We grab an exclusive interview with Brit actress Jemma Powell, soon to be seen in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland!
Read more: British star Jemma Powell talks Alice in Wonderland
One of the highlights of Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland is Johnny Depp's performance as The Mad Hatter; here, we chat to the star about his relationship with the director and the wonders of green screen...
This is the seventh film you’ve done with Tim Burton. When he came to you and asked you if you’d like to play the Mad Hatter, what was your reaction? Why did you want to play that character?
To be honest, he could have said Alice and I would have said yes! I would have done whatever character Tim wanted. But, certainly, the fact that it was the Mad Hatter was a bonus because of the great challenge to try to find this guy and not just be a rubber ball that you heave into an empty room and watch it bounce all over the place. [I wanted] to find that part of the character but also [add] a little bit more of the history or gravity to the guy.
How did your professional and personal relationship with him grow on Alice In Wonderland?
I was Tim’s worst nightmare! Each time out of the gate with Tim, especially with Tim, the initial thing for me is to obviously come up with a character. But then, there's a certain amount of pressure where I go, "Jesus, will this be the one where I disappoint him?" You know what I mean? So, I try really hard, especially early on, to come up with something that's very different, that he hasn't experienced before and that we haven't experienced together before, and that will stimulate and inspire him to make choices based on that character. I try not to embarrass him, basically.
There's the whole Hatter's dilemma, really, which is where the term, "Mad as a Hatter," came from. The amount of mercury that they used in the glue to make the hats was damaging. So, in terms of looking at Hatter from that perspective as this guy who is literally physically and emotionally damaged goods and a little obtuse, I took that and decided that, as opposed to just this hyper-nutty guy, he should explore all sides of the personality at an extreme level. So, he could go, from one second, being very highfalutin with a lot of levity, and then straight into some kind of dangerous potential rage, and then tragedy. It was really interesting trying to map it out.
Was there a time in your own career where you felt like you were Johnny In Wonderland?
My whole experience on the ride since day one has been pretty surreal in this business and defies logic. I'm still completely shocked that I still get jobs and am still around. But, I guess, more than anything, it has been kind of a wonderland. I'm been very lucky.
Did you dream that it was going to be that way when you started?
No, not at all. I had no idea where anything was going. But, you can’t -- it's almost impossible to predict anything like that. I had no idea. Truly, I felt after I had done Cry Baby with John Waters and Edward Scissorhands with Tim that they were going to cut me off right then. You know what I mean? I had felt, at that point, I was on solid ground and I knew where I was going and where I wanted to go, and I was sure that they would nix me out of the gig. But, luckily, I'm still here.
You've created so many memorable characters. When you take on something new like the Mad Hatter, do you have to look back at your own work to make sure that you don't repeat anything?
You definitely have to, I mean, at a certain point, especially if you’re dealing with…. I've played English a number of times, and used an English accent a number of times, so it becomes a little bit of an obstacle course to go, "Oh, that's teetering into Captain Jackville," or "This one is teetering over into [Charlie and the] Chocolate [Factory] or [Willy] Wonka." You've got to really pay attention to the places you've been. But, hopefully, also, that's part of it. That's the great challenge. You may get it wrong. There's a very good possibility that you can fall flat on your face, but again I think that's a healthy thing for an actor.
You seem to be going through the entire canon of 19th century fantasy literature in your films, from Edgar Allen Poe’s Sleepy Hollow to James Barrie’s Finding Neverland and now Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland. What is the attraction to that era's literature?
I just adore it, from certainly JM Barrie and the wonderful characters he created to Lewis Carroll, but even French literature. When you read Baudelaire, or over in the States, Poe, it’s like Tim said about Lewis Carroll, you open those books, or you open the Flowers of Evil, and you begin to read, and if it were written today, you'd be absolutely stupefied by the work. It's this incredible period where the work is timeless and ageless. So yes, I love all those guys. It’s my deep passion, you know, those great 19th century writers.
When did the original book, Alice in Wonderland, first come into your life and how did it influence you?
Even though you can't quite place when the book or the story came into your life, I do remember vaguely, maybe when I was roughly 5 years old, reading versions of Alice in Wonderland. But, the thing is the characters. You always know the characters. Everyone knows the characters, and they're very well-defined characters, which I always thought was so fascinating. Most people who haven't 
read the book definitely know the characters and reference them. For me, I went back - ironically, it was only maybe a year prior to Tim calling - and I had re-read Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, and what I took away from it was all these very strange, little cryptic nuggets that he'd thrown in there, and I was really intrigued by them and became fascinated by them because they were asking questions that couldn't be answered almost, or were making statements that you couldn't quite understand, like "I'm investigating things that begin with the letter ‘M.’" That took me through a whole stratosphere of possibilities, and then doing a little research and discovering that the M is mercury. And then, "Why is a raven like a writing desk?" Those things just became so important to the character and you realize it the more you read the book. If I read the book again today, I'd find a hundred other things that I missed the last time, so it’s constantly changing, the book.
Read Interview with Tim Burton
Read Interview With Helena Bonham-Carter, Anne Hathaway, Michael Sheen
Read Interview With Jemma Powell
Watch Alice in Wonderland Trailer
Alice in Wonderland co-stars Helena Bonham-Carter (The Red Queen), Anne Hathaway (The White Queen) and Michael Sheen (The White Rabbit) tells us what we can expect to find down their rabbit hole...
What were the challenges of acting in front of a green screen?
HELENA BONHAM-CARTER It was all green. When you’re acting, you have to kind of imagine anyway. The unsung heroes of it are these various green people that gave us their lines off. We had real proper actors who would dress in leotards and didn’t look that good at their best. For instance, I’ve only met Michael Sheen in the last 12 hours. He wasn’t there [when I was filming]. I just had a 12-inch drawing of a rabbit. But then, behind him, was this green screen, green actor. That’s what we had to act opposite.
MICHAEL SHEEN It’s because I don’t like being around other actors. It’s in my contract!
BONHAM-CARTER I would have appreciated if you had come in your bunny outfit once. But he didn’t.
SHEEN I used to stand outside. You didn’t see. I was outside the studio with my nose up against the glass in a rabbit costume going “Please let me in, Helena. Please.”
BONHAM-CARTER I wish. But it was no, no, he only acts by himself. And then, Matt [Lucas] had to be always hunched over or on the floor to give lines. Whenever I’d look at Matt, he was always in deep discomfort because he had to try and make himself smaller. [Anne] is the one who does her own special effects, but she didn’t have anything special done to her. She does her own gliding. Crispin [Glover, who plays the Knave of Hearts], I don’t know how he did it. He was on crutches and had no eye and somehow managed to remain upright. I don’t know how he did that. We all have to act opposite tennis balls and bits of tape, but you do that anyway. And actually, tennis balls and bits of tape can be good actors. You know, they’re minimal.
Anne, what was it like to play the opposite of Helena’s character?
ANNE HATHAWAY I’m so much more interested in what Helena has to say about it. One of the most fun parts about my character was this freedom that Tim gave me from the first conversation we had. He said, “In Wonderland, I don’t want anything to be all good or all bad, so I don’t want it to be the Red Queen is the bad one and you’re like the nice benevolent one who’s all good.” He said, “Have fun exploring the relationship between the two of them. They come from the same place.” I thought, oh how fun if my character has a sort of hidden psychosis.
BONHAM-CARTER It’s not that hidden.
HATHAWAY Now it’s not. [Laughs] She’s dangerous and is interested in knives and things like that and is kind of adorable on the outside and has tried very hard to become this good, almost over the top, positive creature. But underneath, she has a murderous streak that comes out when she’s around weaponry. So, it wasn’t necessarily that they were opposites. They were just sisters who were different.
SHEEN I watched it for the first time the other night and the thing that struck me the most was the thing I liked most about the Red Queen [which] was her vulnerability, and the thing I liked most about the White Queen was how sinister she was. That worked brilliantly for me. It’s tragic when she says, “It is better to be feared than loved.” That’s a tragic line really. It’s beautiful. In my case, I thought it was better to be furred than loved and I slightly misheard it.
Michael, being just a voice in the film, were you ever jealous that you couldn’t actually be there on set?
SHEEN I would have given anything, literally, to put the ears and the tail on, and jump around. I would have loved to have done that. One of the things I loved about the film most is that the animals really do look like animals. They’re not humanized, in any way. When a horse suddenly turns around to the Knave of Hearts and says something disparaging about dogs, you really don’t expect it. It’s really effective. So, I can understand exactly why they went with the idea of really going for the animal thing. But, I still look very cute with a little bunny nose, so maybe I can be in there, if there’s a sequel or something. So, I did a couple of sessions with Tim, and just had him all to myself, in London and in America. I was filmed with just a basic camera, so when I saw it, I was amazed at how much all my hand movements were there. Tim said, “Really perform it. Don’t just do the voice. Move and do as much performing as you can. Twitch your nose as much as you can.” So, I really recognized my hands. It was really funny. I didn’t think I’d recognize any of that. See, I lived with rabbits for 6 months beforehand and I did a lot of yoga to build up my legs so I could get my leg up and scratch my ear like a bunny.
Helena, you spent hours in the makeup chair each day, what was the challenge?
BONHAM-CARTER Speak to my husband! It wasn’t that long. I just said hours for the sympathy effect, but it was only two-and-a-half hours. I did exaggerate it, I guess. They had to get rid of my hairline so you put a bald cap on. That takes about two-and-a-half hours and then they have to paint it and then they put my beauty makeup on. That took some time. And, my huge wig. But they didn’t blow my head up every morning. They did that on camera. I had this one camera. There are two cameras in the world that do this and they just blow your head up. That’s all it does. And I had this huge camera dedicated to me, which was fine by me.
What was your first experience with Alice in Wonderland, growing up?
HATHAWAY When I was in 5th grade, I had a teacher and he made the entire class memorize Jabberwocky and perform it. So, during the battle sequence, I made Tim let me recite the poem and he literally looked at me and said, “Well it’s not going to be in the film.” And I said, “I know, but just for my own sense of completion in my life, please let me do this.” I didn’t read Alice until I was in college. I was reading a lot of [Vladimir] Nabokov and actually one of his big inspirations was Lewis Carroll, so I thought before I get too deep into him I’ll read Lewis Carroll, then I never went back to Nabokov! That’s when I read it and I was really moved by it. She’s a very emotional character and a lot of people feel a kind of confused 19. [It’s about] who they think they are vs. who they want to be. You struggle with a sense of identity then and at other times in your life. I really read the book from that perspective as a girl who’s trying to find her identity, which is great because that’s what the movie really focuses on. Which Alice are you? So, that was my experience.
SHEEN As most people, I think I knew the characters before I ever read the book. They’re just ingrained into the Western consciousness. For me, the allure of the story is that we all live in this illusion that we’re civilized and that everything makes sense and everything has a place, and Alice in Wonderland shows you that actually it’s a very thin film between sanity and insanity, and total wildness, chaos and fear. Somehow, that seems to be the most true expression of what it’s like to be a child, where things are both familiar and strange, at the same time, and when you think you know what something is, it suddenly shifts and becomes something else. We grow up and forget the truth of that, or buy into the illusion that that’s not the case. We’re drawn back to Alice in Wonderland all the time because it somehow reminds us, as all great Greek drama does, of what the actual truth about life is.
What do you think is an appropriate age for children to see this film?
BONHAM-CARTER Tim always has this theory that it’s us that have got the problem, that we impose fears on our kids and the kids are actually quite robust. But it depends on your kid. We haven’t shown it to Billy yet just because it wasn’t finished until a few days ago. I don’t know. You know, there was that 3D thing. We were trying to find a nursery school for our son, Bill. Apparently, according to the Montessori method, they can’t tell the difference between reality and fantasy until age 6. They had recommended no fairytales so that’s why we didn’t send Bill to Montessori because having Tim Burton and fairytales and his world of ideas. Oh! Okay!
SHEEN I still have difficulty with that. Someone told me once, and I don’t know if it’s true, that there’s a part of our brain that, when we’re acting and something traumatic is going on, believes that it is actually true. So, part of us is traumatized from it, as actors, which probably explains why actors are the way they are.
Anne, how do you feel about being CGI’d or do you prefer playing a real person?
HATHAWAY Honestly, I would do anything if Tim asked. I’m fond of saying that I would have played a mushroom in this if that’s the way he saw me in it. So, I would have happily donned my green onesie and been up in stilts. I would have just done anything to be in Wonderland. But, it’s nice to be a real person as well. I have no preference. I’m sorry, I don’t.
Helena, what was your family’s reaction when they first saw you as the character in full makeup and costume?
BONHAM-CARTER Well my little daughter, who was only 1, just said “Mommy!” It was bizarre. But my son is slightly frailer or sensitive. He just didn’t want to look at me.
Michael, what does your daughter think of you being the White Rabbit?
SHEEN My daughter is still living off the fact that I’m in [Twilight] New Moon! Now that I’m in Alice in Wonderland as well, it’s just gone stratospheric. At school, I’m treated like royalty now. But, everyone is convinced that I have red eyes because that’s two characters now with them.
Read Interview with Tim Burton
Read Interview With Johnny Depp
Read Interview With Jemma Powell
Watch Alice in Wonderland Trailer
The director of Alice in Wonderland tells us how he set about putting his own spin on the Lewis Carroll classic...
When did the story of Alice in Wonderland first enter your life and how did it influence you?
I’m from Burbank, so we never heard about Alice in Wonderland, except for the Disney cartoon, the Tom Petty video, and Jefferson Airplane! It was interesting because that’s what made me realize the power of it. I got my introduction to it much more from other illustrators, music, culture and writers. The imagery would come up in work. Then, when you start to delve into it, you realize just how powerful that is. That’s why it remains that way.
How did you set about putting your own stamp on it?
There have been so many versions, and for me, I’d never seen a version that I really liked, so I didn’t feel like there was a definitive version to me that we were fighting against. Also, I liked what Linda (Woolverton) did with the script. She treated this story [from the perspective of] how the Alice material has affected us. For me, it’s a story about somebody using this kind of imagery and this kind of world to figure out problems in their own life. It’s about what’s fantasy and reality and dreams and reality, how they are not separate things, that they’re one thing. It’s how we use those things to deal with our issues in life.
What made you want to go into the world of Alice in Wonderland in 3-D?
It was that. It was Alice in Wonderland in 3-D. It just seemed like the world that Lewis Carroll created, with that kind of trippiness and the size and spatial element. Then I started thinking about the world of Lewis Carroll, not so much about the films and things, but more from listening to music and bands and seeing other illustrators and artists that would incorporate that imagery in their work. It made me realize just how powerful the material was. If it were written today, it would be mind blowing. So, the combination of the medium and the material just seemed really right.
Instead of shooting in 3-D, you made the film in 2-D then converted it to 3-D. Why did you go this route?
Because of all the techniques we were using, there was no point shooting in 3-D when there’s nothing to shoot. We used so many different techniques. We didn’t go motion capture, but we had live action, we had animation, and we had virtual sets. I looked at the conversion we did from A Nightmare Before Christmas. [Visual effects supervisor] Ken Ralston and I looked at things that were shot in 3-D and shot in 2-D conversion, and it’s like anything. With all of these tools, you can see good 3-D, bad 3-D, good conversions, bad conversions. We always knew it was going to be in 3-D. We did all the proper planning so that when we got to that stage and the elements finally came together, it was just another piece of the technology. In fact, that was probably some of the easier technology than the other elements that we were dealing with.
How has your personal and professional relationship with Johnny Dep grown?
I don't know. I couldn’t really look at him during the shooting because he looked like a scary clown. We didn’t make much eye contact during the shoot. Look, I’ve always loved working with Johnny, from [Edward] Scissorhands on, for many reasons. He likes to play characters and be different things. He doesn’t like watching himself which I love because that makes it a lot easier for me. Each time you do something, he’s always trying to do something different. He surprises me. It’s great when you know somebody and they keep surprising you.
Of all the films you’ve done, which is your children’s favorite?
My kids don’t really like my movies. No, I can’t say that! They’re too young. My son’s getting older but since I don’t really know what I do, I can’t really describe to him what I do, so he doesn’t really know what I do, so whatever.
Read Interview With Johnny Depp
Read Interview With Helena Bonham-Carter, Anne Hathaway, Michael Sheen
Read Interview With Jemma Powell
Watch Alice in Wonderland Trailer
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