Declan Cashin

Writing: the art of applying the ass to the seat

My Reel Life column from ‘Day & Night’ in today’s Irish Independent

*Anyone who watched the brilliant, just-departed TV series Friday Night Lights will be well aware of the wouldn’t-kick-him-out-of-bed-for-eating-crisps piece of prime American beef known as Taylor Kitsch.

Although the lank-haired actor has made some moves into cinema already – mainly in the dud X-Men prequel Wolverine – this looks set to be the Kitsch’s year, with three major movies on the way.

First up is John Carter, which, to Reel Life’s disappointment, isn’t a big screen spinoff from the medical TV drama ER revolving around the doctor character of the same name played by Noah Wyle, but rather a sci-fi action adventure based on a famous series of novels by Edgar Rice Burroughs.

And, as the movie’s director Andrew Stanton (Wall-E) pointed out to Reel Life when we met a little while back, Kitsch is actually the perfect age to take on this role. Note: this will be of interest to the male reader with a complex about hitting a certain third-decade milestone birthday.

“I caught Taylor in Friday Night Lights, and was initially afraid that he might be too young, but it turns out he was just playing young,” Stanton explained.

“Harrison Ford was 32 in Star Wars, Sean Connery was 29 in Dr No, and Christopher Lambert was 27 on Highlander. It turns out being either side of 30 really is a prime spot for these iconic heroes. I was psyched because Taylor (who is 30) was just there.” Phew, there’s still time guys!

*The latest movie project from Kathryn Bigelow, a thriller about the capture and killing of Osama Bin Laden, is already provoking controversy almost a year before its release.

The nature of the material has prompted an inquiry by the US Pentagon that will investigate if the Oscar winning director or her team received any classified information in the writing of the movie.

Such is the level of concern that the CIA now says that it will create new guidelines for dealing with movie and TV productions.

*Reel Life brings you news of two movie-related exhibits in London over the coming weeks and months to mark in your diaries, should you be planning a visit. Yul Brynner, the Oscar winning star of the classic musical The King and I, was also an avid amateur photographer, and a collection of his on-set and behind-the-scenes snaps of his famous co-stars and pals are on show in The Little Black Gallery, until February 11^th.

Meanwhile, the Victoria & Albert Museum is planning a major exhibit of famous Hollywood costumes to open in October, and will feature such items as Dorothy’s gingham pinafore dress from The Wizard of Oz, Darth Vadar’s cape, and even Rocky Balboa’s boxing shorts.

*Finally, last Friday, Reel Life opened an email containing possibly the best opening line in the history of the internet, if not the entire world. It read: “Declan, are you free to interview Kermit and Miss Piggy next week?”

Yes, the two felt-featured, on-off lovers are coming to London to promote the new The Muppets Movie (out on February 10^th). As you read this, I should be sitting opposite the pair of them, doing my utmost, in particular, to get a karate chop to the neck from Her Nibs. Check back next week to see how I fared.

A hearty LOL all round. View more here.

Some initial thoughts on today’s Oscar nominations:

*I’m extremely surprised that the clearly incredibly lucky Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close made it onto the Best Picture roster. Happy for Max Von Sydow’s Supporting Actor nod, however. He and Christopher Plummer will battle it out for the award.

*I say yay to the two nominations – writing and Supporting Actress for Melissa McCarthy – that came to Bridesmaids.

*Gutted for Michael Fassbender that he missed out for his extraordinary performance in Shame. Still, there were two surprises in the Bast Actor category: Demian Bichir, for A Better Life, and Gary Oldman, scoring his first career nomination for Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy.

*I guess the Academy liked the divisive The Tree of Life after all, giving it two major nods for Best Picture and Best Director for Terence Malick. Why am I getting a sneaking feeling that Malick could pull off an upset in this category?

*Hugo: shamefully, I never saw it first time round, but am rectifying that tonight. 11 nominations: must have something going for it? So far I’ve only met/spoken to one person who actually liked it.

*Pleased for Rooney Mara and her Best Actress nom, but what a pity there was no room – or certainly no buzz – this year for other newbie Elizabeth Olsen and her remarkable work in Martha Marcy May Marlene. Ditto for Olivia Coleman’s devastating performance in Tyrannosaur.

*Screenplay surprises: JC Chandor for his tight, sharp script for Margin Call, Clooney’s writing nod for The Ides of March, and the Original Screenplay nod for A Separation.

*Only one nominated song from The Muppets Movie. But it’s sure to win it for Bret McKenzie – and not just because there are only two songs competing.

Me hanging with Daniel Radcliffe while talking about his new movie The Woman in Black, out February 10th. Interview will run in ‘Day & Night’ in the Irish Independent in a few weeks.

This week’s ‘Reel Life’ column from ‘Day & Night’ in the Irish Independent

*Last week Reel Life was invited to a preview of eight scenes from James Cameron’s 3D upgrade of Titanic, his 1997 (ice)blockbuster that’s sailing into cinemas again on April 6^th.

Reel Life is ordinarily suspicious of any kind of 3D retro-formatting, but we must admit to feeling a bit of a thrill seeing Kate’s endearing puppy fat, Leo’s so-90s hair curtains, and Billy Zane’s incredible eye-brows popping out in stereo depth. And, of course, the 3D conversion certainly adds to the sense of scale when watching those final boat-sinking moments (sorry, should we have said ‘spoiler alert’?).

“It’s the exact same cut as in 1997, but now you get to experience the movie as it was originally intended,” explained Oscar winning producer Jon Landau.

“Every shot in the movie is now a special effects shot,” Landau said of the painstaking process of conversion that has required the services of 450 people at a cost of $18m. “But it’s all about enhancing the story. 3D should be a window into a world, not a world coming out of a window.”

*Ah, but what of the reports that stars Leonardo diCaprio and Kate Winslet are sceptical about being involved with the Titanic re-release? “I screened for Leo in Australia and he couldn’t be more enthusiastic,” replied Landau. “Kate is going to be seeing the footage soon, and from everything I understand she’s excited too.

“I think what part of it comes down to is that it’s very unusual to have a movie re-released. We’re not asking them to do a whole ton of marketing or publicity. We understand that they have other priorities and professional commitments today.”

*Making Margin Call, the new movie about the 2008 economic crash, seems to have prompted something of an existential crisis for British actor Paul Bettany.

“I think anymore we are judging the success of our lives by our ability to purchase things, and not our ability to make things,” Bettany mused to Reel Life.

“I found myself saying the other day, ‘I can’t use a PC; I’m a Mac person’. What am I fucking talking about? What does that mean? Wow.”

The engaging star also opened up about what it was like to twice work with his actress wife, Jennifer Connolly. “It’s fucking intense when we’re working together,” he said. “On [the 2009 Darwin drama] Creation, it was 24 hours a day. She’s so fastidious when working. She just wanted to be up talking about it, and I was like, ‘Fucking hell, go to sleep woman!’”

*In the first of Reel Life’s occasional series, ‘Where/Who Are They Now?’, we turn our attention to Heather Donahue, the female star of the 1999 horror movie phenomenon, The Blair Witch Project.

Audiences might remember Donahue better as ‘Snotty Weepie Girl’, but the 38-year-old can now go by another sobriquet: ‘pot farmer’.

In her new biography entitled Growgirl: How My Life After The Blair Witch Project Went to Pot, Donahue documents her career-reinvention as a Californian medical-marijuana farmer.

She also talks about her discomfort with the level of fame that Blair Witch thrust upon her, even going as far as to fight against the movie’s title from appearing on her book cover.

Once more, it seems Donahue lost out to the power of the Blair Witch.

My ‘Upfront’ column from ‘Day & Night’ in today’s Irish Independent

Call me batshit crazy, but I’ve applied for an audition to be a dancer during the opening and closing ceremonies of the London Olympics, which you might have heard are taking place this summer.

Technically, the audition is to be a “performer”, but the ceremony director, Danny Boyle, has made no secret of the fact that organisers are desperate for more male volunteers to come forward who are willing to shake their thang.

As an adopted citizen of London town, I feel it behoves me to do my part, even if it goes against all my instincts that London isn’t ready to stage the Olympics, and that the strain on the public transport system, to take just one example, will make life in the capital unbearable for the duration of the Games.

So instead of fleeing the city, as I’d originally planned, I may yet end up strutting, bopping, pirouetting, and jazz-handing around the Olympic Park in Stratford.

At this point you might well inquire, in the words of Cat Deeley: ‘So you think you can dance?’

It’s something I’ve been thinking about lately as it happens, and not just because I reduced my niece to tears of laughter/fear on Christmas morning during a dance challenge on her Xbox Kinect in which I flapped about like an epileptic seal at feeding time.

I’ve always thought I was a decent enough hoofer, but maybe that’s just because I’m often more willing than others to muster up a little soft-shoe gentle sway at social gatherings. Naturally, such enthusiasm is usually drink-fuelled, and, being a total lightweight in that regard, a mere sip of wine is now enough to have me dancing on the bar a la Coyote Ugly.

But just because I’m usually willing to dance doesn’t mean I should. Or can.

I had two weddings last year where my dance – let’s just say “skills” for now – came under intense scrutiny, my exertions on the floor earning me a slew of knowing winks and smiles over breakfast the next morning and even the ambiguous complimentary nickname “Twinkle- Toes”. Personally, I’d have plumped for “drunken asshat”.

There’s a disconnect in all this, of course. I’m a gay man. Stereotypically, at least, dancing is supposed to be in my genes.

Alas, I have to face the truth, and admit that I’m an uncoordinated biological aberration. Like a lot of guys, I work best when my dance songs have specific instructions for me to follow. Example: “Put your hands up in the air” and “Side to side like you just don’t care” are perfect. Similarly, “Jump Around” is pretty self-explanatory.

Looking at my moves in as clinical and sober a manner as possible, I guess I do over-rely on my little feet-shuffle/shoulder-shrug dances, incorporating a few of the legendary hand gestures and shapes known as ‘Shuffing the Deck’, ‘Dealing the Cards’, ‘Painting the Ceiling’, ‘Rowing the Boat’ and the seminal ‘Big Fish, Little Fish, Cardboard Box’.

So how does this all bode for my Olympics audition? I guess it depends on just how desperate Danny Boyle et al really are. Presumably I’ll have to be fully sober for some or all of this process, so I’ll have to get past the awkward self-consciousness that holds so many of us back when it comes to bustin’ a groove (oh yes, I just said that).

Oh, and if you’re reading Mr Boyle, this audition will work better for all of us if you use one or more of these tracks to gauge my level of dancing ability: Westlife’s ‘World of our Own’ (officially the only acceptable pop song to which men everywhere can dance), Jackie Wilson’s ‘Your Love Keeps Lifting Me Higher’, Amy Winehouse’s ‘Valerie’, or White Stripes’ ‘Seven Nation Army’. Don’t even think about springing any Beyonce on me.

Whatever happens, I’ll report back later next month after the audition. Now to finish: jazz hands!

My interview with Ralph Fiennes in today’s ‘Irish Examiner’

SITTING on a sofa in a West End hotel in London, Ralph Fiennes’ intense eyes are focused intently on a prize.

A waiter is removing a plate of cakes and buns from the table, prompting Fiennes to politely reach out to keep the confectionery in place, and then order a fresh cup of tea.

Fiennes needs the sugar rush. He has a mild dose of flu, and sounds disconcertingly like his raspy uber-villain Voldemort from the Harry Potter series.

The 49-year-old is meeting the Irish Examiner to discuss Coriolanus, his directorial debut, in which he also stars. It’s a modern-day adaptation of one of Shakepeare’s lesser-known plays. Set in a contemporary cityscape, the film retains the Bard’s language.

Fiennes lived in Ireland as a child in the mid-1970s. The eldest of six children — his siblings include film-maker Martha and fellow actor Joseph — he spent four years in Kilkenny, and later west Cork, after his parents, Mark, a photographer, and Jennifer, a writer, moved the family from Ipswich.

Continue here.

My interview with Paul Bettany for ‘Margin Call’ for movies.ie

Hailed as the best movie yet about the 2008 economic crash, Margin
Call has wracked up some of the strongest reviews of the past 12
months.

Set in the offices of one fictional New York investment bank over the
course of one night on the eve of the financial calamity, Margin Call
boasts a whopper of an ensemble cast including Kevin Spacey, Stanley
Tucci, Jeremy Irons, Demi Moore, Zachary Quinto (also serving as
producer), Penn Badgley, Simon Baker, Mary McDonnell, and Paul
Bettany.

Q: How did you become involved in the movie?

A: My agent sent me the script, and I thought it was great. I went to
meet the director, JC Chandor, who was incredibly enthusiastic and
knowledgeable about this world. Plus it already had Zach Quinto
producing it as well as Kevin Spacey and Stanley Tucci, and it was
going to be two-and-a-half weeks out of my time. I thought that was a
good punt.

Q: How much research did you do for the part in Margin Call?
A: All I knew about the banking world beforehand is that I had a bank
account and a PIN number. So I went on a trading floor and shadowed a
guy who did my character’s job, listened in on his calls, and asked
him questions. It was really enlightening. It’s surprising because I
guess you have certain preconceptions about the person you’re going to
meet. Then you’re actually sat opposite a human being and it’s quite
confounding because they have a wife and kids and a mortgage, and they
felt like they tried to tell their boss what was about to happen and
their boss didn’t listen. They’re human.

Continue here.