30/04/2008 : Interview exclusive de Craig Mazin sur super-heros-movie.over-blog.com !

Le scénariste et réalisateur Craig Mazin a gentillement accepté de se prêter au jeu de l'interview après la sortie de son film. En voici la retranscription intégrale, en anglais pour le moment.


ZAZ : The Superhero! project began in 2004. Was it your idea or Dimension's idea ?

Craig Mazin : It was my idea.  I actually pitched it when we were doing Scary Movie 3.

When you wrote the first treatments for the movie, did you deal with a Spider-Man spoof ? Please, tell us how the story evolved from the first concept to the final cut.

The treatment always concentrated on Spiderman, but we had a bit more Batman Begins in the early versions (including a bit where our hero climbed a mountain to seek counsel in a temple).  Initially, we had very little from any other movies…no X-Men, no Fantastic Four or anything like that.  It was our preference to make a movie that wasn’t too much of a direct spoof of lots of other movies.

Between the officialisation of the project in 2004 and the beginning of the shooting in 2007, have you worked on other projects ? How much time did you actually get for the writing of the screenplay ?

Yes, there was Scary Movie 4 in the middle there, and I also worked for quite a while on an animated project called Opus, although sadly that one didn’t come to fruition.  I had about six months to work on the screenplay for Superhero! before we started to prep.

Richard Donner's Superman really defined how to tell a superhero story on big screen. Sam Raimi's Spider-Man used the same structure. Did it get a certain influence on your choice of spoofing Spider-Man and taking its structure ? Were there other reasons to spoof almost only Spider-Man ?

Basically, we spoof movies that are good, popular and serious.  You need that eager quality in order to get good spoof material.  Spiderman had the love story, the coming of age tale, and such a wholesome eagerness about it.  It felt right.

Spoof movies never have big budgets. Nevertheless, the genre that you spoof, superheroes, need big budgets because of the sfx. Did you need to rewrite some stuff because it was too expensive ?

Yes.  Our budget was nearly half what we had for Scary Movie 3, and I definitely felt that every step of the way.  Big fight scenes were written out, the entire ending was dramatically changed in order to accommodate budget…it was a never-ending struggle.

How was David Zucker (or other crew members) implied in the screenwriting process ?

David worked with me the way he did on Scary Movie 3 and Scary Movie 4.  He reads everything, we discuss it all, pitch out possible other jokes, and so forth.  In short, he does what a good producer should.

Do you test your jokes in your private circle (out of the production team) to see if it works ? Were some jokes in the movie found by some crew members or actors ?

We have a cast reading before we start shooting, and that often tells us which jokes are working better than others.  However, because so many of the jokes are visual or physical, you’re going on faith with much of it and hoping that it cuts together the way you’d hope.  That’s also why there’s not much in the way of improv…the scenes require too much prep to allow for much variance.  There are always some places where we can give our cast free reign, and we’re always rewarded for it.

When and why did David Zucker decide not to direct the movie ? Did you want to helm the movie or was it an idea from the producers ?

I think he was ready for a break after the brutal grind of Scary Movie 3 and Scary Movie 4.  Everyone felt I was a logical choice to take the wheel for this one, and I appreciate their faith.

From the moment that you knew you would direct this movie, did it influence your writing ? If the answer is yes, how did it influence you ?

Not really.  Because I was sitting next to David every day during production when he was directing, I already understood much of how things translated.  If anything, directing your own writing makes you harder on the writing, because you know you’re going to be accountable for it.  It also makes the notes process more emotional.  If you write something and it’s changed for the worse because of notes or budget or schedule, it hurts…but directing it hurts even more because you keep thinking, “I know I could do this better, if only for…”  And you know you’re going to get blamed for something outside your control.

These movies (spoofs) are funny because you hire straight actors to play zany comedy. How do you convince such respectable actors like Marion Ross to play these crude scenes like this never-ending farting moment ?

I didn’t have to convince her at all.  She wanted to do it.  In general, if you have to convince someone to do these jokes, they’re the wrong actor for the part.  Our casts needs to be willing participants in the insanity.

During the Scary Movie 4 promo, you said that the Superhero! cast would be different from the one for the Scary Movie series (no Leslie Nielsen, etc.) Why did you choose to cast some of Scary Movie actors to play supporting roles ?

I know this might shock some people, but the director doesn’t have total control over casting!  As in all things, compromises with the studio must be found.  However, in the case of Leslie, I changed my mind.  I needed an “Uncle Ben” character, and there are jokes that only Leslie can get away with.  No one else can molest a corpse and be forgiven.

During the pre-production, did you spend a long time on the creation of this fictional universe with the art deparment (costumes, town, etc) ?

Yes.  Costumes were obviously critical.  When it came to the look of the town, budget and schedule sort of ruled the day, and I was limited to what I could work with on studio backlots…although I think that turned out nicely.  Many of the interior sets were seriously compromised by budget.

What can you tell us about the process of creating the Dragonfly and Hourglass costumes ? It seems that people who worked on the Spider-Man costume worked on your movie.

From the beginning, I knew it was critical to have serious costumes.  If the costumes are “funny,” the rest of the jokes won’t have anything to play off.  Our wonderful costume designer Carol Ramsey worked tirelessly to create our hero’s costume, using some of the same technology used in the Spider-Man suit.  We made great use of a terrific company called Frontline, which not only supplied us with the Dragonfly suit and the foam musculature that went under it, but also created the Hourglass costume from scratch.  Those guys were amazing…and did so much with the limited resources we had.

Being the screenwriter and director, you had more responsibility. So, you couldn't blame the screenwriter or the director about the result of the movie... because it was you ! Was it a relief to get David Zucker et Bob Weiss as producers ?

No.  I hate those guys.

Seriously, though, David and Bob and I have always felt complete shared responsibility for the movies we’ve done.  Scary Movie 3 and Scary Movie 4 and Superhero! are team movies, and even if we shifted hats around throughout them, it always came down to the three of us figuring it all out and trying to make stuff work.  I had more to do on this movie, but the team was still the team.

The previous Scary Movies were shot in Canada. Why did you work in Los Angeles for this movie ? Was it better for you to work there (because you were closer to your family) ?

You got it.  David and I both insisted on Los Angeles because of our families.

Scary Movie 4 was shot in HD. Why did you come back to the 35mm format for this movie ?

God knows I didn’t want to.  I loved working with the Genesis system.  Apparently the film package was cheaper for us on this movie, so again, it was a budget thing.

During the shooting of your movie, the writer's strike began. How did it affect your work ?

Somewhat dramatically.  Throughout the film, I would sit with David and Bob on our Sunday “day off” and rewrite the material for the upcoming week’s work.  Once the strike started, those sessions ended, of course.  We had about 15 shooting days to go, much of which was the ending of the film.  The ending could have used those extra polish days, but it wasn’t to be.  Only until we were in post-production did the studio sign an interim deal with the union, which allowed me to write additional material as well as some new voice-over material.

When the strike was over, did you rewrite or reshoot some scenes that you couldn't change during the strike and wanted to improve ?

Unfortunately, we had an extremely short post production period…about half of what a film normally gets, so we could only do a very limited additional photography session.  Wish I could have done more.  Oh well.

The budget was pretty low for a superhero movie and post production was short. How did you get convincing sfx ?

Alison O’Brien, our VFX producer, did an amazing job getting some terrific work out of some terrific companies.  Zoic and Entity both did a ton of work in a brutally short amount of time.  Hats off to them.

What scenes did you add after the test screenings ? Are the X-Men, Batman Begins and Fantastic Four spoofs an idea from the producers ?

The Batman Begins flashback had been in the script from the start.  In fact, it was the opening scene of my first draft.  The X-Men and Fantastic Four stuff was added in at the request of the studio, although I like much of it.

Do you have a scene that you particulary like and that you had to cut because of a negative response from the audience ?

Yes.  There’s this terrific bit where Lou Landers attempts to knock Jill Johnson unconscious, but we pull a bizarre switcheroo.  Christopher does one of the best double takes I’ve ever seen.  We all loved it.  Got nothing from the audience…but I think I put it in the DVD version anyway, because, well…I love it.

Why did you decide to include deleted scenes during the end credits ?

Not my decision.

How did you work on the music with James Venable ? What were your instructions ?

Jim did an incredible job as always.  I asked that he come up with themes for our hero, our villain and our romance, and he delivered.  He knows exactly how to stay out of the way of jokes without completely ignoring them either.  Jim’s our secret weapon.

Who decided to include two original songs during the end credits ? Was it a way to make it look more like a "real" movie ?

I asked Drake and Sara to do songs for me because I knew they were both talented.  I don’t think it adds “realness” to the movie…I just like the songs!

How did it happen with the MPAA to get the PG-13 version ?

We had to cut a lot of good jokes.  That’s how it happened.  Good news is that all of those jokes are restored in the DVD version, and frankly, I don’t think any of them ought to have gotten us an R, so in my opinion as a parent, the DVD version is still material I’d consider PG-13, even if the MPAA didn’t.

How did you react when the producers changed the title Superhero! (a reference to Airplane!) into Superhero Movie ? Because of the "Movie", some people thought it was by the same guys who did Epic Movie and Date Movie; then, Meet the Spartans came out two months before and got terrible reviews. Did you think it could affect your film ?

Yes, this was a studio decision.  I didn’t like it then, and I don’t like it now.  I think it took a bad situation (confusion with the Friedberg & Seltzer movies) and made it worse.

The movie poster is in the same style than the Scary Movies posters. Did you previously think about a more ambitious poster ?

Yes.  I imagined a campaign that sold the movie as an event.  In other words, the campaign would be serious, but the jokes would undercut the pomposity of it all.  The studio went in a different direction.

Why didn't the producers screen the movie for critics ?

I don’t know.  We had to convince them to screen the movie for critics when we did Scary Movie 4.  I guess they’re afraid of bad reviews, but not screening the movie ensures more bad reviews…everyone’s suspicious if you act like there’s something to hide.  I think that hurt us as well.

You worked on the movie until the end of February and the movie was released at the end of March. How did you feel after all that work ?

No, I was working on the movie well into March!  Our schedule was insane.  I think I finished just two weeks before the movie hit theaters.

I feel tired.

Will the dvd be a real director's cut ? Will you add some parts in scenes that we know ? Can we expect some new scenes not in the theatrical cut ?

No, the studio didn’t give me the opportunity for a director’s cut DVD.  It’s an unrated version at the very least, so I was able to restore quite of a bit of stuff, and there were certain scenes that were edited in a way for theatrical per the studio’s request that I changed back to the way I preferred.  There are still some things in the cut that I would do differently in a director’s cut, but not many.

What can you tell us about the dvd extras ? I've read that you planned a screenplay/final cut comparison feature.

Yes, I planned that.  Ain’t happening, as far as I know.  I think the DVD will have the usual assortment of deleted scenes, a typically self-effacing commentary from me and Bob and David, and a few other goodies as well.  The real draw I think will be the unrated feature, though., which has more jokes.

Would you like to make other spoofs in the future, or do you think about a new carreer orientation ? What can you say about your project with Jerry Bruckheimer ?

After three in a row, I’m ready for a break.  I didn’t get into the business to do spoofs, although I’ve had a great time doing them.  Can’t talk about the Bruckheimer thing, but happily, it’s a change of pace.

Thanks for taking your time to answer my questions.

Always a pleasure!


Encore une fois, merci à lui pour sa disponibilité et sa franchise.