Spider-Man as well as the
films Venom and The Sinister Six, based on some of Spider-Man’s
villains. The duo are also set to produce Universal’s The Mummy and Van
Helsing reboots through their overall deal with Universal Pictures. In
TV, Kurtzman and Orci recently wrapped the first season of Sleepy Hollow, the hit adaptation on Fox. They are currently
preparing for the second season of the show which will return to Fox this fall.
Kurtzman and Orci are the writers behind some of the decade’s biggest
films, including Star Trek; Transformers; Eagle Eye; and Mission:
Impossible III. They also executive-produced the romantic comedy hit The
Proposal. The duo’s writing and producing credits have earned over $4
billion worldwide.
The duo co-wrote and produced People Like Us for Dreamworks,
starring Elizabeth Banks and Chris Pine, which marked Kurtzman’s directorial
debut. They created and executive produced the hit TV show Fringe, which
ended its 5-season run in 2013. Their current television slate includes CBS’ Hawaii
Five-O.
Kurtzman and Orci began their careers writing for the popular TV series
Hercules. They went on to write for Xena: Warrior Princess, where
they moved up the ranks to become head writers for the show at the age of 23.
Next, they wrote for J.J. Abrams’s hit series Alias, beginning what has
turned out to be a fruitful collaborative relationship with Abrams. They
eventually served as executive producers on the show.
Kurtzman and Orci first met during high school. They both live with
their families in Los Angeles.
A
native of Baltimore, Maryland, JEFF
PINKNER (Screenplay by / Screen Story by) graduated from Northwestern
University and Harvard Law School. He moved to Los Angeles to pursue a
writing career in 1991 and soon thereafter a spec film script he wrote brought
him to the attention of David E. Kelley, who hired Pinkner to write a freelance
episode of Kelley’s TV show, “The Practice.” (The episode was soon thereafter
produced as an episode of “Ally McBeal.”)
From
this, Pinkner moved on to a television career, where among notable early jobs
he wrote “Early Edition” starring Kyle Chandler, and “The Beast” with Frank
Langella.
In
2001, J.J. Abrams hired Pinkner to join the initial writing staff of “Alias,”
along with future colleagues Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci. ”Alias,”
starring Jennifer Garner, ushered in a new era of television drama with its
cinematic storytelling, pacing and production values. Pinkner worked on the
show for all of its five seasons, ultimately serving as Executive Producer and
Showrunner.
During
this time, Pinkner, along with Abrams, Damon Lindelof, Jesse Alexander and
Bryan Burke, helped create “Lost,” which Pinkner served on as consultant in the
show’s initial year and then, when “Alias” ended, Executive Producer in the
show’s third season. That year, the “Lost” writing staff, including
Pinkner, were nominated for the Writers Guild of America (WGA) Award for Best
Dramatic Series.
Following
“Lost,” Pinkner was hired to be Executive Producer and Showrunner of the TV
series “Fringe,” created by Abrams, Alex Kurtzman and Bob Orci. Starring
John Noble, Anna Torv and Josh Jackson, “Fringe” became known as one of the
most compelling and best-acted science fiction shows on television. In the show’s third season, “Fringe” won a
Golden Globe Award for Best Dramatic Television Series.
Pinkner
is currently co-writing The Amazing
Spider-Man 3 with Kurtzman and Orci.
He is also co-writing The Dark
Tower with Akiva Goldsman, based on the series of novels by Stephen King,
for Ron Howard to direct. He also is developing television shows, among
them two series for Amblin Entertainment and TNT.
Pinkner
lives in LA with his wife and three children, and is still basking in the glow
of the Baltimore Ravens’ Super Bowl victory, and Baltimore Orioles return to
relevance.
JAMES VANDERBILT (Screen Story
by) is a talented multi-hyphenate whose diverse catalogue of films range from
heavy-hitting blockbusters, to edge of your seat thrillers, with a comedy or
two in between. He sold his first screenplay 48 hours before graduating from
the University of Southern California’s film writing program. Since then
he has found steady employment pushing words around on the page, which is
really lucky as that is the only thing he ever wanted to do.
He wrote the critically acclaimed,
true story Zodiac, directed by David Fincher, earning Vanderbilt
numerous accolades including a USC Scripter Award nomination and a Writers
Guild of America nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay. His other writing
credits include The Rundown, The Losers, The Amazing Spider-Man,
starring Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone, and White House Down,
starring Channing Tatum and Jamie Foxx. Among his producing credits are Basic,
Zodiac, the Showtime documentary, Suge Knight, and White House
Down.
Vanderbilt’s upcoming credits
include the screenplays for Solace, starring Anthony Hopkins; and Murder
Mystery with Charlize Theron.
Esquire Magazine profiled
him in their Genius Issue and called him a “Fearless Screenwriter.”
Vanderbilt is afraid of the following things, in no particular order – bugs,
flying, enclosed spaces, in-laws, roller coasters, being buried alive, and The
Dark.
He is a founding member and partner
in Mythology Entertainment, a company dedicated to story-driven entertainment
and content. He lives in Los Angeles like the rest of these fools.
E. BENNETT WALSH (Executive Producer) was most recently executive
producer of After Earth, starring
Jaden Smith and Will Smith (directed by M. Night Shyamalan); Ghost Rider™ Spirit of Vengeance, starring Nicolas Cage (directed by
Neveldine/Taylor); Knight and Day, starring
Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz (directed by James Mangold); and the crime
thrillers Edge of Darkness, starring
Mel Gibson (directed by Martin Campbell) and State of Play (based on the highly praised BBC miniseries of the
same name), starring Russell Crowe, Rachel McAdams, Jason Bateman, Ben Affleck,
Robin Wright Penn, Helen Mirren and Jeff Daniels (directed by Kevin Macdonald).
Walsh produced the critically acclaimed The Kite Runner, based on the
international best-selling novel; directed by Marc Forster, it garnered Golden
Globe® and BAFTA nominations for Best Foreign Language Film. He served as producer on the thriller Disturbia, starring Shia LaBeouf, which
became one of DreamWorks’ biggest grossing films of the year: its international box office surpassed $100
million—more than five times the film’s budget.
He also executive produced Ghost
Rider, starring Nicolas Cage and Eva Mendes (directed by Mark Steven
Johnson).
With Volumes 1 and 2 of Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill, Walsh enjoyed one of his
greatest successes as executive producer.
Kill Bill: Vol. 1 earned a
Golden Globe® nomination for star Uma Thurman as well as five BAFTA
nominations. The two films earned a
combined international gross of over $300 million.
DAN MINDEL, ASC,
BSC (Director of Photography) most recently lensed Star Trek Into Darkness, marking his third collaboration with
director J.J. Abrams after previously working on Star Trek and Mission
Impossible III. He will re-team with
Abrams as the director of photography on Star
Wars: Episode VII.
Mindel’s prior credits include Oliver
Stone’s Savages, John Carter for
director Andrew Stanton, Iain Softley’s The
Skeleton Key, and the Jackie Chan starrer Shanghai Noon.
Born in South Africa, Dan Mindel
studied in Australia and the UK before exploding onto the commercial world
under the tutelage of Tony and Ridley Scott.
He worked as a loader and shot 2nd unit on such films as Thelma and Louise and Crimson Tide, before earning his first
sole credit on the action thriller Enemy
of the State starring Will Smith.
Mindel’s partnership with Tony
continued on Spy Game and Domino, which allowed him the creativity
to service the director and story while further expanding his filmmaking
palette in photographic experimentation. Their inclusion of period hand crank
cameras, cross process reversal stock and HD cameras—all in nearly impossible
places to light—helped create a unique, kinetic look by incorporating equipment
from both the past and present. Mindel
currently resides in Los Angeles with his wife Lisa and their four children
Lily, Molly, Eden and Sam.
Originally a student of fine art, New York City
native MARK FRIEDBERG (Production
Designer) married his passions for both film and painting by cutting his teeth
as a production designer on a series of influential low-budget movies that came
about during the indie film movement of the early ‘90s.
Friedberg’s previous work on small but noteworthy
endeavors such as Alexandre Rockwell’s In
the Soup and Maggie Greenwald’s The
Ballad of Little Joe earned great attention, leading to Friedberg’s
collaboration with a variety of filmmakers, ranging from industry stalwarts Mel
Brooks (The Producers, 2005), and
Garry Marshall (Runaway Bride, New Year’s
Eve), to independent mavericks like Mira Nair (The Perez Family, Kama Sutra: A Tale of Love), Ang Lee (The Ice Storm, Ride with the Devil),
Todd Haynes (Far From Heaven), Jim
Jarmusch (Coffee and Cigarettes, Broken
Flowers), Wes Anderson (The Life
Aquatic with Steve Zissou, The Darjeeling Limited), Julie Taymor (Across the Universe), and Charlie
Kaufman (Synecdoche, New York).
Other films designed by Friedberg include Julie
Taymor’s imagining of Shakespeare’s The
Tempest, shot on location in Hawaii and on stage in Brooklyn; Jodie Foster’s
The Beaver, co-starring Foster and
Mel Gibson; and the romantic comedy Morning
Glory, starring Harrison Ford, Diane Keaton and Rachel McAdams, and
directed by Roger Michell. His work was
most recently seen in Darren Aronofsky’s epic Noah, starring Russell Crowe, Jennifer Connelly, Emma Watson and
Anthony Hopkins. He is currently
collaborating on director Ang Lee’s next project.
Recently Friedberg won the Emmy Award for
Outstanding Art Direction for his work on the critically acclaimed HBO
mini-series Mildred Pierce, starring
Kate Winslet and directed by Todd Haynes.
During his twenty-five-year editing career, PIETRO SCALIA, A.C.E. (Editor) has been an integral collaborator on
films from acclaimed directors such as Oliver Stone, Ridley Scott, Bernardo
Bertolucci, Gus Van Sant and Sam Raimi. The Italian-born Scalia was raised and
educated in Switzerland before moving to the United States to pursue
filmmaking, receiving his MFA in Film and Theatre Arts from UCLA in 1985.
Scalia began his career as an Assistant Editor for Oliver Stone on
Wall Street and Talk Radio, then went on to contribute as an Associate Editor on Born on the Fourth of July and as an Additional Editor on The Doors. In 1992, the 31year old
Scalia won his first A.C.E. Eddie Award, the BAFTA Film Award for Best Editing
and the Academy Award® on Stone’s JFK.
In 1998, Scalia received a second Academy Award® nomination for
Gus Van Sant’s Good Will Hunting. He
went on to edit G.I. Jane, Hannibal, Gladiator,
Black Hawk Down and American Gangster
for director Ridley Scott, garnering another Academy Award® nomination on Gladiator and winning his second Academy Award® for his work on Black Hawk Down.
After Body of Lies and Robin Hood, Scalia completed Prometheus with R. Scott in 2012 and The Amazing Spider-Man for Marc
Webb. Scalia’s other editing credits
include Little Buddha and Stealing Beauty for Bernardo Bertolucci,
The Quick and the Dead for Sam Raimi, Playing by Heart for Willard Carroll, Memoirs of a Geisha for Rob Marshall,
and Kickass for Matthew Vaughn. He most
recently re-teamed with Ridley Scott, serving as editor of The Counselor.
He has also co-edited documentaries such as 40 Years of Silence: An Indonesian Tragedy, The Eleventh Hour and Ashes and Snow. In addition, Scalia’s efforts include stints
as music producer with composer Hans Zimmer on three of Scott’s films, and
served as a Jury member at the Venice Film Festival in 2004 and at the Zurich
Film festival in 2012.
JEROME CHEN (Visual Effects Supervisor) is an
Academy Award®-nominated senior visual effects supervisor at Sony Pictures
Imageworks.
Chen served as visual effects supervisor on Marc Webb’s
The Amazing Spider-Man. He was also senior visual effects supervisor
on Beowulf and The Polar Express and applied his outstanding talents on the two Stuart Little films, creating the first
all-digital character to star in a live action film. He earned his first
Academy Award® nomination for the groundbreaking visual effects in Stuart Little, recognizing his advances
in the development of digital imagery techniques including innovations in
digital lighting, compositing, fur and cloth.
His work on Stuart
Little also was awarded with a Monitor Award for Best Electronic Effects in
a Theatrical Release. For Stuart Little 2,
Chen invented the complex feather systems and perfected the photo-real
integration for the film, which won the Prix du Long Metrage (Best Feature
Film) at the Imagina Awards in 2003.
Chen’s earlier film credits include Godzilla (Annie Award nomination for
Best Special Effects Animation in a Feature Film), Contact (Monitor Award for Best Electronic Effects in a Theatrical
Release), James and the Giant Peach, The
Ghost and the Darkness, and In the
Line of Fire.
Chen joined Sony Pictures Imageworks in its founding
year, 1992, and worked his way up through the production ranks as a digital
artist, senior animator, computer graphics supervisor, digital effects
supervisor to his current position of senior visual effects supervisor. He is
an acknowledged expert in the technique of integrating digital imagery with
live action, especially in the area of photorealistic effects, and is known
internationally for his presentations on the topics of digital character
creation and imagery techniques.
Academy Award®
winner DEBORAH L. SCOTT (Costume Designer)’s first project
as a feature film costume designer went on to become one of the highest
grossing films of all time, Steven Spielberg’s E.T. The
Extra-Terrestrial.
Scott went on to design such notable
films as Robert Zemeckis’ Oscar®-winning film Back to the Future, starring
Michael J. Fox; Ed Zwick’s Oscar®-winning film Legends of the Fall, starring
Brad Pitt and Anthony Hopkins; Steven Spielberg’s Minority Report, starring Tom Cruise; Roland Emmerich’s The Patriot; and Hoffa, starring Jack Nicholson.
Scott achieved the highest honor bestowed to
a costume designer when she won the Oscar® for her work on James Cameron’s Titanic,
starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet.
Some of Scott’s recent credits include James
Cameron’s blockbuster hit Avatar, all three installments of the Transformers
franchise, Ed Zwick’s Love & Other Drugs and Cameron Crowe’s We
Bought a Zoo. Scott’s most
recent credit is Michael Bay’s Pain and Gain starring Mark Wahlberg and
Dwayne Johnson; her work will next be seen in Cameron Crowe’s upcoming film, in
theaters this Christmas.
Hans Zimmer has
scored more than 100 films, which have, combined, grossed over 22 billion
dollars at the worldwide box office. He has been honored with an Academy Award®,
two Golden Globes®, three Grammys®, an American Music
Award, and a Tony® Award. In 2003, ASCAP presented him with the
prestigious Henry Mancini award for Lifetime Achievement for his impressive and
influential body of work. He also received his Star on the Hollywood Walk of
Fame in December 2010. Some of his most recent works include Steve McQueen’s 12 Years a Slave, Ron Howard’s Rush, Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel, History Channel’s miniseries The Bible; the
Christopher Nolan-directed films Inception, The Dark Knight and The
Dark Knight Rises; and Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.
Upcoming titles include Son of God and Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar.
Pharrell Williams, a three-time Grammy
winner, is one of the world’s most in-demand and influential music producers
and recording artists. This summer,
Williams became the 12th artist to hold the #1 and #2 spots on the Billboard
Hot 100 simultaneously as he was featured on two songs – Robin Thicke’s “Blurred
Lines,” also featuring T.I., which Williams also produced, and Daft Punk’s “Get
Lucky,” which Williams co-wrote – both of which have been called the “Song of
Summer.” He has previously composed songs and the score for the hit
animated films Despicable Me and Despicable Me 2.
Johnny Marr rose to fame as co-songwriter and
founder member of The Smiths. Since then, Marr has continued to push
boundaries and work with some of the world’s most exciting musical artists,
including Modest Mouse, The The, Pet Shop Boys, Talking Heads, and Beck. This
year NME awarded Marr the Godlike Genius award. He recently released the
critically acclaimed solo album, “The Messenger.”
Marvel, Spider-Man, and all related character names
and their distinctive licenses ™ and © 2014 Marvel Entertainment, LLC and its
subsidiaries. All Rights Reserved.
“ACADEMY AWARD®” and “OSCAR®” are the registered
trademarks and service marks of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and
Sciences.
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