Andy Serkis, better known as ‘motion-capture actor’, is back with Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. He talks about evolution of visual effects and emulating technology to make his characters look real
How does it feel to be back on the Planet Of The Apes playing CaesarIJ
It’s exciting and it’s great working with Matt Reeves (director). Matt is just brilliant and he’s clear about the story he wants to tell and it’s huge. Rise was such a domestic movie and this is so epic, it’s vast.
You had a good relationship with director Rupert Wyatt on the first film, and he quit this one early on. Was that tough for youIJ
Rupert would have made a very different movie and it would have been equally as interesting a journey. I know that one of the main differences in Matt’s approach is seeing a stage of growth in terms of the apes as a community, as a group, before encountering human beings again, and that’s the major difference in the story. But Rupert’s DNA is in the writing of this as well. Rupert had his own reasons for not doing this, and obviously one respects that. We’re still very close and keep in contact. But Matt is inspiring in a different way. He’s a actors’ director, it’s always about drama. He realised where the heart of this movie is and what’s worth gunning for and spending time on, so he goes out of his way to make a good acting environment and totally gets the process. And that’s why I think he was very excited about doing this job.
How is Caesar’s journey more complex in this installment of the franchiseIJ
He’s now completely torn apart because he doesn’t entirely hate humans and he can’t admit that to the other apes because he was actually brought up with a lot of love — and that is a very difficult thing to communicate to the rest of his tribe. And he isolates the only people (Jason Clarke and Keri Russell’s characters) that he can cut through all the prejudice to, to connect with. And obviously that’s reflected from the human side. What I love about this film is that it is incredibly balanced, it’s an ensemble piece, and the human story is equally as potent and powerful and meaningful. We’re talking about people on the edge of survival and equally on the edge of destruction. And at this point in time, yes, the apes are surviving because they don’t need power, they don’t need the same resources that humans do, but it shows how fickle survival is in both camps, I suppose. The film is very centred around family. Both sides of the story have familiar arcs.
How exactly do the apes communicate with each other in this story if they’re not talkingIJ
We had to figure out how the language works. So it is apes’ vocalisations — various different apes, chimpanzees, orangutans and gorillas, with their own forms of vocalisation — plus gesture, sort of slightly more human gesture. And there’s the sign language, which obviously Caesar was taught, which he’s transmitted and what he and Maurice (Karin Konoval) were able to communicate, so he thinks that’s a way of galvanising the apes. And there’s the ability to use human words and the logic behind that. Matt was very specific about not wanting to land too far down the line in terms of their evolution.
So you see no division between ‘performance capture’ and straight performanceIJ
No, no I never have. (As Caesar) I am just playing a character in a movie which has a different set of cameras filming me in order to achieve the aesthetic. That’s the difference. In terms of playing a role, the embodiment of the character, the psychological investigation, everything to do with building a character is all exactly the same. If I had to play Caesar, or Gollum, or any of those characters now for you, I could act them out for you without any costume. It wouldn’t be a pretty sight but hopefully the drama of the scenes would be there. Of course, the selects that the director makes to put into the final cut of the movie is where the authorship lies, as it does with a live-action movie. Even in a live-action movie, when you’re wearing a costume, that’s as much input as you can have into the thing. The enhancement, whether it’s music or sound or lights or choice of angles or whatever…It’s not an actor’s medium, film. It’s a director’s medium. And so all our performances are enhanced in some way, shape, or form. The only difference is putting a costume on beforehand or putting costume and make-up on afterwards via the visual effects.
You’ve been a pioneer in this area. You educated some crew people on how precisely it works, performance-wise. Do you feel you’re still doing thatIJ
I think there’s been a huge shift in the perception of performance capture since the last movie. I mean since then, of course, Tintin had come out…Within the acting community alone there’s been a huge shift. When we were casting Animal Farm, we did a big drive, and there was not one single actor of A-list quality — really high calibre actors — who turned around and said, ‘God I don’t want to do that.’ I don’t think that would have been the case three or four years ago — certainly not before (Rise). So I think the perception has definitely changed. The technology has become less invasive.
By all accounts it was a particularly challenging shoot, especially in the way it took motion-capture and 3D out onto exterior locations. What was your take on thatIJ
In terms of taking the cameras and 3D out onto real outdoor locations, this was the most ambitious film I think ever to use performance capture on this scale.