LES MIS Movie Update: Poster and Teaser Trailer

"Glacial silence in the coach. Marius, motionless, his body braced in the corner of the carriage, his head dropping on his breast, his arms dangling, his legs rigid, seemed waiting for nothing now but a coffin; Jean Valjean seemed made of shadow, and Javert of stone; and in that carriage full of night, whose interior, whenever it passed a lamp, appeared to turn lividly pale as if from an intermittent flash, chance had grouped together and seemingly confronted the three tragic immobilities - the corpse, the specter, and the statue."

- Victor Hugo (V.3.ix)

Day Count: 151

Page Count: 1317

Honestly, I shouldn't even need to say that I've written three posts about the current LES MIS film project (as those three posts are the most-viewed posts I've written on this blog - making up for almost 20% of this blog's viewership overall). Since the announcement of said film project, I - like many other film and/or musical and/or literature fans - have anxiously been awaiting more information and details regarding this project.

This week has been a great week for those anticipating this film.

Earlier today, Universal Studios released the first ever teaser trailer, depicting, among some great images of the characters in the film, Anne Hathaway as Fantine singing the ballad, "I Dreamed a Dream" (made famous recently by Susan Boyle's performance on 'Britain's Got Talent'). While many sites will likely pick this trailer apart image-by-image, I will not do that. Mainly because I don't have the time (I have to leave for rehearsal in ten minutes).

What I will say, however, is this: I think this trailer looks very beautiful. As it's just a teaser, it's difficult to really ascertain much at all (lucky for me, I know the plot), but the cinematography looks stunning and the characters seem really well portrayed (as well as one can figure in a trailer with no audible dialogue). Ultimately, I'm reserving final judgement, but this is a great start, I feel.

Feel free to share your comments below in the comment section once you view the trailer!

I leave you with the image of the new trailer released for the film. Enjoy - and I'll catch you next time!

A Little Matter of Character and Narrative (or Stephen Points Out Differences Between the Musical and the Novel)

"It's impossible that a mattress should have so much power. Triumph of what yields over what thunders. Anyway, glory to the mattress that nullifies the cannon."

- Bossuet (V.1.ix)

Day Count: 133

Page Count: 1208

It has been far too long since my last update and, for that, I apologize. Life has been pretty crazy-busy since March. Had I had the time and inclination to maximize the popularity that my blog underwent while writing my "Thoughts on Les Mis Film Casting" series (if you haven't, read parts one, two, and three now), I very probably could have found a way to garner more consistent readership, but so be it. Obviously, I'll never be a professional blogger!

I have a post begun and planned - perhaps one day I'll get to it - regarding my two week Les Mis binge: reading the book, watching the 1998 film, and seeing the Broadway touring company of the Les Mis musical. It was a great period and a wonderful artistic experience that I will (hopefully) one day complete and share with you all.

Today, however, I want to share one of the realizations I've become increasingly aware of in the past few weeks. I've shared several times before that my impressions of Les Miserables had been previously shaped by my exposure to both the film and musical adaptations of the story. For this reason, reading Les Mis has been a vastly different experience than, say, War & Peace was for me last year. With W&P, everything was a discovery. The characters, the story, the emotion - it was all new and exciting! With Les Mis, I feel like I already know these characters and have heard their story several times. It's not new - it's familiar.

That having been said, it's been quite an experience to have my perceptions of both of those works altered by what I've read in the novel. The characters I'm reading about are in many ways the same characters I know from my previous experiences, but in many ways they are different. And not just surface-level different. Vastly different.

I find this law at work: with but a few exceptions, the characters that I hated in the musical are the characters I am loving in the novel. Conversely, the characters I loved in the musical, I find myself hating in the book.

For example, my favorite characters in the musical are the Thenardiers. They may be smarmy and conniving, but they are hilarious! Monsieur Thenardier is actually one of my dream roles - I would love to play that character.. if only to sing "Master of the House!" The two of them certainly have their flaws, but they make up for it by providing their audience with the greatest gift imaginable - laughter!

The Thenardiers in the novel, however, are vastly different creatures than their singing and dancing counterparts. There is no laughter. No light-hearted banter. No quick-witted jabs or well-timed gags. Heck, they don't even have any show-stopping musical numbers! No, Hugo's Thenardiers are devious, diabolical, and cruel. That really is the best word to describe them, too - cruel. From the moment we see them, the Thenardiers are painted as treacherous opportunists with little-to-no redeeming qualities whatever. The trauma they put the young Cosette through is enough to make you hate them eternally... and then they find a way to further plummet themselves in your estimation. Unlike Tolstoy, Hugo doesn't seem to have as much of a problem with you despising certain of his characters completely.

I also loved the character of Eponine. I detailed in Part Two of my "Thoughts on Les Mis Film Casting" series the fact that she is the one we want to see end up with Marius because, unlike Cosette - who, despite one or two unpleasant circumstances in her childhood, leads a life of privilege - it is Eponine who is the underdog character. And we root for the underdog. It's a human thing. "On My Own" remains one of the best-loved, most recognized songs from the Les Mis musical and every word and melody draws the viewer to identify more and more with Eponine's point of view (far more than Cosette's "I Saw Him Once" or "A Heart Full of Love").

While there are some great moments with Eponine (her chasing off of her own father and his gang of thugs outside of Valjean's house on Rue Plumet springs immediately to mind), I find myself nowhere near as sympathetic to her plight in the novel as I was in the musical. Most of this, awful as it sounds, happened at her death for me. She takes a bullet for Marius so that he will live and, in the musical, the tender and touching "A Little Fall of Rain" takes place, further manipulating us into thinking Marius is an idiot for not loving the girl he had right there loving him the whole time (but more on that later). In the novel, though, her motivation for taking the bullet for Marius goes something like this:

"See, you're lost! Nobody will get out of this barricade, now. It was I who led you into this, it was! You're going to die, I'm sure. And still when I saw him aiming at you, I put my hand on the muzzle of the musket. How odd it is! But it was because I wanted to die before you. ... Oh, I'm happy! We're all going to die." - Eponine Thenardier (IV.14.vi)

Not only do we see Eponine committing suicide, but leading Marius to his own death so the two of them could die together. If she couldn't have Marius, no one would have him! This completely put me off of the character of Eponine altogether.

On the other hand, one of the reasons this bothered me so was because of the depth of feeling I felt for Marius Pontmercy. In the musical, I didn't really care for Marius. I felt he was a whiny, one-dimensional waif of a man who was singularly obsessed with a girl he'd only ever seen once. And while this isn't an entirely inaccurate portrayal of Marius, it is only the tip of the iceberg. The musical completely omits Marius' sense of honor - the debt he feels he owes the vile Thenardier for having rescued his father during the Battle of Waterloo many years previously. It omits his role in the events that lead to the collision of Valjean, Javert, and Thendardier on the streets of Paris. It eliminates his own sense of virtue and makes trite the supreme purity of his love for Cosette (another character I hate in the musical, but love in the book).

Earlier, I mentioned "a few exceptions" to the loving characters in the novel, but hating them in the musical... because there are characters in both that I cannot help but love regardless. They are, of course, Valjean and Javert, both of whom are very well developed in both novel and musical (though, naturally, much more so in the novel). But it also includes Enjolras, possibly one of the most inspirational characters in the novel, and vividly portrayed onstage as a pillar of idealism. (Although, as I'd mentioned before, it wasn't until he was portrayed by Ramin Karimloo that I really felt Enjolras was a great character. Before that, he would've easily been listed alongside Marius and Cosette.)

At any rate, this has been one of the most interesting things I've noted about my time spent in Les Miserables, especially as it's nearing its conclusion. I'm a scant 255 pages from the finish line and feel good about being able to wrap this book up toward the end of this month (or beginning of the next). Hopefully, it won't be another two months before you hear from me next. But, until then...

Thoughts on LES MIS Film Casting (Part Two): Cosette, Marius, and the Thenardiers

"In this state of reverie, an eye looking deep into Marius's soul would have been dazzled by its purity. In fact, were it given to our human eye to see into the consciences of others, we would judge a man much more surely from what he dreams than from what he thinks. There is will in the thought, there is none in the dream."

- Victor Hugo (III.5.v)

Day Count: 80

Page Count: 693

Yesterday, I posted my thoughts on the primaries in the upcoming Les Miserables musical film adaptation. Within a day, it became one of my most-viewed posts on this blog - getting over 50 views in just two days. (As a point of comparison, my most popular blog to date - "My Russian Transformation" - has just over 100 views. With that kind of response, I knew I couldn't wait too long before starting up the second installment. With that having been said, here goes nothin'!

Rising star Amanda Seyfried will portray Cosette. Will she be able to make it work?

I liked up-and-coming starlet Amanda Seyfried since I saw her in the first season of "Veronica Mars" as Kristen Bell's deceased wild-child best friend. I also liked her in "Big Love" as Bill Paxton's eldest, conflicted daughter. However, when it came to film roles, I began to get very disappointed. The films I did end up seeing her in (Mamma Mia! and Alpha Dog) were not very good, though she managed to turn out a halfway decent performance. The other films she was in - the ones that she's 'known' for these days, like Red Riding Hood or Jennifer's Body - looked so horrid that I had absolutely no desire whatever to see them (appearance by Gary Oldman and script by Diablo Cody notwithstanding).

Here's the problem I have with the role of Cosette in the Les Mis musical: she's not the one you're rooting for. In the book, Cosette is a child brought from the most haggard circumstances imaginable into relative piece and security. You feel her abuse. In a musical condensing a 1400+ page novel, you don't have TIME to develop that suffering... especially not with a song as lilting and lullaby-like as "Castle on a Cloud." The extent of her suffering - as far as we see in that song - is that she has to sweep floors, doesn't have toys or friends, gets yelled at, gets lost, cries, and has to get water from the well by herself at night. Also, that she doesn't get to see nice, soft ladies dressed in white that tell her they love her and sing lullabies.

This is not the suffering she goes through in the book! We're talking a little girl who is worked so hard she doesn't know how to play, is ignored and abused by the daughters of the Thenardiers, and is so petrified of "the Thenardiess" that fear of her alone will keep the girl still and quiet while she and Valjean are on the run from Javert. The Cosette from the book is the epitome of pitiable, while her musical counterpart is living the life of luxury by comparison.

This only becomes a problem when the love story angle is brought into the story. We don't want Cosette to get the guy because she's not the abused underdog she is in the book... Eponine is. It is her character that captures the hearts and minds of the audience, not Cosette's. We don't love her and, for that reason, we find her annoying.

All that to say that, while I'm certain that Amanda Seyfried could sing and act the role, I'm not sure that having her play this particular part is a good enough use of her talent. My hope is that she can bring something likeable to the character... but I'm not sure even she can manage that.

Tony Award-winning actor Eddie Redmayne will play Marius.

Eddie who?! I'm not going to lie to you, I have no idea who this guy is. Not living in New York, I've not seen his Olivier and Tony Award-winning turn as Ken in Red (2010 Best Actor in a Supporting Role). I've also only seen one of his film roles (as Edward Wilson, Jr. in The Good Shepherd), but I won't lie, I don't remember him (or much of the rest of the movie for that matter). Still, his film/television resume looks solid (My Week with Marilyn, Elizabeth: The Golden Age, and "The Pillars of the Earth"), but I've yet to hear a decent clip of him singing (outside of those "Do You Hear the Cast/Actors Sing?" videos on YouTube). I'll have to wait this one out...

...not that Marius is all that compelling a character anyway (at least in the musical - like with Cosette, most of his interesting character stuff got stripped in the conversion from book to musical). Yes, Michael Ball nailed it in the original, but if Nick Jonas can get cast and manage to convince someone other than teenage girls that he can pull off the role, then I'm sure this Eddie guy will be fine.

Borat star Sacha Baron Cohen will portray M. Thenardier. Should I worry?

This is where I feel like I'm going to start getting into really personal territory. Thenardier is my favorite role in Les Mis and has been since I first experienced the musical as a college freshman. Of all the roles in this epic show, it's the one I would most like to play myself. I have a vision for the role and, to be honest, it's based almost entirely on the performance of one Alun Armstrong - the original British Thenardier and, to my mind, the only true Thenardier. Sure, Matt Lucas did a decent job at the 25th Anniversary Concert, but it's Armstrong who really made the role everything that it could be.

Then we get to Golden Globe winner Sacha Baron Cohen. Sure, I thought "Da Ali G Show" and Borat were pretty funny, but didn't bother to see Bruno and still need to see Hugo. That having been said, we've seen the guy sing as Signor Pirelli in Tim Burton's hit-and-miss adaptation of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street and, while he's not awful, he's hardly strong enough to be singing that role. Should he be singing Thenardier? I can't help but wonder... This is the role I'm most worried about, to be sure.

Tim Burton staple Helena Bonham Carter will play Mme. Thenardier (a.k.a. the Thenardiess).

And finally (for now), we have Helena Bonham Carter, wife of 'quirky' director Tim Burton and two-time Academy Award nominee (for The Wings of the Dove and The King's Speech). While Helena is certainly not a bad actress (having great turns in the aforementioned films as well as Fight Club and the TV miniseries "Merlin"), I certainly wouldn't peg her as one of the best of her generation. In terms of singing, I really was not all that impressed with her work in Sweeney Todd. (Of course, who can be after hearing the immortal Angela Lansbury or the incomparable Patti LuPone perform the role?)

Sure, Carter plays the skeezy, greasy woman better than just about anyone else... but she is not Mme. Thenardier material. In the book, Hugo describes her as such:

"Since her first appearance, the reader perhaps remembers something of this huge Thenardiess - for such we shall call the female of this species - tall, blond, red, fat, brawny, square, enormous, and agile; she belonged, as we have said, to the race of those colossal wild women who pose at fairs with paving-stones hung in their hair... Her broad face was covered with freckles, like the holes in a skimming ladle. She had a beard. She had the look of a market porter dressed in petticoats. She swore splendidly;  she prided herself on being able to crack a nut with her fist... This Thenardiess was a cross between a whore and a fishwife." (II.3.ii)

 With the exception of perhaps the 'agile' and 'swearing' comments, I can't think of any of these characteristics which describe Helena Bonham Carter. But you know who they do describe? Jenny Galloway! Don't know who she is? Check out the clips of Alun Armstrong and Matt Lucas above - she's playing Mme. Thenardier in both of them. She's also been in the original cast of Mamma Mia! and has played in productions of My Fair Lady, Mary Poppins, Sweeney Todd, and Oliver! She's the easy choice for this role as far as I'm concerned. No, she's not a big name star like Helena, but she has more than proven that she can knock this role out of the park!

"Wait... 'Elena 'oo?!"

 Alright, Hugo, musical, and film aficionados! That's all she wrote for this evening! Next time, I'll dig into the roles of Enjolras, the Bishop of Digne, and - if I can - Gavroche and Grantaire. Let me know if you agree or disagree with my assessment by commenting below. Keep up with my thoughts on reading Les Miserables by following my Twitter account - @HurdlingHugo! Until next time... stay thirsty, my friends!

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Read the rest of this series:

- Part One: Valjean, Javert, Fantine, and Eponine

- Part Three: And All the Rest... 

Thoughts on LES MIS Film Casting (Part One): Valjean, Javert, Fantine, and Eponine

 "...there are many great deeds done in the small struggles of life. There is a determined though unseen bravery that defends itself foot by foot in the darkness against the fatal invasions of necessity and dishonesty. Noble and mysterious triumphs that no eye sees and no fame rewards, and no flourish of triumph salutes. Life, misfortunes, isolation, abandonment, poverty, are battlefields that have their heroes; obscure heroes, sometimes greater than the illustrious heroes."

- Victor Hugo (III.5.i)

Day Count:  78

Page Count: 688

I won't lie - much of my exposure to Les Miserables prior to this year had little-to-nothing to do with Victor Hugo's initial work. That is to say, I'd been exposed to adaptations rather than the original text.

My first exposure was the 1998 film starring Liam Neeson as Valjean, Geoffrey Rush as Javert, Uma Thurman as Fantine, and Claire Danes as Cosette. I watched scenes from it in my eleventh-grade Bible class during a study on Paul's epistle to the Romans. It was interesting to contrast the major themes of Romans - grace vs. the Law - with the themes of Les Mis, particularly the forgiveness of Valjean juxtaposed with the by-the-book lawfulness of Javert. While there were elements of the film I enjoyed, I definitely felt that there were things lacking... but I didn't really notice to what extent until I discovered the Les Mis musical in college.

My freshman year at Olivet Nazarene University, the student theatre organization - Green Room - took a trip up to Chicago to see the touring company of Les Miserables. I was entranced. From top to bottom, this was more or less the best show I'd ever seen. I was particularly enamored with the role of Thenardier (and still not-so-secretly hope to play it someday, despite my less-than-stellar singing ability). I ended up seeing the musical again my senior year at ONU and getting the soundtrack (Original London Cast, of course!).

So, when I found out that, after 25 years, producer Cameron Mackintosh was FINALLY making the musical into a film, I was... well, I was nervous. Musical films made within the last several years have been incredibly hit-or-miss. They're either incredibly well-received (Chicago, Dreamgirls, Hairspray, Sweeney Todd) or... something less than stellar (Nine, Rent, The Phantom of the Opera, Mamma Mia!). As a fan of both great movies and great musicals, I know that Les Miserables could stand to make either one of the best (or one of the worst) movie musicals in recent memory.

Academy Award-winning director Tom Hooper is set to direct the Les Mis musical adaptation... for which he probably hopes to win another of those glittery statuettes.

 Mackintosh and company have assembled an all-star cast, led by director Tom Hooper. Hooper was a relative unknown in America until last year when his film The King's Speech took home Oscars for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Actor for its star Colin Firth. However, Hooper had already developed an impressive resume by directing The Damned United and the John Adams TV miniseries for HBO.

I understand Hollywood's desire for all-star casts. Honestly, I do. You have to get butts in seats, otherwise it doesn't matter how good your movie is, no one will see it. Star power is an important factor in movies making money because, after all, in Hollywood, movies are a business more than an art.

Hugh Jackman will be Jean Valjean... but can he act it?

This is why I wasn't really all that surprised to hear that Hugh Jackman and Russell Crowe had been cast as Valjean and Javert, respectively. Jackman is Hollywood's new "go-to" guy when it comes to singing and dancing. His stint as host of the Oscars a few years back was full of singing and dancing, including an elaborately choreographed tribute to movie musicals alongside Beyonce, Amanda Seyfried, Dominic Cooper, Zac Efron, and Vanessa Hudgens (ironic for a year where very few movie musicals were released), as well as an incredible opening number reminiscent of Billy Crystal's old openers (though with considerably more spectacle).

Jackman, who comes from a musical theatre background, seems like an obvious choice to play Valjean - he's got the vocal range, he's a big enough name to bring people in, etc. But will he be strong enough to pull off the complex emotional range of reformed criminal Jean Valjean? Granted, I've never thought of Jackman as a bad actor per se (numerous poor film choices notwithstanding), but none of his previous films have required the type of acting one would have to convey here... which is to say nothing of the believable aging he would have to undergo to go from Valjean at 40 at the play's beginning to Valjean at 75-80 at the end? While I know he's got the voice, I wonder if he can act well enough to pull off the main protagonist here.

Russell Crowe will be Javert... but can he sing it?

Russell Crowe came as a bit more of a surprise. Not in terms of star power, of course. I mean, the guy is a three-time Oscar nominee (his sole win coming for the movie Gladiator) and he is a consistent fixture in great period dramas. No, my concerns with Crowe were the opposite of Jackman. While I have no doubt whatsoever about Crowe's ability to play the hardened gendarme Javert, my doubts lay in his ability to sing the classic Javert numbers like "Stars," "Confrontation," and "Javert's Suicide."

Apparently, though, Russell Crowe has been singing and performing musically since the 80s when he became part of the band 30 Odd Foot of Grunts (which has to be one of the most ridiculous band names of all time). Crowe's vocal stylings on these recordings are hardly as 'clean' as those acts typically associated with Javert - Terrence Mann, Philip Quast, and Roger Allam, to name a few of the more renowned. In fact, most of the YouTube clips of Crowe's singing make him sound like a grizzled old country singer... but then you come to a clip of him singing live at some awards ceremony and you can't help but wonder if he might be able to pull it off. Chalk me up as 'cautiously optimistic' for this one.

Anne Hathaway will be Fantine. Can she pull it off?

Then we come to Anne Hathaway as Fantine, a single mother propelled by her estranged daughter's happiness. In the book, Fantine is a broken figure and a lot of this carries through to the musical - she is without options and is caught in a downward spiral, forced to become a prostitute in order to pay for her daughter's care. I want to go on record before I go much further and say that I've long been a fan of Miss Hathaway. I'll be honest - she's really attractive. But more than that, she is also an incredible talent. Granted, she hasn't had too many opportunities to spotlight that talent, but there are certain roles she's played (including her Oscar-nominated performance in Rachel Getting Married) that warrant her consideration as a talented performer.

Not only that, but the girl has some pipes! If you didn't catch her performance in the opening number of the 2009 Oscars that Hugh Jackman performed, check that out... and then watch her parody of Les Mis staple "On My Own" at the 2011 Oscars (which she attempted to cohost with James Franco). So it's not a serious attempt, but she clearly has the range to pull off Fantine. I'm excited about this casting choice for no other reason than that I want Hathaway to do well here.

Samantha Barks will reprise the role of Eponine.

Samantha Barks beat out a laundry list of what would appear to be "Hollywood gold" to claim the coveted role of Eponine - the daughter of the unfortunate Thenardiers who is rejected by her true love, Marius Pontmercy. Among those up for consideration for the role included Glee's Lea Michele, Scarlett Johanssen, Evan Rachel Wood, and teen pop sensation Taylor Swift. But Barks, who had recently portrayed the role at the 25th Anniversary Concert at O2 Arena (opposite Nick Jonas as Marius... but more on that later), won out... and deservedly so, I think. Her portrayal of the role at the concert is, I'm convinced, what helped her edge out the other major contenders.

The best part about Barks' casting is that we don't have to wonder whether or not she's able to play it. We've SEEN her do it and she knocked it out of the park! And if you are one of the unlucky few that hasn't seen her portrayal, check out this clip of her singing "On My Own" (Eponine's perhaps-too-popular ballad) at the 25th Anniversary Concert. Barks captures every conceivable shred of emotion in this song and conveys it darn near perfectly. I remember commenting to a friend after seeing her rendition that her portrayal was among the best - if not THE best - that I'd seen. I could not be happier that she got cast in this role! (And couldn't be even happier that she won out over Taylor Swift.)

"Alright, Taylor, I'mma let you finish... but Samantha Barks had one of the greatest film auditions OF ALL TIME!"
(Sorry - have to strike while the iron is tepid and lukewarm. :))

Okay, so this ended up being a lot more time-consuming than I initially thought (what, with the links, the photos, and all), so I'm going to have to break this up into multiple parts. Part Two will be coming in a few days and will feature my thoughts on the casting of the roles of Marius, Cosette, and the Thenardiers. Stay tuned and watch this space!

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Read the rest of this series:

- Part Two: Cosette, Marius, and the Thenardiers

- Part Three: And All the Rest...