OZ THE GREAT & POWERFUL Press Day (Part 2)

By Melissa Howland | March 5, 2013

Last week, WAMG took a journey down the yellow brick road in celebration of Disney’s new film OZ THE GREAT & POWERFUL while attending the press day for the film at the Langham Huntington Hotel in Pasadena, CA. No… really! They had a yellow brick road!

While at the junket, WAMG attended a press conference for the film. The conference was split into two parts. Below you will find the second half with actors Rachel Weisz, Michelle Williams, Zach Braff, and director Sam Raimi. Enjoy!

To check out the first half with actors James Franco, Mila Kunis, Joey King, and producer Joe Roth click HERE.

When small-time magician Oscar Diggs (James Franco) pulls one flimflam too many, he finds himself hurled into the fantastical Land of Oz where he must somehow transform himself into the great wizard—and just maybe into a better man as well.

Q: In addition to, uh, being a history of Oz, this movie is also a kind of a metaphorical history of the cinema from being a carnival sideshow attraction to becoming a great force that can motivate crowds and inspire.  Uh, what was it about “The Wizard of Oz” story that made you decide to merge these two themes together?

SAM RAIMI: Uh, what was it about “The Wizard of Oz” story that made me decide to do what?

Q: To sort of add the theme of the history of cinema from being a sideshow carnival attraction to becoming a great force that can motivate crowds and inspire?

SAM RAIMI: Well, um, what I was trying to do and what I think the screenwriters were trying to do and the art department, prop department, were trying to set up Oz’s knowledge as a tinkerer, Oz’s, uh, awareness of Edison’s kinescope and early motion picture cameras so that we could properly support the idea that he could have created this technology with the help of the tinkerers once he got to the land of Oz, uh, in the climax of the picture.  So I wasn’t trying to do a history of cinema as much as set up the character with certain abilities in the first act to let them properly pay off in the third act.

Q: This question for Michelle Williams, uh, we cinema lovers love your work, uh, on indie films before this and this is probably your first big blockbuster stuff, so how is that experience, you know, doing this CG visual effects and of course director Sam Raimi’s, yourself?

MICHELLE WILLIAMS: Um.  Well, I knew the moment that I met Sam that it wasn’t really going to be, uh, that different from, uh, other experiences that I’ve had because he’s, I mean, he is first of all like a consummate family man and his sets feel like, he makes like little homes.  And it feels very cozy and it feels very safe and it feels like all of your ideas are welcome, even the bad ones.  And that’s the way that I’ve, um, grown accustomed to working, and I like working, and-and I-and, um, and I had that with Sam.  I think we all-we all really had that with Sam.  Um.  And the-and-but-and what people have said before, and it’s entirely true, the thing that I’ve never experienced before is a director, um, with, uh, an unflagging sense of humor like Sam.  He really taught me a lot about how to like keep your chin up, like when the day is long and things aren’t going quite as you had sort of planned them out in your head, um, Sam is-Sam is there with a smile.  Sam is there with a hand.  Sam is there with a joke.  Um.  And he really taught me a lot about, um, uh, about, uh, keeping a good face.  Yeah.  And not getting-not getting, um, yeah, not getting down on yourself.

SAM RAIMI: Thank you. Another question like that, please.

Q: This movie obviously demonstrates a lot of love for the original “Wizard of Oz”.  But, uh, at-at the one moment when it appears to be a musical, it gets shut down promptly.  Can you please talk about, uh, about not going there as a musical?

SAM RAIMI: Um.  Yeah-we–  Yeah there was a-that was a tribute to the great “Wizard of Oz” picture.  But, um, early on I think the writers decided that we shouldn’t imitate that fantastic musical.  There was no-no comparison to the great quality of music in the original, in fact.  Ours was, uh, more based-more based on the Baum works.  So we decided not to make it a musical.  And just tell the fantastical tales that he had written about but that one number was a tribute to the great “Wizard of Oz” movie.  Did I answer your question?

Q: Hi, Mr. Raimi?  My question is about, uh, the visual effects and they were absolutely stunning and-and-and the 3-D really, really worked for me.  And I’m just wondering for you was there any particular big challenge for you this time around ‘cause obviously you’ve worked with-with effects in the past.  But was there anything in-in this particular shoot that was the most challenging for you?

SAM RAIMI: Yes, there were a tremendous amount of new challenges for me.  I had-didn’t know anything about 3-D so I had to go to school and learn about 3-D.  I had to meet with technicians and study the camera systems and go to effects houses and hear what the different visual effects artists had to say about working with the systems and I had to basically shoot some test days and see what the effects of convergence was on the audience and why the audience gets a headache.  I used to get headaches at 3-D movies and I didn’t want this movie to give people headaches so-

RACHEL WEISZ: Oh, did you figure that out?  Yeah.

SAM RAIMI: Yes.  They actually-

RACHEL WEISZ: Amazing.

SAM RAIMI: They know why.

RACHEL WEISZ: Why?

SAM RAIMI: There’s about four reasons that I learned about.  There may be more.  I-I’m sure technical people at this point are going, Raimi, you’re getting it wrong!  But I’ll tell you what I know, which is-you don’t want to dramatically change the convergence from shot to shot and have something in the-breaking the screen plane in the foreground and then quickly go to a shorter shot where there’s something in the deep background, and then again cut to a shot where you’re playing the convergence in the foreground.  It has to be delicately handled.  And you have to let the audience’s eyes adjust.  Have longer shots, if you intend to make that dramatic adjustment.  Or take them to a little stairway from convergence level to convergence level so that their brains can adjust and their eyes can adjust.  Otherwise you’re making their heads work so hard, it’s a-forcing those eyes-the muscles and the brain muscle to work in a way it’s not used to working and it gives headaches.  You do develop a muscle for it, though.  Uh, a tolerance for it, if you could-could say.  That I developed.  So I couldn’t trust my own instincts after a time.  I had to just go by the numbers.  What is the convergence on this.  How different is it, etcetera.  In addition, I didn’t want to-I-I don’t want to turn this into a technical conversation but it’s about where images are on the screen.  You don’t want to make the audience look both left and right dramatically from cut to cut and change convergence.  It’s just too difficult for-too much of a strain.  But it has to do with brightness, also.  And it has to do with ghosting in the background and a minimization of that and a contrast ratio that’s much tighter than in a normal-normal picture.  And there’s a lot of other technical ways to minimize stress on the audience.  Anyways, I had to learn so much about 3-D.  I had to learn about creating a whole world.  I-I surrounded myself with the best artists.  Not just actors but artists.  Uh, storyboard artists, visual effects artists, concept artists, landscape artists, greenery-greenswomen and men and people that really knew how to create a world from the ground up because I had never created a world before.  This is some-every single blade of grass and little blossom has been thought out by a individual artist.  Every insect is not from a library, is not from nature photography.  It’s created by artists.  There’s little zebra bees.  You can’t even see them.  There’s little-strange little white-haired squirrels that are half-muskrat, half-squirrel, that inhabit this land and giant creatures that lope like dinosaurs, you see only in the background but everything had to be animated and designed so I’d never been part of anything so gigantic before.  That was a new challenge.

Q: I want to ask-would like to ask the ladies, um, about your-your big fight at the end.  The wire work and everything.  Was it painful?  Was it fun?  Was it both painful and fun?  How did it work for both of you?

MICHELLE WILLIAMS: And I think we both really loved being on the wires.

RACHEL WEISZ: Yeah, it was-it’s very fun.  I mean, it was-a little scary the-the first day.  I mean, we-we had a rehearsal period where, um, these wonderful stunt coordinators who had worked extensively with Sam on these “Spiderman” films.  So they were all experts in making people fly, right, I think-

SAM RAIMI: They were experts.

RACHEL WEISZ: Yeah.

SAM RAIMI: But the ladies have been very good sports.  And truth is, I think it’s fun for the first, like, twenty minutes, on the wires.  But around hour four, hanging up there, I-I-I know it-I know those wires, they cut into you.  The straps do.  They dig into your legs, into your arms, and it just becomes, um, you’ve got to always exert a cert-a great degree of muscle control to remain-look, to look like you’re floating on your own power and it-I think it gets very exhausting and, uh, leaves its marks.

Q: What about acting during that?  I mean, you have to get through pain to-to really play that scene.  It was wonderful.

MICHELLE WILLIAMS: Thank you.

RACHEL WEISZ: Me, too.

MICHELLE WILLIAMS: Is what’s your ha-

RACHEL WEISZ: You just-you hear Sam say “action” and-and-

MICHELLE WILLIAMS: And everything else sort of-

RACHEL WEISZ: Yeah.

MICHELLE WILLIAMS: Drops away, I feel-I feel like you’re always kind of acting through something.  Like it’s really hot or it’s really cold or you-

RACHEL WEISZ: Yeah.

MICHELLE WILLIAMS: You know.  There’s always something else that’s going on that is-

Q: Or hanging from the ceiling.

MICHELLE WILLIAMS: Or hanging from the ceiling.

Q: Hi.  Mr. Raimi, was there a temptation to make Theodora a little more scary, given your background in horror.  And then for the ladies, um, what was the best part about being a witch?

SAM RAIMI: Well, I love-I love making those horror movies but, um-I was really guided by Mila Kunis’s performance and what her instincts were in playing that character.  And she decided that-and I’ve heard her say-that she was playing her like a woman scorned.  So even though-even though-and she wasn’t really thinking about the fact that she was green, I think she was-she’s told me she was playing it as an innocent who fell in love and her heart was broken and she suffered and she couldn’t take the suffering and wanted to end that suffering and her sister was all too willing to let that suffering end and it awakened something that was already there but just fueled the fire of-of, uh-I don’t know what you women call it, hatred, anger, mixed with love, jealousy, rage.  Rage is a good word.  That rage drove her.  And I’m-I-so I wasn’t tempted to-to make it more like a horror movie.  I wanted her to guide us and I would follow her with the camera.

Q: The best part about being a witch?

RACHEL WEISZ: Um-

MICHELLE WILLIAMS: Flying.

RACHEL WEISZ: Flying!  It’s really hard to beat flying as a skill.  Yeah.  I would say.  Yeah, flying.  Number one.  Number two-lightning bolts for me.  Um.

MICHELLE WILLIAMS: Making little girls smile when you walk by.

SAM RAIMI: You didn’t have that problem, I guess.

RACHEL WEISZ: I guess not.  I guess not.  But my winkie guards were very fond of me.  Do you remember on the-on the last day, when I-I kind of ran off and they had more shooting?  And they were all like in unison, “Bye, Evanora!”  Like that, they-I was their leader.

SAM RAIMI: Yeah.

RACHEL WEISZ: They believed in me.

SAM RAIMI: You were-

RACHEL WEISZ: Yeah.  I basically beat them all down, those winkie guards, and they-they’re-they’re my, uh, they’re my soldiers.

SAM RAIMI: That was funny.

RACHEL WEISZ: Do you remember that?

SAM RAIMI: Yeah, they formed a bond.  With her.

RACHEL WEISZ: Bye, Evanora.

SAM RAIMI: Great.

RACHEL WEISZ: Yeah.  You have children.  I have winkie guards.  Oh, lord.

Q: Hi.  Um, my question is for all three of the actors.  I’m wondering if you could talk, uh, very briefly about your experiences with the first film, the Judy Garland film, and how much you had to either draw on that or discard those memories, uh, to do the work you did here.

ZACH BRAFF: Good morning, everyone, um-

RACHEL WEISZ: [LAUGHTER]

ZACH BRAFF: No, um, uh, I-I love the film.  Um, the-um, sorry, what was the question?  Do we love-was oh, our experience of “Wizard of Oz”?

ZACH BRAFF: I like making these two laugh, though, it makes me feel good.  Um.  Sorry, these three.  Sam.  But them first, then you.  Um.  I think that the spirit of it, uh, that was what was so cool.  I mean, we weren’t-Sam wasn’t trying to remake “The Wizard of Oz”.  He was-you-you know, he-he was-you know, that sacred classic.  It was like we were gonna return to that world.  So I think that was what was exciting for us.  It was a way to go back and re-visit that world without-without the pressure, necessarily, of trying-or the audacity, I should say, of trying to remake what for a lot of people is so-so sacred.  And like everyone, I grew up on it and, uh-and, um, and loved it.  And I-I remember particularly just liking the physical comedy and-and the way that the characters moved.  I thought that was-you know, as a kid, so in-intoxicating and-and fun, you know, we didn’t-grow up on-on the Fred Astaires of-of old cinema because we didn’t see those as  much.  For us, “The Wizard of Oz” was on in rotation and the actors who did those animals were-was my early experience of-of physical comedy and, uh, and-and a big inspiration in my whole career.

MICHELLE WILLIAMS: Um.  Um.  Yeah, I gr-I-I don’t remember really like the first time that I saw the movie or-or anything like that but I do remember-I do remember the, um, feeling I had when I first realized that the characters in her waking life were the same as the characters in her dream life.  That the woman on the bicycle was the wicked witch.  And I remember being really affected once I had discovered that because a I-I felt kind of like somebody had been pl–  tricking me or playing with me.  Like, oh, I didn’t-something was working on me on a subconscious level that I wasn’t aware of and that kind of freaked me out as a kid.  Um.  And other than that, you know, I think it was just a-a great place, um-to take inspiration from.

RACHEL WEISZ: Um, it was-it’s the first-was it you who asked the question?  Who am I looking at?  Hello.  Uh, it was, um-the first film I remember seeing so it’s my earliest film memory.  So I guess it has that kind of-that kind of power and the bits that I remem-I remember my Mom taking me to the cinema.  I remember being about five.  I remember being really traumatized by the-the wicked witches.  They were very, very scary.  And I guess the thing I loved-I loved Judy Garland’s voice.  I love how she sings.  I-she gives me goose bumps.  Um.  So, yeah, for me it’s, uh, it’s about her-her singing, and it really makes me feel good.  Yeah.

Q: Uh, for Rachel and Michelle, right here.  Can you ladies talk a little bit about your costumes?  Those amazing dresses that you wore?  How did that change how you were approaching your characters and did you ask to keep them when the shooting was done?

RACHEL WEISZ: Um.  I didn’t actually ask to keep my co-I don’t know where I would wear that dress.  I imagine-I don’t have the right life for that dress.  I would like to have that life.  But I just-it doesn’t fit in.  It’s funny ‘cause Sam is so, um, up for exploration.  You know, he’s making this great big budget movie.  I can’t even imagine the level of pressure that he was under but he was just up for an exploration and-and-all the time so-so there are these incredible drawings of our costumes that were done by that German artist his name I’ve-

ZACH BRAFF: Just forgotten-

RACHEL WEISZ: Forgotten, yeah, but they’re incredible drawings.  And, you know, my character looks a bit like a bird of prey and slightly militaristic and via Las Vegas or however you want to see it.  But because I was getting into my character-Sam was like, “Well, you know, play around.”  So Gary and myself, the costume designer, spent a f–  you know, couple of weeks in a room and I cooked up this costume, which I brought to the first screen test, where basically I looked a little bit like the Duchess of Windsor.  I should be so lucky.  I mean, I don’t really look anything like her.  It’s this little green dress and a little crown and it was this height of my character who just desperately wanted to be queen.  And Sam looked at it and just said, “It’s just-uh, it’s just not right.  You need to go back to the original thing.”  But he kind of let me go-it was like part of my process, I think.  It was me finding my desire to be a-to be queen.  I wanted to be queen.  Do you remember that costume?

SAM RAIMI: I liked a lot of it and, um-

RACHEL WEISZ: It was wrong.

SAM RAIMI: I think both the girls-both you ladies, um, put a lot of input into your wardrobe, I think, and made it what it was.

RACHEL WEISZ: Yeah.

SAM RAIMI: I don’t think it was half the outfits that they turned out to be until they added touches, coming out of their character, what each of these particular dresses need.  Needed.

RACHEL WEISZ: Yeah.

SAM RAIMI: And it was-they were very important outfits because each of these ladies only changes once.  Uh.  Glinda changes for battle.  She decided-Michelle decided this was a little too frilly to go into battle with.  She needed to have a little bit more of a serious outfit, perhaps I’m using the wrong word but a battle dress.  And, um-

RACHEL WEISZ: Yes, I turned from green to black, once the audience knows who I-once I’m out the closet as a-

SAM RAIMI: Once you’re-

RACHEL WEISZ: Bad girl.  Uh, yeah, I go black-

SAM RAIMI: Like the expression, once your true colors are revealed.

RACHEL WEISZ: There we go.  Once my true colors are revealed.

SAM RAIMI: Right.  She had a green dress because she was caring for the Emerald City.  And then when she was revealed to be wicked, the black came out.

Q: Sam, uh, the-the Oz books have a legions of fans who are very loyal to it.  Because of that, did you have any trepidations about sort of getting into that-that-that field?  And, secondly, did it help having in the past done something like a Spiderman let it know what it’s like to deal with legions who are very loyal to a-a-a, you know, uh, printed material?

SAM RAIMI: Yes.  Spiderman helped me because I-I learned that, um, I can’t-you can’t be loyal to every detail of the book.  Every filmmaker knows when you make a book into a movie, the first thing you have to do is kill the book, unfortunately.  You’ve got to re-create it.  But I decided I could be truest to the fans of Baum’s great work if I recognized what was great and moving and touching and most effective about those books to me.  Just to me.  And put as much of that into this picture as I could.  And that’s so I was not slave to the details.  But I was a slave to the heart and the soul of the thing.  In as many ways as I could express it, I put it into this movie.

Q: So, uh, congratulations to all of you on this.  Uh, for Mr. Raimi, uh, of course Walt Disney wanted to, uh, tackle the-the land of Oz decades ago and-and others have bought up the rights.  So I’m curious what-what it means to you to be able to-in-in theory, bring, um, you know, this thing that-uh, the man who started this studio wanted to do so long ago and for all the actors, um, what your impressions were upon the first time of-of watching the movie, something that stuck out to you or-or it stayed with you that you just kind of didn’t imagine on set would look the way it did or turn out the way it did.

SAM RAIMI: Oh, what did I see in this movie?  That surprised me?

Q: [UNINTELLIGIBLE] for the actors for you getting to be able to bring this thing that-that Walt Disney wanted to do something decades ago and never got to do  [UNINTELLIGIBLE] but you get to do with the Walt Disney name attached to it.

SAM RAIMI: Well, it-I had learned that Walt Disney wanted to make an Oz picture only recently, after the, um, after we were done shooting, when the movie was almost finished.  And the guys in the marketing department said, “Take a look at this reel we’re putting on the DVD” and it showed how Walt was trying to get the rights to the Oz books and how he was gonna get his army of Mouseketeers together to each play a part.  That part I didn’t think was gonna work very well, actually.  That’s weird.  For his show.  But anyways, it was a dream-a passion and dream of his, and I thought that was very touching because I have-all I wanted to do was making the ultimate Walt Disney picture.  I thought this movie always could be.  It could be for families.  It could be uplifting.  And it makes sense in retrospect that it was Walt’s dream to make an Oz picture.  And I hope that Walt would have, uh, uh, ap-appreciated, uh, I hope he would have liked the movie.  Um.  There’s no violence in the picture so I think he would a like that.  He’s got, uh, some classic Disney princesses and witches in the picture.  I think he would like that.  And he’s got those Disney, um-you know, little bluebirds and, uh, cuddly creatures like the blue monkeys.  So I think he might have liked it.  Unless he hated it.  But I-but I-it’s hard to say.  Hard to say what he would have liked.  But I was honored to-to make it and surprised to find out that he had intended to make an Oz picture.

Q: Oh, hi.  Uh, this question is for Zach.  Um.  Finley is such an adorable character, for one.  Um.  I wanted to know more about the experience of actually doing the voice while on set ‘cause it seems like a different approach than most movies.

ZACH BRAFF: Yeah, it was-it was a little tricky and, um, Sam was, um, and I’m-was really, um, intent on having my there, interacting with everyone, which-which was great for me because I was-well when he first cast me, I was worried I was just gonna be confined in an audio booth the whole time.  But we ended up finding on set, uh, most of my stuff is with James, obviously.  And we ended up finding when I was actually there, when it was possible for me to be physically there, interacting with-with James, uh, we were getting the best stuff.  So we-we figured out a bunch of ways, um, and-and very often I was just kind of scrouched down.  We figured out if I was on my butt and hunched over, I was roughly 36 inches tall, which was-which is how tall Finley is.  So often I was there in my little bluescreen onesy, um, uh, which is-even after six months, still made people laugh when I put it on.  Um.  Um.  And-but I really would just often scrunch down and-and just play the scenes straight with-with James.  And they were, um-three different cameras that were on my-my body and face and Sam cut that v–  uh, separate from the-the three film cameras.  And Sam cut that video footage together to create the performance that the animators, uh, would eventually animate, uh, Finley off of.

 

Disney’s fantastical adventure “Oz The Great and Powerful,” directed by Sam Raimi, imagines the origins of L. Frank Baum’s beloved wizard character. When Oscar Diggs (James Franco), a small-time circus magician with dubious ethics, is hurled away from dusty Kansas to the vibrant Land of Oz, he thinks he’s hit the jackpot—fame and fortune are his for the taking—that is until he meets three witches, Theodora (Mila Kunis), Evanora (Rachel Weisz) and Glinda (Michelle Williams), who are not convinced he is the great wizard everyone’s been expecting. Reluctantly drawn into the epic problems facing the Land of Oz and its inhabitants, Oscar must find out who is good and who is evil before it is too late. Putting his magical arts to use through illusion, ingenuity—and even a bit of wizardry—Oscar transforms himself not only into the great wizard but into a better man as well.

“Like” OZ THE GREAT & POWERFUL on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ozthegreatandpowerful

“Follow” OZ THE GREAT & POWERFUL on Twitter: https://twitter.com/disneyozmovie

Visit the website: http://www.disney.com/thewizard

 OZ THE GREAT & POWERFUL lands in theaters March 8