Interview: Matthew Vaughn - Part 2
Here, the X-Men: First Class director talks about his amazing cast, comic fans and Take That.
In the second part of our round table interview with X-Men: First Class director Matthew Vaughn, we focus on his stellar cast. He also reveals why he doesn't like 3D, how he coped with comic fans during production, and exactly why he asked Take That to write and perform the end credits song.
He also talks about the possibility of Kick-Ass 2, missing out on directing X-Men 3: The Last Stand, and his project with Mark Millar. Read the first part here!
Did you have actors for Charles and Erik in mind when you were writing First Class?
[James McAvoy] was top of my list when we talked about who would play Professor X. I thought McAvoy was perfect. He's a good man. He's a fucking good actor. So I sat with him and then he got pretty annoyed with me because I kept and made him audition with every single actor who came in for Magento, because I was like, if we're trying to do that Butch Cassidy/Sundance Kid of chemistry I think it was really really important that you have to see that chemistry beforehand. The poor guy. I'm wheeling him in every day saying you've got to read with this other actor and this other actor. Then when Michael [Fassbender] came in, after 20 seconds of the two of them together, I'm like, okay, I've found them.
I said, don't worry about Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart. I think they did a great job, but you've got to make these characters your own. I think, the way I was saying to James was, let's make the character more fun, so that you slowly see him becoming the Professor X. When we first meet him, he's not a professor, and we were trying to show that transition. It's just not as fun. Seeing Magneto growing into a villain, that's far more interesting than seeing a guy sadly becoming a cripple, and becoming a teacher, ultimately. It's not quite the arc that you want to see as much, but I think James did a fabulous job, because it's the hardest character to make interesting.
Magneto. I said to Michael - I've always wanted to do a Bond movie, so pretend you're Bond, but you don't have to have gadgets. Bond would have to use his watch to make it magnetic, and you can do shit that other people can't. You're the ultimate assassin in the world that no one knows about, you and your powers. I've always loved Magneto. I don't know why. It's weird as his power's bloody odd if you think about it! It's not that great a power, but there's something about Magneto I've always loved.
Was Kevin Bacon your first choice for baddie Sebastian Shaw?
There were two actors I was thinking of, either Colin Firth, or Kevin Bacon, and they're best friends, which I didn't fucking realise - really close! So they knew about it as well, because I was talking to both at the same time! But Fox were very nervous about having another Brit in there. Because I thought it would be very interesting to see Firth playing a villain - this was way before King's Speech and getting Oscars and shit - but I think he's a great actor, and it would be interesting to see what he could have done with it. But also I've been a fan of Kevin's for a long, long time. Kevin had that bravado that Shaw needed. Shaw's a difficult character. That whole thing about absorbing energy, and I thought, 'how do you do that?' Then when you see him, with the ponytail, and the dressing up in the cravats and all that shit. If you get it wrong, I don't want it to be like Stormbreaker, where you get to these villains, and you can't take them seriously. So I sat down with Kevin and said, let's make him like a Bond villain, where he's suave, debonair and charming.
How did you cast the smaller roles, as you have actors like Oliver Platt in bit parts?
Actually we were thinking of Dexter [Fletcher] to play the Oliver Platt role. He came in and auditioned for it, but again... I get why Fox were nervous, saying 'you can't have all these Brits,' but I like working with my friends. It's so much easier to turn up with my mates on set, you have a laugh. I don't have to pussy foot around. If I could cast my mates in every movie, and I do, I will. [Jason Flemyng] is my lucky talisman! I think every character in the movie is... people with one line are just as important as someone with a thousand lines. It takes one bad delivery to remind an audience that they're watching a film, and it just takes you out of the moment. So if I can get away with casting great actors in smaller roles, I'll take it. And they all said yes. I remember with Flemyng, when he read the script, I said, 'come on, play Azazel'. I had to bullshit him that in the sequel he'd have a much bigger role, because he hated it on Clash [of the Titans], all the prosthetics he had to do on Clash! and I said, 'no, it'll be fine'. Then he signed up, and said, 'fuck me, I'm red!' Azazel, even though he hardly speaks, he's still a character, and you've got to believe what he does, and the looks in the background. Casting good actors makes movies better. I shock my casting directors, because I say names for people with two lines, and they say, 'you're never going to get that'. Well, there's no harm in asking them.
Why didn't you go down the 3D route for X-Men: First Class?
I'm sure if we'd have had more time they'd have brought it up. I'm not a big fan of 3D. I think Avatar works in 3D because they really shot and designed it... I think half these films I see, it just doesn't feel like they've designed every shot to be 3D. They have something coming towards the camera every now and then. That's what I loved about Avatar. They made it just to give it more depth, and you could tell Cameron knows what 3D means. But the rest of these directors? When they do that post conversion shit? You're watching it, and they've cut it in 2D, and they need it in 3D, so they slow it down. I find the glasses annoying. My kids hate it as well; I sit with them and they take the glasses off half way through and I'm like, you've got to watch it with them on! Maybe I should be more of a fan of 3D, but for me Avatar's the only 3D movie where I became immersed in the world. Doesn't Cameron call it RealD? I think Hollywood's fucking up 3D now as well, because they're cheapening the process and people don't care anymore.
How much pressure did you allow yourself to have from the hardcore comic fans?
You read about it, but - don't take this the wrong way - you have to ignore it at the same time. I remember talking to Daniel Craig about this when he was doing Bond. I was like, fuck these fuckwits. It doesn't matter - they haven't seen what you're doing. You're a good actor, so let your work do the talking. I always knew when people saw him as Bond, they'd think he was great. So I had this... it's odd, as you do read, and you do want to hear what the concerns are, and if you can address. But at the same time, you don't know who the hell is writing it. It could be some eight-year-old kid. If you met these people, you'd be like, I'm listening to an eight-year-old on how to construct a film? But now and again there's be some valid points. I was amazed at the negativity to the X-Men world. Well, not really, after watching Wolverine. [laughs] It was quite scary - am I going to manage to turn fanboys around? I thought the best way of doing it was, try to make a good movie that is respectful to the other X-Men movies, but not reverential to them.
Why did you get Take That on board to do the theme song?
I think this movie, out of all the X-Men movies - correct me if I'm wrong, females in the room - I think there's a lot for women to enjoy in this film. [Cue geek meltdown over Magneto] We had the philosophy, like remember Armageddon? The Aerosmith song? That got girls, who probably wouldn't have originally gone to see Armageddon, they saw there was a love song, and were like 'oh, maybe there is something in the film'. I bumped into Gary [Barlow] in LA, and said, 'do you want to come and see a rough cut of it?' and they came, and they wrote the song. I said if we can do a video which gets girls more interested, and they're going on tour, so they're playing to one and a half million people who traditionally might not be interested in X-Men, and we might get them to come and watch it. So it's pure commerce, to be blunt, and I want women to see this film, because there are a lot of moments that females will like.
Why did you turn down directing X-Men 3: The Last Stand?
The reason why I pulled out of it was because I genuinely didn't think I had enough time to make the film. Although they gave me much more time on that than they did on this film! And that world was already created, so what was more satisfying about this was that after Stardust and Kick-Ass I was far more comfortable about a bigger budget, special effects and all that shit. But I loved the idea that I could recast every character, set up a new world and do my version of an X-Men movie. Because X3, you're ultimately following a trend. You know I storyboarded the whole bloody film - I did the script. I think my X3 would have been at least 40 minutes longer. I can remember when I was writing the scenes when Jean Grey turns around to Wolverine and says 'kill me', the deaths at the end, Professor X's death.... I was writing all that shit and I just felt that they didn't let the emotion and the drama play out in that film. It just became wall-to-wall noise and action and how long was it? I think it was about 98 minutes, not even that, 89. I would have let it breathe and have had far more dramatic elements to it. But then they probably wouldn't have let me do that. Here, Fox were great on this. Fox have got this really bad reputation but they were true allies on this. They really let me get on with it.
Will there be a Kick-Ass 2?
Maybe! Everyone says we're doing it, but I don't know yet. The weird thing about Kick-Ass 2, I'd love to do it as I enjoyed it so much, but I'm a big believer that if you're going to do a sequel it's got to be as good as the first if not better. The business brain of mine says let's do Kick-Ass 2, shoot it and get it out there and we'd make a lot of money, but I really do love that movie. It was a very special moment to me making that film and I don't want to spoil it. I'm not saying it's as good as Pulp Fiction but it would be weird if Tarantino did Pulp Fiction 2. Everything that made Kick-Ass original and fun, I think if you did it again, it could be crass. I'm not saying it won't happen but it would have to have something about it which made me feel comfortable that the audience would enjoy it as much.
What's the status of your planned project with Mark Millar, Super Spy?
I co-created it with him [Millar]. We're writing it at the moment. The weird thing is, we came up with a great plot and great characters, and I'm telling it to my kids every night as a story. What I do is I tell the stories to my kids and see how they react. It's the tone I haven't figured out yet. I rang up Mark and said, look, I've got this idea. You know what we did for Kick-Ass? Let's do that for spy movies. And we both came up with these characters, which are cool. But the problem is, I cannot decide which way to take it. Because I could make it like a really great kids' film, but I don't want to be Spy Kids. Or I could make it really hardcore. You know how Kick-Ass did fall between being a kids' movie or an adults' film, and it was neither? That's the problem I'm having with the super-spy thing. But we are working on it.
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