He had the biggest role in the movies last year, but Andy Serkis doesn’t have to worry about fans and paparazzi.
Serkis, as you well know, created the title character in “King Kong” ($30.98), Peter Jackson’s giant movie. Before that, Serkis – wearing a motion-capture suit, as he did for “Kong” – played and did the voice for Gollum, the twisted creature in Jackson’s “Lord of the Rings” trilogy. But Serkis isn’t entirely unrecognizable.
“It’s funny – with Gollum and now Kong, I always thought that I’d be completely anonymous,” says the 41-year-
old British actor, “but because of DVDs and behind-the-scenes stuff and ‘Kong Diaries,’ yeah, people do recognize me, not to an unhealthy extent. I have a certain amount of anonymity, and certainly professionally I’m not typecast. Well, it’s not that you can be typecast, because there aren’t that many roles for 25-foot gorillas.”
Serkis is referring to the DVD of “King Kong – Peter Jackson’s Diaries.” Most of the extras on the DVD of the film released this week are of Jackson’s post-production diaries, so you’ll see Serkis there too – not only as Kong but playing the role of Lumpy, the cook on the ship that transports Ann Darrow (Naomi Watts), Jack Driscoll (Adrien Brody) and Carl Denham (Jack Black) to Skull Island, the kingdom of the great ape.
While many people flocked to the film to see the breathtaking special effects – from an amazing re-creation of Depression-era New York City to the roller-coaster battles of the prehistoric monsters on Skull Island – the heart of the film is the special relationship between Kong and Ann. Though not known primarily as a comic actor, Serkis says that it was important that Kong “didn’t have to be just an angst-ridden gorilla. It was a really crucial discovery in that characterization that we could afford for him to be funny so that Ann would want to spend time with him.”
Serkis never expected to end up playing roles in a motion-capture suit. When he auditioned for “LOTR,” it was to do the voice of Gollum. But the actor felt like he had to inhabit the role to do the voice; so he made an audition tape playing Gollum and sent it to Jackson, who then met him and shot him from “all different angles. Then the whole motion-capture thing evolved.”
While you don’t see Serkis in the role of Gollum or Kong, you do see his performance, and many – myself included – believed he should be recognized with an Oscar nomination.
“A lot of people have a lot of theories about this,” says Serkis. “Some think that a special category should be created. Really, my take on it, which I arrived at over the last couple of years, is that it’s acting. It isn’t any different than I’d approach a conventional role. The processes and the mechanisms are different, by which the performances are different, and the enhancement of the performance happens in a particular way.
“Conventionally, on a film, you wear a costume, you wear makeup – all other people’s work – sometimes you wear special-effects makeup. … With motion capture, you have animators translating your performance using their craft. But at the core of it, it’s still acting.”
Although it generated numerous well-deserved raves and was a box-office hit, the actor believes that “Kong” may not have gotten nominations almost as a reaction to the success of “LOTR.”
“I think ‘Kong’ is a great film. I think when people watch it on DVD, they will realize that.”
NEW ON DVD
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe *** Faith and possibility are nearer to each another than little Lucy Pevensie’s two front teeth in Andrew Adamson’s loving adaptation of C.S. Lewis’ classic. And one need not be of a particular monotheistic bent to be moved by that notion. World War II refugees Lucy and siblings Edmund, Susan and Peter become our surrogates once they travel through a wardrobe into Narnia, a realm where fauns, centaurs and chatty animals have been enduring a 100-year cold snap, thanks to the White Witch (Tilda Swinton). Special-effects magic never overwhelms the truths of their spiritual sojourn: Forgiveness transforms; trusting in the impossible has its own deep and magical logic; and death is not always what it seems. PG; 135 minutes (Lisa Kennedy)
Bee Season *** An effective and affecting adaptation of Myla Goldberg’s intense, literate novel. Richard Gere plays a renowned scholar of mystical Judaism and captures the focus of a father trying too hard to make his family in his own image. Flora Cross is terrific as the brooding daughter enchanted by letters. PG-13; 104 minutes (Michael Booth)
“Memoirs of a Geisha” ** 1/2 Arthur Golden’s best seller about a girl sold into servitude in Kyoto who later becomes a renowned geisha in pre-World War II Japan demanded a deft gift with the epic and the intimate. It’s an elusive mix that seldom gets its due in director Rob Marshall’s adaptation. Ziyi Zhang as Sayuri, Michelle Yeoh as her mentor and Gong Li as her rival give the film great glamour and its best drama. PG-13; 137 minutes (Lisa Kennedy)
“Get Rich or Die Tryin”‘ *** Inspired by the true story of rap artist Curtis (50 Cent) Jackson, this film tells a harrowing story: He never knew his father, was orphaned by the early death of his mother, was selling drugs as a teenager, was shot nine times but lived and eventually sold millions of albums. Jackson plays the character based on himself, Terrence Howard is his friend and manager, and Joy Bryant is the woman who loves him. R; 134 minutes (Roger Ebert)
