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Now that the nine-episode epic “WandaVision” is over and the premiere of “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier” is still a week away, Disney Plus has released a new documentary-style special for viewers until now. the.
“Assembled: The Making of ‘WandaVision’” features interviews with showrunner and executive producer Jac Schaeffer, director Matt Shakman and stars Elizabeth Olsen, Paul Bettany, Kathryn Hahn and Teyonah Parris. The hour-long program also offers a deep dive with the show’s visual effects and production design assistants responsible for Marvel Magic, as well as composers Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez. (To learn more about music, watch this Variety video interview with the songwriters “Agatha All Along”.)
Here are some highlights from that peek behind the curtain.
“Filmed before a live studio audience” was actually shot in front of a live studio audience
Of course, each episode is titled with old-fashioned TV phrases, but who knew that the pilot, “Filmed Before a Live Studio Audience,” was actually filmed in front of a live studio audience?
“We always dreamed that if we did a real multi-camera show, we would have a live audience,” Schaeffer said in the special. “We knew it was a risk, we knew it would be an expense – almost an indulgence – but for the cast, for the energy and for the crew, it will be really exciting.
Olsen, Bettany and the rest of the cast positively watch the joyous shoot in front of a live group for the 1950s-inspired episode “The Dick Van Dyke Show”. “WandaVision” engaged in the period, even behind the scenes, by sitting members of the audience in old-school wooden chairs and asking them to come dressed in 1950s attire. (Presumably, an NDA of Marvel’s size kept them from disclosing spoilers.)
For Olsen, the setup was reminiscent of his childhood in the ’90s watching his sisters Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen in action as “Full House” character Michelle Tanner.
“I’ve done theater before, but filming a TV show in front of a live audience was an odd meta-experience for me because I grew up on the set of ‘Full House’ watching these recordings live on Friday, without ever thinking that it would one day be a form of reality for me, ”says Olsen in the program.
Paul Bettany wore a fake ass – and blue face paint
Steve Rogers might have “America’s ass,” but Vision’s synthezoid posterior was perfected in a prop store.
“Do you want to talk about your butt?” Olsen asks at one point, while discussing her 50s A-line dress and Spanx. “Yeah, I wanted to talk about my butt,” Bettany replies.
The dress helped improve her posture, she said, moving side to side, before Bettany stepped in.
“I have exactly the same thing, but with my fake butt. It makes me stand up and makes me want to do that too, ”he said, wiggling in his brown pants.
Aside from the artificial rear, the show’s visual effects team found that Vision’s usual crimson red face just didn’t translate to a black and white TV, so they turned Bettany’s face. in blue instead to get the correct shade of gray for the final product.
“We did some tests using footage from previous films as my first week on the job,” VFX supervisor Tara DeMarco explains in the special. “We knocked on a colorist’s door and said, ‘Can we see what he looks like?’ And we quickly realized it should be blue.
This makeup thing apparently came straight out of The Way TV’s Used To Be book, when actresses in the 50s and 60s wore blue lipstick to make it appear “red” on black and white shows.
Marvel went low-tech before flying high
Director Shakman’s appreciation for old-school television is evident in the loving way he talks about “The Dick Van Dyke Show” and the live theater aspects of the “WandaVision” tribute. Geffen Playhouse art director and former child actor, who has directed episodes of “Game of Thrones” and “The Great,” brought in special effects coordinator Dan Sudick for some very little Marvel-style effects.
Those sticks of butter that Wanda floats in the air as she tries to cook a homemade meal for Vision’s boss and wife? No CGI there, just yarns and rods coordinated by Sudick, who came under the artisans who worked on “Bewitched.”
Instead of relying on digital magic to turn that roast chicken into eggs, Olsen froze in place as the crew changed accessories.
That all changed for the later episodes of course, when Olsen says they spent the last six weeks filming sons, while they were filming the battle scenes between Wanda and Agatha Harkness, and Vision and Ghost Vision. The paper provides an overview of the massive scale and magnitude of effects required for the nine episodes.
Said Kathryn Hahn, “I think my most rewarding [moment] It was then that I finally donned the hero look of Agatha and was able to be raised in these sons for the first time and feel these huge fans on me, even though it was a hundred degrees to outside. It was crazy to feel all the work of all these people who had collaborated, helped to make it.
“WandaVision” was a seed planted a long time ago, perhaps?
Recalling the multi-year journey between filming “Avengers: Age of Ultron” and “WandaVision,” Olsen alludes to the idea that someone at Marvel was already exploring the idea of a true romance Wanda Maximoff-Vision.
“Starting with ‘Ultron,’ Marvel was really, really excited to bring Wanda into the MCU, and only offered me possibilities that we weren’t sure if we were actually going to fill those possibilities or not,” note- she does. “So we would sort of place Easter Eggs in certain places, whether it was just taking too long a peek with Vision or just trying to play with that in ‘Age of Ultron’.”
As for Bettany, he remembers when Jon Favreau was making the first “Iron Man” movie and called his old “Wimbledon” co-star for a role that wasn’t originally supposed to appear on screen. .
“He called me up and he said, ‘I’m making this movie with Robert Downey and it’s Iron Man, and I need some kind of really boring, personalityless voice for the computer running this world. , and I immediately thought of you, Paul, ”Bettany recalls, laughing. “How do you say no when you are asked so nicely?”
In typical Marvel secrecy, much of “WandaVision” has been kept a secret, even from the actors themselves.
“I was just sent a few teams,” says Teyonah Parris of the audition process, who was picked before she found out who she would play. “I think it was the 70s episode. I was very confused. He didn’t say it was the 70s, but that’s a joke. And I was like, ‘What am I doing with this? I’m not sure, because it’s not Marvel as my mind can process it.
“Assembled: The Making of ‘WandaVision’” is now airing on Disney Plus.
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