'Who Framed Roger Rabbit', Director & Animator, Simon Wells

0:00Simon WellsAnd Disney was stuck with this idea that had, you know, been handed down as kind of gospel, that if you're doing live action and animation combo, you have to lock down the camera, and do everything with lock off camera because otherwise the animation skids around a bit on the, on the camera. Spielberg and Zemeckis absolutely rejected this as an idea. They said, "You know, you can't do good filmmaking without moving the camera." and so they then went on a kind of a search to find out who could actually do this, and one of the first people they'd talked to had been Chuck Jones, as, you know, great hero of the animation world. And Chuck had said, "There is only one person in the world who can do this movie, and this is Dick Williams, and you need to talk to him. Here is his phone number." and Chuck then called Dick and practically ordered Dick to do the movie.

1:02Jawad MirI'm doing good. How have you been?

1:05Simon WellsOh, I'm all right. Yeah, ticking along. The movie business is a weird place at the moment.

1:14Jawad MirIt is. It is. I think in every different aspect, whether it's a narrative, in doc, on TV, everywhere it's, it's more or less the same. It's in a very strange spot.

1:27Simon WellsYeah. I have a live action script that, I've discussed with a stunt coordinator. I've got a, an actual breakdown of the visual effects work I'd need to do and the costing out of that, and I don't wanna take it out. It's, it's funny. It's one of those scripts that I feel like, "Oh, this is really saleable," but at, in the current climate, I just don't wanna take it out 'cause I feel like it'll get rejected by a whole lot of places that don't want to green-light anything, and it'll just... You know, it'll have a bad smell on it because of that, you know?

2:04Jawad MirYeah.

2:05Simon WellsOn the other hand…

2:05Jawad MirYeah, no, I…

2:05Simon Wells... A whole lot of writers who I know of who, you know, they're spending this year writing spec scripts because, you know, there's a general survive until '25 ethos going on out there. And, so I think the trouble is in '25 there's gonna be a whole mass of spec scripts that people are gonna be taking out, so I don't know what's the right smart thing to do.

2:29Jawad MirI think right now is just, it is one of those things that, where you just have to sort of be prepared for anything and everything, and just, you know, have multiple things ready. But it's, again, when everybody will come out, then it's gonna be very competitive, as it always is, but probably a bit more than usual.

2:46Simon WellsYeah, right. So, who knows? Yeah.

2:52Jawad MirHow were your summer holidays?

2:54Simon WellsIt's okay. I did a brief trip back to England, for like a couple of weeks and saw some friends and stuff, but, it was, it was pretty much a flying visit. Got to see, my brother and his family and,.. But yeah, other than that, I've actually... I have been extremely fortunate to be in full-time work, at DreamWorks. I'm, I'm storyboarding on a couple of movies, and they've actually got the scheduling sorted out so, like, one movie is running up for its screening and the other movie gets going. So I'm just jumping from one movie to the other, which is kind of fun. 'Cause there was a time, oh, a couple of years ago, when they got the scheduling wrong and it seemed like every movie they were developing came up to a screening at the same time, and that means all the storyboard artists are out of work at the same time. And

3:47Jawad MirRight. Right

3:48Simon Wells... So yeah, which is boring. But yeah, this is, this is fun…

3:51Jawad MirYeah

3:52Simon Wells... And I'm, I'm working. I can't, I can't disclose the movies, but I'm working with Tom McGrath, who did the Boss Baby movies… ... And, on one of, one picture, and, Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado, who directed Puss in Boots 2. So I've worked with Joel and Januel on a couple of movies. I worked with them on, Croods 2 and Puss in Boots 2, and I think they're amazing. They're, they're really such tremendously nice guys to work with, as well as actually being very talented. And Tom is a guy I have known... I think I've known Tom for over 20 years. I can't remember when I first met him. I mean, he was a story artist. I think he was the head of story on the first Madagascar movie, so I guess I might have met him there. But anyway, oddly enough, it's the first time I've ever actually, boarded for him as a director, which is very strange since we've, you know, worked in the same studio alongside each other for a, for a couple of decades.

4:54Jawad MirRight. I… is... Okay, correct me if I'm wrong. Is Tom McGrath the same Tom McGrath, if it is Tom McGrath, my memory serves me right, Animaniacs and Tiny Toons EP? Is that the same individual, or no?

5:06Simon WellsI don't know, actually. It is McGrath, G-R-A-T-H. So I…

5:13Jawad MirYeah, because I have been trying to get ahold of his agents to just speak about Animaniacs, that it is Tom McGrath.

5:21Simon WellsI did not know he was, he'd done Animaniacs.

5:24Jawad MirSo then…

5:24Simon WellsI'm just looking him up right now.

5:27Jawad MirM… maybe I'm wrong.

5:31Simon WellsHe…

5:31Jawad MirMaybe somebody

5:32Simon WellsHe was,.. He did live action boards for a while.

5:38Jawad MirIt's probably someone with a similar name.

5:41Simon WellsI think he was on Ren & Stimpy show. I mean, he directed an episode way back.

5:51Jawad MirNo, Tom Ruegger. Sorry. My apology.

5:53Simon WellsYeah.

5:54Jawad MirYeah. Like two To… two different Toms. I... Yeah, no, I... That sounds about right with Madagascar. I think now with my memory… Clicks in. Well, that's exciting. That's good. I'm looking forward to whatever those two projects are. And, of course, Wild Robot, which I know that you didn't have any part of, but nevertheless…

6:15Simon WellsRight

6:15Jawad Mir... It looks like an exciting film that's coming out too.

6:17Simon WellsI think that looks, that looks amazing. I mean…

6:20Jawad MirYeah

6:20Simon Wells... I have enormous, respect for Chris Sanders who created it. And I really do think he created it. I mean, he crafted the whole kind of shape of the thing, and it, and it's got his fingerprints all over it, the sort of the feel and nature of the, of the movie. Yeah, I'm really looking forward to seeing how that comes out. I'm, sadly I never worked on that movie, and I've, I've worked on several of Chris's things before. So, or at least a couple. But, yeah, it was just, I can't remember what I was on, but I... Oh, I was on Kung Fu Panda 4 when they were in the middle of doing that, so.

7:01Jawad MirRight.

7:02Simon WellsBut yeah, everything I've seen on it is just phenomenal.

7:07Jawad MirThat's awesome. No, I'm looking forward to it. I'm really... It's been a long time since I've been looking to an animated feature, either by DreamWorks, Illumination, or Pixar. It, and this looks kinda like... You know, it's g… I was talking to my kids the other day yesterday, about it, and I was like, it kinda looks like, again, I'm not trying to say that it's a, you know, imitation I think, but it just has a feel of ET meets Iron Giant meets

7:34Simon WellsYeah

7:34Jawad Mir... Jungle Book meets Bambi. Like, it just has everything of all those little bits and pieces and this into its original story.

7:41Simon WellsYes.

7:41Jawad MirOf course, ba… based on a book.

7:43Simon WellsET meets Iron Giant meets Bambi. That's very good. Yeah.

7:47Jawad MirWell, it just does have that feel. But l… look, and animation looks amazing. It has that Puss in Boots, feel to it. And the voices sound amazing. Everything is just pinpoint. And the story, you know, the heart, you can feel it in the trailer. You definitely can feel it.

8:03Simon WellsOh, I think it's gonna be a total tearjerker. Yeah, the trailer was actually, the trailer was also Chris Sanders. The original trailer, that the, marketing department had come up with was, apparently it was n… I never saw it, but it was sort of an okay but fairly standard animation trailer. And Chris had... 'Cause I saw him and I said, "That's an amazing trailer." And he said, "Yeah, that was a..." He'd heard the piece of music, like, over a year ago, and he had this kind of idea for the trailer kind of bubbling along in the back of his head. And…

8:36Jawad MirYeah

8:36Simon Wells... Yeah, and, yeah, just such a phenomenally emotional, thing. So yeah, I think it's gonna be a tearjerker.

8:47Jawad MirCan't wait. Can't wait. Well, we didn't really plan any particular film to talk about on this podcast, but I'm just gonna go with the flow, and you tell me if…

8:56Simon WellsSure

8:57Jawad Mir... You wanna continue. We touched upon a few times in our conversation, in our several conversations, on Who Framed Roger Rabbit? ... You know, your, those were your early years, right?

9:12Simon WellsThat's right. That was perhaps…

9:12Jawad MirAnd you talked…

9:13Simon Wells... The beginning of my career, yeah. I'd, I'd been…

9:15Jawad MirYeah

9:15Simon Wells... Working for commercials for maybe two years before Who Framed Roger Rabbit came up. It was a, it was a phenomenally lucky, event for me.

9:27Jawad MirYeah. And I, and I, you also talked about how Spielberg stumbled into you and, you know, you got the gig and all that. But moving along from that, at the ti… up until that time, the only films that probably mixed live action with animation, to my knowledge, were Mary Poppins and Bedknobs and Broomsticks.

9:46Simon WellsRight.

9:46Jawad MirAnd Mary Poppins probably did a better job than Bedknobs, in my view. But nevertheless…

9:51Simon WellsAnd there was stuff as well, 'cause there have been things like Gene Kelly and Jerry the Mouse dancing together, that were done.

9:58Jawad MirRight. Right.

9:59Simon WellsThere had been a few, bits and pieces. And indeed, you know, the early, Alice comedies, which, Walt Disney did, were a live action girl, but I think she was cut out and stuck onto a, an animation world rather than it being animation put into the, into the real world. So yeah, it's... And I think there was some stuff…

10:21Jawad MirYeah

10:21Simon Wells... Max Fleischer did and so on. So yeah, it's a thing people had messed around with. But yeah, there was this kind of, fear of it, 'cause trying to combine the two things, they just, they were so distinctly different worlds. The very flat world of animations, painted cells, and even the very flat Technicolor lighting still looked far too dimensional compared to animation. Anyway, sorry, what was the, what was the thing you were gonna say?

10:53Jawad MirYeah, no, I was just talking about Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and I've always wondered, and I've never actually looked into the depths of where the story originated from, like the idea of this character named Roger Rabbit, right? And then there's Baby Herman…

11:09Simon WellsOh, it was, it was a novel. It was actually, it was…

11:12Jawad MirOh, was it? I didn't know that.

11:13Simon WellsYeah. And I forget, I forget the name of the guy who wrote it. I think something Roger Wolf. Gary Wolf? But yeah, it was a novel. It was originally, Who Killed Roger Rabbit? And it was a rather complicated thing. It, Eddie Valiant was the, a detective, but Roger Rabbit is actually murdered at the beginning of the book. And then this kinda avatar shows up in Roger Rabbit's, in, sorry, in Eddie Valiant's office, and the avatar is a thing that Toons create so that when they have horrible stunts where they get chopped into pieces or, you know, a, you know, a safe lands on them or that kind of thing, the avatar is just a kind of projection of the, of the character. And so this is an avatar that's left over after Roger Rabbit has died, and he's only gonna exist for a, for like a day or two, during which time they have to solve the puzzle of who killed Roger Rabbit.

12:15Simon WellsAnd, I guess that very sensibly they realized that idea was kind of complicated and difficult idea, and moved away from it. But it had been in development at Disney for several years, prior to Spielberg and Zemeckis getting involved. And actually, I believe Zemeckis had been approached to direct the live action, at an early stage, and he had turned it down. And at another completely separate stage, Spielberg had looked at the whole thing and not been that interested. And then it had come back to Spielberg, and at some, as I understand it, Bob Z was in Spielberg's office and saw the script lying on his desk and said, "Oh yeah, you know, someone should really get that and make it right." And so they then discussed it, and basically went along to Disney and said, "Okay, we're, we're the guys who are gonna make this."

13:23Simon WellsAnd essentially took it away from Disney. They looked at everything Disney had done in development, and Disney was stuck with this idea that had, you know, been handed down as kind of gospel that if you're doing live action and animation combo, you have to lock down the camera, and do everything with lock off camera because otherwise the animation skids around a bit on the, on the camera. And, a… and Spielberg and Zemeckis absolutely rejected this as an idea. They said, you know, "You can't do good filmmaking without moving the camera." and so they then went on a kind of, search to find out who could actually do this. And one of the first people they'd talked to had been Chuck Jones, as, you know, great hero of the animation world. And Chuck had said, "There is only one person in the world who can do this movie, and this is Dick Williams, and you need to talk to him, and here is his phone number."

14:27Simon WellsAnd Chuck then called Dick and practically ordered Dick to do the movie. And so I remember, you know, the, there'd been a Fanta commercial, you know, the soft drink Fanta, that Dick had done, oh, about six months to a year earlier. It's while I was there at the studio doing commercials. I didn't work on the Fanta commercial, but, basically that had been shot with a moving camera, and it had been a bunch of kids playing soccer, and then the Disney animated characters, Fanta had done some deal with Disney. So, Mickey Mouse and, Donald Duck, and I think,.. I'm trying to think whichever character. But anyway, they're, they're, they're literally running through this, crowd of kids and kicking the ball about and stuff. And the camera's tracking. And so Spielberg and Zemeckis looked at that and said, "Well, okay, so it can be done."

15:29Simon WellsAnd they then set about, they shot a live action test. It was actually gonna be, I think, three shots, and rather typically, Dick never got them finished., but you could see even from the line test that, it was like, it w… it was, there was some actor standing in for Eddie Valiant, and they'd built this set of, kind of, you know, rubble and broken stuff. And Roger comes down, a set of metal stairs and then walks through this environment, and it's a tracking shot. I think it's actually, it's a crane shot as well. It's, it's a whole full 3D movement. And Roger goes behind, like, panes of broken glass and stuff like that. It was basically to test out all the possible things. And there's, and there's lighting from neon lights, and so there's rim lighting and all kinds of stuff. 'Cause it was not only gonna be a test of the animation, it was also gonna be a test of ILM's ability to put this whole thing together and light the characters to look like it was in the environment.

16:36Simon WellsAnd, yeah, I remember Dick doing the animation for that. And then there was another shot that was with, Jessica Rabbit. I'm not sure if that ev… I think that did actually finally get finished, but we were already in the process of making the movie by then. But yeah, the, that original Roger test, it, even in line test, even in a, you know, black and white, photos of the live action and the animation just drawn in pencil, you could tell it was gonna work. It was just, it was eye-popping 'cause it was just like, well, there he is in this three-dimensional environment. And Dick was always an extraordinary draftsman, and so his ability to just draw things, you know, happily moving around in space was, re… really very impressive. And then they, the, you know, the, in his... This was all done when we were still running the commercial studio.

17:40Simon WellsYeah. Funny little side story to that, when Bob Z and Spielberg came to visit, Dick in his studio in, this was in, Soho Square in London, they had a reception. It was, it was an old Victorian building. It looked like something straight out of Dickens. And you went through reception, and then there was a kind of, a, an interior lobby where the production management people sat. And there was a whole wall that was a glass cabinet, and Dick had deliberately put all of the awards that he'd ever won, you know, racked up in there because you had to walk through past this to get into the boardroom. So, you know, if you're a client coming along to employ Dick Williams Studio, you walk past this kind of wall of fame, and you're intimidated by the time you get to the boardroom. So, you know, Spielberg is walking past and goes, "Hey, Dick, you got a lot of awards here." It's like, "You know, the only thing you need is a..."

18:41Simon WellsOh, and he's gonna say an Oscar, but there was an Oscar because Dick had won an Oscar for, Christmas Carol, the half-hour short version of Christmas Carol. So anyway, amusing little story, but, yeah, he then won a couple more Oscars for, Roger Rabbit. But yeah, so Dick proved that you could just move the camera however you like, which kind of freed the movie up. And I mean, I don't know the ins and outs of how they got the thing actually green lit, but it was, I think it was phenomenally expensive. I remember there was a lot of,.. Y… you kinda heard the echoes of some very unpleasant conversations. And I remember Bob Z saying, "I don't know, I don't know..." 'Cause Jeffrey Katzenberg was running, Disney…

19:37Jawad MirDisney, yeah

19:38Simon Wells... Animation Studios there, the whole studio then. And Bob Z saying, "I don't know what Jeffrey's complaining about. He's getting one movie for the price of three."

19:50Jawad MirWell, you know, y… you kinda mentioned, you said one movie for the price of three, and I realized this last year. I found out, I mean, it was always in the back of my mind, but then I looked up, you know, Back to the Future came up in, came out in 1985.

20:04Simon WellsYeah.

20:04Jawad MirRight? Who Framed Roger Rabbit in '88. Back to the Future II, '89. III in '90, and Death Becomes Her in '92, and Forrest Gump in '94. In nine years, he directed six films.

20:18Simon WellsYeah.

20:19Jawad MirAnd I… that's unheard of, especially three movies in a row. I mean, granted, you know, Back to the Future II and III, you can say they were shooting simultaneously and whatnot, but still. And to have consistent hits one after another, maybe Death Becomes Her didn't really do that well as they expected. But nevertheless, it's, it's just amazing that how…

20:40Simon WellsBut Death Becomes Her…

20:41Jawad Mir... He was able to…

20:41Simon Wells... Was lit, finding something to do while Tom Hanks lost weight, 'cause they shot the first half of Cast Away, and then Tom Hanks went on a crash diet for, like, three months, and they went away and shot Death Becomes Her while he was losing weight.

20:58Jawad MirNo, that's... I'm gonna have to correct you. Cast Away came out in 2000. I think you're mixing that up with, What Lies Beneath, possibly. They did that, Tom…

21:09Simon WellsOh, sorry…

21:09Jawad MirThey did the shooting of…

21:09Simon Wells... It was What Lies Beneath. You're right. You're right.

21:11Jawad MirYeah.

21:11Simon WellsIt was What Lies Beneath they shot during Cast Away. Yes.

21:14Jawad MirYeah. But another example, '97, Contact…

21:17Simon WellsBut, yes, Death Becomes Her, the Bruce Willis and... Yes.

21:20Jawad MirYeah. Yeah.

21:21Simon WellsWhich, and was another movie that, th… you know, we forget now because that kind of visual effects work is so commonplace, but, the visual effects work in that movie was astounding.

21:36Jawad MirIt is. We saw it, my wife and I saw it recently, like, five, six months ago. I was blown away by the visual effects in that film. It was just amazing.

21:44Simon WellsYeah, it's still good, and yet you remember it was like that was made during the '90s. You know, that was, we're only a few years after The Abyss and, you know, the sort of groundbreaking stuff with the, with the, you know, the water pseudopod which, you know, Jim Cameron was never happy with. And, you know, it was, it's amazing how much stuff is in that movie that's, that sort of, you know, still holds up, actually.

22:14Jawad MirIt does. It does. It, well, something else. Going back to Roger Rabbit, so the book that was called, I looked it up, it's called Who Censored Roger Rabbit. So that's news to me that it was based on a book.

22:23Simon WellsOh. Oh, okay. Yeah.

22:25Jawad MirYeah.

22:25Simon WellsSorry.

22:26Jawad MirNo, it's okay. I just wanna correct it.

22:27Simon WellsAlso a Clint Eastwood film.

22:29Jawad MirIn, I don't even know there was a book. I had never known. I thought it was an original idea. So, you know, your particular work on Who Framed Roger Rabbit, what scenes/characters, you know, you were responsible for drawing or inking?

22:45Simon WellsIt's... Oh, yeah, what did I do on that movie? I picked up and did a lot of the Maroon Cartoon from the point where, like the opening scenes of the Maroon Cartoon

22:57Jawad MirYeah

22:57Simon Wells... Dick did all of those. And then there's a point where Roger looks over, after the mother leaves and, you know, "You better look after him or it's back to the science lab for you." And, she goes out the door, and then there's a crash, and Roger looks round, and we slam zoom into the, in the kitchen. And, I picked up there with the baby crawling up the cupboards and going across the stove. There were a couple of shots done by other people. I remember, Chuck Gammage, for instance, did several of the shots where Baby is going across the sink full of washing up and sees the cookies. But I both laid out and animated, a lot of the stuff like the, you know, Roger on the rolling pin getting the th… the kettle stuck on his head and, you know, smashing into the,.. Oh, he went into the wa… dishwasher, comes out of the dishwasher, the whole running around the room thing, and crashing into the wall, the electrical socket.

24:09Simon WellsYou know, all of that. The, oh, I'm just trying to think the, which way around it was. The, he goes into the electrical socket, and then you've got the chili bottle goes into the, the kettle and that's why he runs around the room. Yeah. Anyway, yeah, I laid out a great deal of that stuff right up until, he comes out of the ironing board and all the knives are flying towards him. And that I think, I think Phil Nibbelink picked up from there and did many of the shots after that. But, it... The movie was very much given out on a sort of, you know, "We got a couple of shots here, you take this. Here, you take that." So, you know, there's some stuff in the speakeasy, where Roger's got the, Roger and Eddie have both got the handcuffs on. So I did, for instance, a shot where, you know, "Can you hold still?" And he comes round and holds the box, and then has to zip back and put the handcuff back on.

25:15Simon WellsBut again, there's shots, in between those are shots that, Chuck did and various other artists did. So, the only, the only section I can claim as a big section, I did the entire scene in the movie theater…

25:33Jawad MirOh

25:33Simon Wells... Where

25:37Jawad MirBob Hoskins

25:38Simon Wells... Bob Hoskins meets up with, Dolores what's her name. And, yeah. So yeah, I did that whole scene, which was, it was quite remarkable to actually get the whole chunk to myself. And there's a few other bits when, Roger and Eddie go to, the Maroon studios and Roger's left to watch out. And he gets banged on the head with the frying pan. Did that scene. Did... I'm just trying to think. I don't think I d… did anything in the, in the sort of final battle apart from my,.. By the end of the movie, I was just, like, desperate to get stuff finished, and so I ended up actually doing in-betweens for Tom Sito at one point. There's some of the big crowd scenes at the end. It was just, like, all hands to the pumps, and so they said, you know, "Would you be prepared to do in-betweens?"

26:39Simon WellsIt's like, "Hey, sure. If you're paying me, I'm happy to do in-betweens."

26:44Jawad MirThat's awesome. And you know, I remember, I distinctively remember, so I had just moved to Canada in 1990, and I remember going to 7-Eleven, 'cause that was, like, my little, you know, that's where I used to play my Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade game from school going to home.

27:02Jawad MirAnd I remember going to 7-Eleven, they used to have this small VHS section, right? And I remember the two m… movie VHS cases that always stood out to me were Batman, the Tim Burton very first film, and Who Framed Roger Rabbit, because of its colors and, you know, the live action versus that. And I remember when I watched Who Framed Roger Rabbit the first time, what blew me away was even at that time, I still don't know what the terminology of it, but the animation was very, like, it had this soft… softness to it, sharpness to it. It was very distinct from what I had ever seen before, like, you know, movies like T… Bambi and, you know, Jungle Book. But that scene when Baby Herman gets out of character and he's in the real world, I still remember that, and that just, whoa. How? Like, I didn't even know what that film was about. I hadn't seen the trailer, and for me to just experience that right at that moment is something I can never forget because it fits in so perfectly throughout the film, the characters, the animations…

28:05Simon WellsYeah

28:06Jawad Mir... And visual effects. It's, it's awesome. And Christopher Lloyd, I think it's probably one of his best roles. I mean, I know he's known as Doc…

28:12Simon WellsExtraordinary performance from Christopher Lloyd, who…

28:14Jawad MirYeah

28:14Simon Wells... I've only met once. It was when I was working on Back to the Future II, and they had a sort of launch party and so a buddy and I went up and said hi to Christopher Lloyd, and he was terribly nice and so, you know, "Hi." And trying to have a conversation with him, he wasn't being unpleasant. He just, he's almost monosyllabic. He's, he's the quietest man ever. And he was very nice, and he didn't wanna move away or anything. It wasn't like we were, you know, em… embarrassing or occupying his time. He was just, like, hanging out, drinking a beer. You know, friendly. But, and I remember seeing an interview with him and, oh, God, what was her name, who played Clara in Back to the Future III?

29:00Jawad MirMary Steenburgen, was it?

29:01Simon WellsMary Steenburgen. Thank you. Sorry.

29:03Jawad MirYeah.

29:04Simon WellsAnd sh… at one point her saying, you know, "Will you just let me get an e… a word in edgeways?" You know, 'cause he just wasn't saying anything at all. He, you know, famously silent, and then he plays these just enormous characters. He, you know, he does Doc Brown or he does, something like Judge Doom. Or indeed, you know, the character he played on Taxi. He's, it's, it's so radically unlike him as a person. It's, it's very odd. It's, it's actually, the only person I've, I've met who's like that is, was, sorry, I'm having difficulty with nouns. It's early in the morning for me.

29:41Jawad MirIt's okay Robin Williams?

29:44Simon WellsRobin Williams. Thank you, yes. Who, I met, I visited the set of Hook, and yeah, you know, he's, he's enormous when he's performing, and the moment he's not performing, it just switches off and he becomes this really meek, nice guy, you know? But kinda quiet and, you know, and it's just…

30:07Jawad MirI…

30:07Simon WellsWhere does it come from? Yeah.

30:10Jawad MirI think it's a sign... I'm not trying to take away from any other actors or superstars and whatnot, but in my view, people who are like that, Philip Seymour Hoffman I'm willing to bet was probably similar in that sense. I've never met the guy. I think Jim Carrey is somewhat similar, too, that you are just so confident about your craft that when you come into the real world… And you don't value who you are as an individual, you just value your character. I'm not a psychiatrist, I'm just sort of guessing based on what I see. It's an interesting, it's an interesting thing that you can study and analyze why do people behave like that.

30:48Simon WellsYeah, whereas there's some actors who are just always on. They're just like they're doing, they're doing their bit all the time. But…

30:57Jawad MirYeah

30:57Simon Wells... Yeah, I don't know. But yeah, Christopher Lloyd, amazing and his Judge Doom, yeah, was kind of a fantastically, edgy, weird character. But of course he was actually, spoiler alert, he is actually a toon. But, yeah.

31:18Jawad MirYeah. No, it's, it's, it… Christopher Lloyd is amazing and you were, I was talking about Jim Carrey. It's interesting you mentioned, and I was just reminded about this little incident. Jim Carrey is always like in his character, more or less, whenever you see the interviews and whatnot. I remember I was at TIFF, in 2017 or 2016. One of his movies had premiered at TIFF, and our company had received some work through with Hollywood Reporter and Adobe, and we were doing some work. And I, we were, this was a big, gigantic room where there was Hollywood Reporter booth, there was Adobe, there was Variety and everything, and all of a sudden you hear these heeled boots making sound, and it was a wooden floor, and this guy walks in, his leather pants, leather jackets, leather shoes, and it's Jim Carrey. And he walks over, and he comes and stands right in front of me, and he goes, "How are you doing?" And I'm like, "I'm fine, and how are you?" Like, he's like, "I'm great, but how are you doing?"

32:21Jawad MirI'm like, "I'm fine." And he was like really serious, and then he looks at me and he laughs and he gives me a hug. And everybody's like, "Do you know Jim Carrey?" I'm like, "No, I don't." But it was just…... His persona. I have never met the guy, but it was just, he was just so, he was trying to sort of, not necessarily intimidate me, but maybe like try to get like a fan reaction out of me. That's my guess, and I didn't give him that, and I think he probably was like, "Okay, this is different." So, you know, he went along with it. But again, people are like, some people have very interesting ind… personalities off camera, and they try to, you know, portray one, portray one thing, but they're different in real life.

32:55Simon WellsYeah. Yeah. I don't know. I, it, that may have been some sort of, you know, I need to kinda either dominate the room or I need to kinda establish myself as a, as a weird character. Yeah, it may be it's a protection thing. It's a sort of like a, you know…

33:13Jawad MirMaybe I think that. I think that

33:14Simon Wells... I hide who I actually am. Yeah.

33:18Jawad MirYeah. It's def… I can, I'm, I'm pretty sure that's what it is. I think that a lot, you just nailed it because I think that's what Robin Williams has probably been, was like and Christopher Lloyd. But, you know, amazing actors, all these individuals. Hats off to them. You know, Roger Rabbit, after the film came out, it came out with three short films. I think one of them was called Trail Mix-Up, one of them was called Rollercoaster Rabbit, and the other one was called Tummy Trouble, which were all fantastic. I don't know if you've ever seen them.

33:48Simon WellsI've seen bits of them, but I don't think I've ever actually sat down and watched the whole thing of any of them.

33:53Jawad MirOh, they're just like five-minute pieces. They're like

33:56Simon WellsYeah. No, I know what they are

33:56Jawad Mir... Comedy gems.

33:58Simon WellsAnd actually after Roger Rabbit, I, Jeffrey Katzenberg did actually talk to me about coming out to work at Disney and that was one of the possibilities of things I might work on. But

34:12Jawad MirBut you ended up working with Katzenberg anyway later on.

34:14Simon WellsYeah, having sort of taken a five-year sojourn not to. Yeah.

34:22Jawad MirWhat do you think it is about Roger Rabbit that appeals to people besides animation, live action versus, you know, animation makes…

34:32Simon WellsIt's interesting. I think it manages to, it manages to appeal to both people who love animation and people who kinda hate animation. And I kind of include myself in the second category weirdly. I've, I've never really been a huge fan particularly of wacky animation. I'm capable of doing it because I understand how it works, but I've never been like a huge Tex Avery fan, and, which is odd given the animation I did in Roger Rabbit. But, and so I always found I kind of identified with Valiant in the movie. I was on his side of like, you know, "God, I hate these toons," you know? And so I think the movie manages to, both be a loving tribute to, crazy cartoons and also sort of have a cynical attitude to them at the same time.

35:34Simon WellsSo but yeah, I think it's just, it's a sort of brilliant mixture of genres. It's like, you know, if you, if you took Chinatown and then put Bugs Bunny in the middle of it, you know, that's what you're gonna get. So I, so I think it's that, it's a cross-genre thing which takes you by surprise and makes it so remarkable. But yeah, I don't know. I think it's also, it's like, it's like nothing you'd ever seen before, so it was…

36:05Jawad MirYeah

36:05Simon Wells... Kind of a groundbreaking, "Oh, my God, you've got to see this movie." Plus, it was, you know, it was genuinely funny movie. Siemens and Price wrote a very funny, or many very funny scripts. 'cause that was another thing. They'd written an early script for the show and like many people had done, attempts at a script, and Bob went back and read all of them and ended up saying, "Okay, these guys actually, y… you know, they've got the tone, they've got the flavor of this right." And so he ended up working with them… on all of the drafts of the final movie. Which…

36:47Jawad MirYeah

36:47Simon Wells... As we said, was kinda remarkable at the time, 'cause y… you know, that was the era when, oh, you know, a good, a good project deserves like four or five writers. Like, you know, you've gotta squeeze everything out of one writer and discard them, and then have another writer take a pass at it and squeeze everything out of them. And so to stay with the same writers through the project is kind of, remarkable. But Bob's quite loyal in that regard. He has people he wants to work with, he continues to work with them.

37:23Jawad MirYeah.

37:23Simon WellsAnd, it's like, y… you know, it's, it's always the same composer on his music even I remember,.. Oh, God, James Horner really, he tried hard to get in and write the music for Who Framed Roger Rabbit? And Bob said, "No, we're sticking with Silvestri."

37:52Jawad MirYeah. Yeah, Alan Silvestri is amazing. I mean, aside from Ro… Robert Zemeckis' film, one of the music that I…

37:59Simon WellsRight

38:00Jawad Mir... Am in love of his that's very memorable is, Predator. The original Predator that came out in the 1980s with, Schwarzenegger.

38:06Simon WellsYeah, it's funny, he's... Y… y… you kind of forget that he did things like that. Y… you know…

38:11Jawad MirYeah

38:11Simon Wells... He's got a much broader range of stuff that he's done than in a sense he ever gets credit for. I mean, he does if you actually bother to look it up, but he's not one of those names that, you know, like James Horner or, John Williams, that you kind of instantly can list off a whole bunch of stuff that they did.

38:35Jawad MirYeah. No, he's a, he's a great composer and I… He also did the, one of the Spielberg films that came out recently because John Williams was busy, Ready Player One.

38:43Simon WellsOh, yeah

38:44Jawad Mir... He did the music for that.

38:45Simon WellsYeah.

38:45Jawad MirYeah. But I think going back to Robert Zemeckis, w… h… up until Death Becomes Her, I mean, even Forrest Gump was a little bit, you know, comedy mixed in there. He's been like, I think he's a really good storyteller, along with the fact that he had knows the c… the comedic beats. I mean, his very f… well, it wasn't his first film, but I think his second film, Romancing the Stone with Michael Douglas.

39:06Simon WellsHe…

39:07Jawad MirI think it's one…

39:08Simon WellsThere was, Used Cars and…

39:10Jawad MirUsed Cars before that

39:11Simon Wells... I Wanna Hold Your Hand before that.

39:14Jawad MirYes.

39:14Simon WellsWhich about a bunch of kids trying to get to The Beatles at Shea Stadium.

39:19Jawad MirYeah, but Romancing the Stone, I mean, it's, it has that Indiana Jones sort of vibe to it, but it's still original and it's so funny. Again, I saw it recently, and there was a n… b… movie…

39:30Simon WellsThe amazing thing about…

39:30Jawad Mir... That came out last year

39:32Simon Wells... The amazing thing about Romancing the Stone is that, the studio hated it. After they shot it and they were in post-production, the studio really did not like it. They didn't th… they thought they'd got a complete bomb on their hands. And at the time, Bob was developing Cocoon, and got fired off Cocoon because they hated Romancing the Stone so much. And that's why, sorry, what's-his-name got to direct Cocoon.

40:05Jawad MirRon Howard. Ron Howard

40:06Simon Wells... Ron Howard. Thank you, yes. And in fact, apparently, like, eh, basically Ron Howard stepped into all the development work, you know, set design and, production design and everything that had been developed by Bob Z, and took it over. But, yeah, and then, and then Romancing the Stone came out and was a stupendous hit. But it was a complete surprise to the studio, apparently. I mean, that's, that's, that's the story as Bob told it to me. So, yeah, he, so yeah, Cocoon should've been his movie and when you watch Cocoon and you think about it's like, "Oh yeah, this has got, it's got all kinds of Bob Zemeckis sort of fingerprints on it."

40:51Jawad MirYeah, it certainly does. And Romancing the Stone, there was a movie that came out last year or two years ago with Sandra Bullock and, what's his name?

41:03Simon WellsOh.

41:03Jawad MirChanning.

41:04Simon WellsYes. Yeah. And…

41:05Jawad MirIt was called The Lost City. It was the same, almost similar premise to Romancing the Stone. I haven't seen it, but the trailer suggested that.

41:11Simon WellsAnd they're, they're all in that sort of, you know, Indiana Jones vibe. But yeah, it's, it was again a writer, and in this case it was, yeah, Channing Tatum was like a male model who was basically the cover art for her novels.

41:30Jawad MirYeah. Yeah. No, it's very…

41:32Simon WellsYeah, I quite enjoyed that film. It was, it was sweet, fun stuff. It wasn't particularly, you know, earth-shattering, but I thought it was f… it was fun.

41:41Jawad MirI'll take a look at it. I haven't seen it, because as soon as I saw the similarities, I'm like, "I'm okay with Romancing the Stone." But now that you're mentioning it, I'll check it out, see how it is.

41:48Simon WellsYeah, I mean, it's a sort of… ... You know, it's a pizza night kinda movie. It's not a you know…

41:55Jawad MirYeah, tear, tearjerker

41:56Simon Wells... Rush out and see it, you know, in a, you know, 70 millimeter print at your local art cinema, you know?

42:04Jawad MirYou, so just to kinda wrap things up, Simon, you talked about two films at DreamWorks, which we can't talk about. Are they coming out in the next year to two, three years? What stage they are, do you know?

42:17Simon WellsYes. I don't believe they've actually been greenlit yet technically. There's a whole w… weird thing about, you know, everything has to, because DreamWorks is now a subsidiary of Universal, stuff has to be developed to a certain point where it can then be presented to, the heads of Universal and they actually decide whether they're gonna go ahead and, you know, finance the making of the movie and give it a release date and so on. So, neither of these two, part of the reason I can't talk about them is 'cause they haven't been announced because they haven't actually been greenlit yet. I would… Be, in both cases I would be both astonished and enormously disappointed if they, if they wouldn't, weren't green-lit, because I think they're both actually brilliant movies. One is based on a comic book, fairly obscure comic book, and, the other is actually an original idea. But both of them are clearly, you know, open to being a franchise with sequel possibilities built in. And are, you know, richly entertaining movies with, you know, masses of comedy and fun characters and also strong drama.

43:33Simon WellsAnd, yeah, so, what do I know, you know? But, it would seem to be, it would be, it would be crazy not to make these movies. But, you know, I've worked on a, on a few movies at DreamWorks that ended up not getting made. You know, they do happen. But anyway, we will see. Fingers very much crossed, though.

43:58Jawad MirWell, I'm looking forward to those films, pending they're green-lit, and I hope they are green-lit. You know, after the success of Wild Robot, which I know it will be successful critically and box office, I... People are looking, and the audience is craving for different stuff now. You know, there's all these…

44:18Simon WellsYeah

44:18Jawad Mir... Remakes and superhero and same old, same old. So you know, they're craving for original idea, kinda going back to what we were talking about, Who Framed Roger Rabbit?. So... And I think Wild Robot is gonna offer that, and I hope the one that you're working on that get green-lit eventually will offer that as well.

44:34Simon WellsWell, yeah. I'd, I'd like to see,.. I think DreamWorks have been doing a good job recently. I gotta say, I wasn't, I wasn't terribly pleased with the way that, the, what was the... Oh, gosh. The movie…

44:51Jawad MirKung Fu Panda 4?

44:53Simon WellsSorry?

44:54Jawad MirKung Fu Panda 4? Were you talking…

44:56Simon WellsNo. That I thought was pretty good. And I thought Puss in Boots 2 was amazing. But, Ruby Gillman. I liked…

45:04Jawad MirOh, right

45:04Simon Wells... Obviously, but I think Ruby Gillman kind of got... I think all the drama and excitement of that movie kinda got squished out of it. And, I feel sorry for it, 'cause I did do some work on the show and I just feel it could've been, that could've been a whole lot more exciting. But I think the, you know, recent movies by DreamWorks have generally been, on an upswing. So yeah, and I think these two are gonna be good.

45:35Jawad MirI bet. And I... You know, it's funny, I was actually thinking about, couple of days ago, Shrek 5, and I was thinking in my head, "What would that possibly be about?" Like, are, you know, is Shrek and Fiona and Donkey, are they like older characters? And then I think it was a couple of days ago I disco… the day after that I discovered online on the Shrek's official, Instagram channel somebody, they shared like a concept art where they are, they are shown as older, Shrek and Fiona and Donkey. Now, I don't know if this is official or not. It is posted on their official account. But that would be interesting to see if that's, if that's the case, because that kinda like adds a, you know, kinda like Meet the Parents and, you know, Meet the Fockers and Meet the Little Fockers, in that sort of realm. I don't know if you have seen it, but…

46:25Simon WellsI haven't seen anything of it yet. They've had, I think they've had one screening or one partial screening so far. I know some people who are working on it, but I, yeah, I can't really comment on where it's going or what's going on with it. But

46:38Jawad MirNo worries. I wasn't, I wasn't, baiting you or anything. I was just talking out loud.

46:44Simon WellsBut yeah, it's, I hope they, I hope they cleave to, you know, what makes the franchise work. And i… in a way, yeah, you know, Shrek growing older and, you know, we… we've already seen him with a young family.

47:01Jawad MirYeah

47:01Simon Wells... I mean, the interesting thing is if his family gets older, then, you know, what differentiates him from, you know, Grug in Croods? 'Cause, in many ways Grug is very much the same sort of character as Shrek is.

47:16Jawad MirThat's true. That's true. I never thought of that. That's so true. That's so true.

47:21Simon WellsYeah.

47:21Jawad MirAwesome.

47:21Simon WellsAnyway, yeah, we will see what happens.

47:24Jawad MirWell 100%. Well, this has been great, Simon. Always lovely chatting with you. I might be popping in LA later this month or early next month, and if you're around maybe we can just grab a cup of tea…

47:34Simon WellsA cup of tea. Yeah

47:35Jawad Mir... As we always do. Yeah.

47:36Simon WellsYeah. That'd be fun.

47:38Jawad MirAwesome.

47:38Simon WellsAll right.

47:39Jawad MirThank you so much, Simon. Take care.

47:40Simon WellsOkay. I'll see you.

47:42Jawad MirBye.