AUSTRALIA: SARAH MICHELLE GELLER AND CAST TALK ABOUT FILMING OF TV CARTOON CLASSIC "SCOOBY DOO"

Record ID: 391501

  • Title: AUSTRALIA: SARAH MICHELLE GELLER AND CAST TALK ABOUT FILMING OF TV CARTOON CLASSIC "SCOOBY DOO"
  • Date: 1st May 2001
  • Summary: GOLD COAST, AUSTRALIA (RECENT) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) ( * BEWARE FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY **) WIDE OF CAST PRODUCER AND DIRECTOR OF SCOOBY DOO ENTERING SET FOR PRESS CONFERENCE VARIOUS SET PROPS AROUND ROOM (2 SHOTS) WIDE OF CAST SITTING AT TABLE FOR NEWS CONFERENCE SCU SARAH MICHELLE GELLER (DAPHNE) AT TABLE SCU LINA CARDELLINI (THELMA)SITTING AT TABLE SCU (SOUNDBITE) (English)
  • Embargoed: 16th May 2001 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: GOLD COAST, AUSTRALIA
  • Country: Australia
  • Topics: Entertainment
  • Reuters ID: LVAVKPWEVNMBZYCLPJZQTL26ENB
  • Story Text: The first ever live-action feature film of cartoon classic Scooby Doo is filming on Australia's Gold Coast, transforming the famous beach into a psychadelic sixties underworld where the gang from Mystery Inc are getting ready to solve a supernatural crime.
    With a cast boasting teen idols Freddie Prinze Jr, TV's Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Matthew Lillard and Linda Cardellini as well as well as 'Mr Bean' star Rowan Atkinson, film production began in February and is due for a US summer release next year.
    And they're having a blast as the intrepid gang and dog adept at solving riddles and catching no-gooders, "who would have gotten away with it, if not for those meddlin' kids".
    Buffy star Sarah Michelle Gellar who plays Daphne is particularly excited about the experience.
    "Unfortunately I wasn't able to be here from the beginning, I was going back and forth from two continents and the very first day we got together we sort of looked around we had never all been in costume before and hair and make up and wigs at the same time and I remember all of us looking around and there was this general huge excitement because all of a sudden we were Scooby Doo and that was so amazing and so seperate and different from anything else. I mean we feel like Mystery Inc, we have a van and we have you know, it's an incredible, I hate to use the word, high, but it is and making this movie is different from any other project I have ever worked on. I have never worked with a cast, I love everybody, I know it sounds cliche, but everyone is so wonderful in each role and brings so much as a group and that's what we feel like," she said.
    And they're also easily kicking back into the relaxing Australian lifestyle for the duration of the shoot.
    "I learnt a great saying here which is the Australian work ethic. It's eight hours work, eight hours play, eight hours sleep, and I'm for it," Gellar said.
    "It's fantastic, the people are great, the climate's gorgeous, work hours are really conducive to our lives," said Lillard who plays the beatnik Shaggy.
    But the cast are finding it hard to adapt to Scooby who's not available to shoot or rehearse most of the time.
    "He's very demanding but he never shows up for anyone's coverage," Gellar said.
    "He's supposed to be here but..." said Prinze who plays Fred.
    As Shaggy and Scooby's constant companion, Lillard said, it took commitment to act around a Scooby that wasn't there.
    "I probably have the most interaction with him, it's committing to your imagination and just kind of taking a leap of faith at some point. The animators are going to do a great job."
    Director Raja Gosnell insists Scooby's computer-generated character will be as real as possible.
    "He will look and act like a real dog, his movement will be very realistic but you will look at him and you'll say, there's Scooby Doo, and he will do all of the things you expect Scooby can do. He can walk on two legs he can open a door he can pick food up and he can talk. But he won't look like a cartoon character next to real people he will look like a living breathing real live animal like your dog in the room," he said.
    But until the animators digitally insert Scooby into the action, Lillard will have to keep on talking to Scooby like he's his imaginary friend, though he'll have a little help.
    "There's somebody on set all the time doing the voice, we have a little person walking around in a dog costume to do all the rehearsals so we establish eyelines. And then we have the stuffy dog who's in strategic places to have something to look at. But it's just committing to it," Lillard said.
    But Lillard's not the only one being followed around by a ghost. For Gellar, playing strawberry blond 'Dangerprone Daphne' was always going to draw comparisons to her blond, vampire-slaying alter-ego, Buffy.
    "I think as an actor it's really important to look at characters seperately to say now I'm Daphne, now I'm Buffy and your goal as an actor is to hope your audience is also able to distinguish between the two. I like to think of Daphne as a completely seperate entity, but you know we solve mysteries and we get ourselves into trouble and some of us are able to lead the path and help everyone out of it, I like to think I'm that person but I would be wrong in saying I was," she said.
    While Gellar and the cast have had to undergo some unusal hair choices to better suit their characters, Cardellini as Thelma has been able to preserve her own locks, which adds to her enjoyment at being in the film.
    "As a kid I was dying to dress up and be in Scooby Doo, and now I get to be, so it doesn't bother me at all. And this is my real hair," she said.
    What attracted stars Prinze and Gellar to the film was the humour in the script.
    "She read the script she loved it I read the script I laughed out loud over a dozen times and though it was absolute genius and that's really the motivating factor," Prinze said.
    "I was, it made me laugh you (freddie) were just sitting ready (imitates him laughing). It was a great reaction and I think it was the same reaction we all had when we read the script because you first wonder what they are going to do when they take what is essentially a two dimensional cartoon and put it into a three dimensional movie and when I read the script the first thing I thought was oh my goodness they succeeded 100 percent, this is great and whether I am part of this or not this is a movie that I want to see," Gellar said.
    But what the two didn't find so funny was the question concerning their plans to get hitched, and considering the long-time speculation among the show's fans about a secret romance between Daphne and Fred, was it a coincidence when the question was popped? "We are not going to answer that," Prinze said.
    Perhaps it's safer to stick to show business, a more genial topic to the two.
    "My favourite episode ever?, there's a few, I liked Scooby dumb a lot and there is two in particular that I really enjoyed," Prinze said.
    "I like the one were the gang get together and they solve that mystery, that's my favourite one....only kidding," Gellar said.
    ---ENDS---
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