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template for using great effects but also
having characters that are fully rounded.
I wasn’t making movies with huge effects
so I couldn’t follow Sam’s model in that
way and it might sound like a small thing
or an insignificant thing, but for me as a
performer it’s a very big thing. One thing
that Sam is great at is his on-set behavior.
He always makes it fun to be at work
and he makes every department feel like
they are contributing equally. One of the
main things a director can do is to bring
everybody together and have everybody
contribute their best work. I really try and
model my on-set behavior after Sam.
(
Steven) Soderbergh said something too.
He came to my school and talked about
directing and he said “it’s not as if you’re
the parent on set, but in some ways you
are. It’s how people look at you and if you
are a bad parent it’s going to reflect on the
children.” So I try and keep that in mind
and if I do get upset, I try and isolate it to
my producer or close collaborator so that it
doesn’t spread to the larger crew.
What is it that makes a
person great and powerful
for you?
One thing about this business is you often
get to work with your heroes, the people
who you look up to and you get to work
with great artists of all kinds — directors,
actors, writers, whatever. So I’ve met a lot
of my heroes and the one’s that I keep as
my heroes are the ones that do what they
do so well but do it without arrogance;
those who are still open and are still giving
back; those who are working at the top
level but also looking towards people that
are coming up and that kind of thing. That’s
what I respect most because I do love
collaboration so much. I collaborate with
people that have more experience than I
do and now I teach and I collaborate with
people that have less experience than I do.
People who are the best collaborators, who
help other people rise and give back —
they are the great ones.
There are a lot of aspects to that. First of
all, there are legal issues where that film
was made by MGM and I think the rights
have been purchased by Warner Brothers. I
think the filmmakers wanted a relationship
to the original, the bound books, which are
public domain now, but there were certain
aspects of the ‘39 film that were created
for that film so there was always a fine line
of paying homage to that world that most
people recognize, but also not going too far
so that it’s not stealing Warner Brothers’
intellectual property or something. For me
the most important part of revisiting Oz
—
something that has a big part in a lot of
people’s hearts — is again paying homage
but having a fresh take on the characters.
There’s a lot of pressure to just match up
to expectations but if you have this slightly
ironic or humorous take to it, you can
get away with more so they can build a
beautiful world, but also have a little bit of
fun with it.
What did you bring of
yourself to this character?
Well, I’m not a circus magician but I am
a performer. I worked with Sam on four
“
My heroes are the ones that do
what they do so well but do it
without arrogance; those who are
still open and still giving back...”
movies and he brings a lot of himself to his
characters, so you could look at this movie
and the way that the Wizard — who is not
an actual Wizard with magical powers but
is somebody who uses sleight of hand to
put on a show — to transport people, to
entertain people. It’s a metaphor for what
Sam does, for what I do. I think telling
stories is still very important, so in that
sense I think I brought…
So you mean you opened
up really?
In some ways you could say it’s a portrait
of what I do as an artist or a performer.
Do you pick up a lot from
the various directors you
work with?
I certainly learn from every director I work
with and I’ve actually thought about this
a lot. When I started directing my own
little movies, Sam was very much in my
mind, in particular because Sam does a lot
of things very well. He’s great at making
huge budget films but still keeping the
human element alive and if you look at
the first
Spiderman
film, it really sets the
James with Mila Kunis
Acting with a computer-
generated character
