Max and the
Wild Things "Monsters"
by Lynn Barker
 Just about every kid in the civilized world probably either read, or had read to them Maurice Sendak's book "Where the Wild Things Are". It's the illustrations most of us remember; huge, furry clawed and toothed "monsters" playing with a kid wearing a crown and a wolf suit! Director Spike Jonze has brought the beloved book to cinematic life in an effort to "make a movie about childhood" that is really for everybody, including teens. If this was one of your fave childhood memories, you are in for a treat.
We got to chat with Max and his Wild Things (sounds like a rock band!) in Beverly Hills recently to learn that the actors voicing the beloved critters from the book had tons of fun recording their voices all together while they cavorted with props on a big sound stage rather than alone in an isolated recording booth. 12-year-old tween Max Records who, coincidentally plays Max in the movie, got to travel to the Melbourne, Australia coastal area and play all day with some friendly actors wearing the giant Wild Things suits. It was our impression that a great time was had by all. Hey, a great time was had at our interview. Max secretly brought a remote control whoopie cushion that made noises here and there.
Let's hear from Max, his director Spike and actors Lauren Ambrose (K.W.), Catherine O'Hara (Judith) and Forest Whitaker (Ira) on how they brought "Wild Things" to life....
AGW: Max, how did this part come to you?
Max: I had done two music videos before this and one of Spike's friends was on the set of one of those. They asked if I was interested in auditioning and then Spike's friend came to my house and had me read a couple of lines but mostly he had me do stuff like go attack my parents in the backyard with a plastic sword (laughter) and water balloon target practice or something and then, on the final audition (Spike enters and sits down), Spike, you had me block little foam bullets out of a foam bullet gun with an umbrella like a light saber and then you had those blow up boxing gloves.
AGW: And the two of you boxed?
Spike: Yeah. He knocked me out and I went 'okay, you got the part. That's a good upper cut'.
AGW: Max, your character is angry and pretty intense through some of the movie. I hear you took the wolf suit off on set and played around. Is that how you released your tension?
Max: There was a lot of play on set; in or out of the wolf suit.
Spike: Yeah. We tried to make it fun but it was a demanding role for any actor and that's why it took so long to find the casting for Max. We needed to find somebody who could play the wild, playful, reckless side and also the internal, interior part of Max. So, every day was full on. Sometimes we had him running through a field for a hundred takes in a row. Sometimes, it was jumping into water and swimming or going underwater. If it wasn't that, it was some more intense, emotional scene. It was a big role; one of those roles where the character is in every shot of the movie so Max never had a day off.
Max: Just on weekends.
Spike: He did have weekends off but we tried to even make him come over to our house on weekends.
AGW: Spike, did you read this book as a kid and how did it touch you?
Spike: I loved the book as a kid (Max's automatic whoopie cushion goes off making a big fart noise)...Oh, scuze me..
 Max: Sorry. (laughter). I forgot to turn it off. It's a remote control whoopie cushion thing.
Spike: Ooookay.... anything that feels honest you relate to as a kid, 'The Wild Things' just feels true to being a kid. I think that kids respond to things that don't condescend to them and Maurice's work doesn't condescend to them. And that's what he told us in this movie, 'don't pander to children. Children are smart'. The main goal was trying to make a movie that feels like what it's like to be nine years old. That was the idea. I didn't look at it as trying to make a children's movie. I just wanted to make a movie about childhood.
AGW: Sounds like this was a really fun set to be on, right?
Spike: The whole thing was this adventure. We went off with our pack (the fart machine goes off again) and everyone brought their families and we moved to Melbourne and it was this wild adventure just making the film. Everyone brought their kids. I really wanted it to be a kids' set. They could go in any truck and play with anything. The art department could make them something. They could go in the costume department and put on wolf costumes or they could go on one of the other sets and make a movie themselves. They owned it.
AGW: Max, how much are you like your character? Have you ever gotten mad and destroyed something?
Max: I would guarantee that I've probably done that. I guess the way I'm like Max is the way any nine-year-old kid is like Max. They want to go hang out with giant 12-foot-tall furry things and have a dirt clod fight and make a giant fort.
AGW: Forts are a big thing when you are little. Hey, here come the "monsters" (Catherine O'Hara, Forest Whitaker and Lauren Ambrose enter and sit down). For you guys, what was the best thing about doing the Wild Things voices for the movie?
Forest: It's different for all of us because the rehearsal part that we got to go through was really fun because it was kind of crazy. We were reenacting the scenes, playing out the scenes, doing the dirt clod fights with bread. Hitting each other with Styrofoam and lying on top of each other. That was fun for me.
AGW: You weren't wearing the monster outfits in the movie, right. Just all of you in a big room with props?
Forest: Well, I wore like a big belly. I had a belly this big kind of warm thing, and they put mikes on sweatbands on our heads and stuff.
Lauren: They filmed our expressions as well. I haven't seen the version with the faces done but I guess they're kind of reflective of our expressions.
AGW: So, Forest, you sort of had a semi-costume on while voice recording?
Forest: I was the only one who wore a belly. I wanted to feel how my hands would go and I thought it would help me figure out how to speak and how to move and gesture. Catherine would rub my belly and touch me differently and our relationship shifted.
Lauren: I wore my red hair.
 Catherine: Didn't James Gandolfini (who voices Carol) wear a striped shirt at some point? He had ripped shorts at one point or another.
AGW: And they were filming while you were playing?
Catherine: We were doing all the scenes. Yeah. There were about 20-something cameras on us. Digital.
Forest: Following us around. Even when we slept.
AGW: Yikes. The Wild Things sleep in a big pile, like cats. You guys didn't do that did you?
Catherine: Oh, yeah, we did. (laughter)
Forest: That's where the belly came in handy.
Catherine: The toughest part about the pile was leaving the pile. It was very cozy.
But we had remote mikes and we had sweatbands on that held the mikes on our foreheads so we moved freely. We did all the scenes and we had these big foam cubes that were set pieces and we work-shopped and acted the scenes over and over again. We had a bread roll fight for the dirt clod fight. The freedom of movement in doing a voice job was completely original because you're usually in a studio in front of a mike and you're usually by yourself in this little vacuum (sealed) world.
AGW: How do each of you see your Wild Things characters? Lauren, how about K.W.?
Lauren: When they asked me to do it I said 'I know which one I'm playing because it's the one with the red hair'. (Catherine laughs.) It turned out that it really was the one with the long red hair. I look like that. I think K.W. is kind of an outsider, kind of shy and she and Carol, played by James Gandolfini, they have this crazy, tense relationship. It sort of evolved a little bit over time and shifted a little bit. People are so interested in seeing this movie because 'how are they going to flesh (the story) out? What are (the filmmakers) going to do with their imagination to make a story about imagination?
Catherine: I think Judith was an outsider too. Ira and Judith and Alexander are kind of a family unit but in a lot of ways they're not too. I felt Judith was like a kid having a bad day. She wants to be seen and wants to be liked and wants to fit in but keeps saying the wrong thing. Luckily, Judith has Ira who can kind of connect her. She probably wouldn't have friends if it weren't for Ira because Ira keeps damage control and is so sweet and loving and open and she's going to stay as close as she can to him. We're all kind of different aspects of children and I kind of tapped into my days as a child, and sadly, my days as an adult too, where I want to be liked and I want to fit in and I just kind of get in my own way.
Forest: Ira is trying to get a complete family unit. He's trying to get order in his life. He puts holes in trees, which gives him a purpose, and purpose is important. He's doing his best to pull things together with his girl, his king and his community. To him, it's all about trying to find some balance and order in his life.
AGW: Max in the film, tends to throw tantrums. Did you ever have a tantrum as a kid?
Lauren: I can think of a good tantrum my kid had this morning. (laughs)
Catherine: That's karma, isn't it?
AGW: If you guys read the book, what did it mean to you?
 Lauren: I always think it's silly for adults to talk about the meaning of children's books because it's not for us. Kids are operating off a different planet and a different world. Maurice really tapped into something deep and big and being a child, so I don't know.
Catherine: We are all wild and we just kind of mold each other, which is really sad. When you're that wild you need some order in the world in order to survive but the wildness is so open and pure and great too. The book is written so simply and the movie is as simply done as possible in this big fat world of movie-making. What they tried to do is capture that wildness. In the book when he says 'and that night in Max's room a forest grew, there's no explanation that he had to close his eyes and then he thought about this. It just happens and you go with it. You completely go with it. The way you think as a child, it's just random and wild and open and free.
AGW: We hear that Spike was very physical and hands on with his actors in this. True?
Lauren: Spike just started beating me up. (chuckles) It was just so physical with me. I got the mike, got the camera and all of a sudden I was like, 'Ahh, what's happening? Why am I being attacked?' He was so funny. I was like 'this isn't "Jackass," man. What's going on?' He was very physical and I got me to be very physical and so I got to be a wild woman lying on the floor. There was lots of foam. I got the mini-version of their experience.
Catherine: He jumped on my back too. Normally, I just show up and do my job. 'What are you asking me to do here?'
AGW: What's your favorite movie about childhood?
Lauren: To Kill a Mockingbird probably. It's another movie that takes nothing away from the book, which is something I feel this is. It's really the true sense of a great adaptation. This movie takes nothing away from the book and only builds on it. And makes it it's own beautiful thing.
Forest: Probably Cooley High or Cornbread, Earl and Me because I could relate to the characters and the environment.
pictures
courtesy of and copyright Warner Brothers Pictures, 2009 |
