Man of Steel
Bryan Singer overcame a path paved with kryptonite to bring back Superman
By SCOTT FOUNDAS
Superman Returns director Bryan Singer is sitting on the wrong side of the camera. Its an early June afternoon on Stage 17 of the Warner Bros. lot in Burbank, and a photographer is about to take Singers picture for the purposes of this article. But were you to stumble in unawares, you might sooner think that the slender, boyishly good-looking man seated in a directors chair and sporting a distressed Superman T-shirt was an actor auditioning for a role rather than the director behind this studios $200 million revival of a long-dormant superhero franchise. Then again, looks can be deceiving. Just ask Clark Kent.
A few hours from now, Singers Superman Returns will have its first press preview and despite weeks of round-the-clock sound mixing, color timing and visual-effects sessions, theres still more work to be done, and more long nights ahead. This particular film, at this particular time, was a unique grind, Singer had told me earlier, noting that he shot Superman Returns halfway around the world in Australia while simultaneously executive producing a six-hour miniseries (The Triangle) for TVs Sci-Fi Channel and the hit medical drama House on Fox. But today, Singer puts on a game face. He jokes with the photographer about being scrawny and out-of-shape for a guy in a Superman shirt. Then, as the session nears its end, he suddenly leaps out of his chair, picks it up with both hands and holds it proudly above his head while a few more pictures are snapped. Its the least of the heavy lifting Singer has been doing of late.
After a decade in development hell and a revolving door of directors (Tim Burton, Michael Bay, Wolfgang Petersen and Brett Ratner among them), far-flung concepts (from the death-and-resurrection of Superman to a Superman-vs.-Batman celebrity death match) and potential Supermen (including Nicolas Cage, Brendan Fraser, Paul Walker and Josh Hartnett), Superman Returns finally took flight under Singers helm last spring and is now set to land in theaters across the globe on June 28, two decades after the caped crusaders last big-screen adventure. Then, millions of fans will weigh in with their verdicts a force, Singer acknowledges, potentially more powerful than kryptonite. Whenever you take any kind of franchise and you play it out, it starts to go into a temporary coma, he says, and when that happens, it takes a while, years even, for an audience to be welcoming to its return.
Rest of the article
http://www.laweekly.com/general/features/man-of-steel/13750/
Bryan Singer overcame a path paved with kryptonite to bring back Superman
By SCOTT FOUNDAS
Superman Returns director Bryan Singer is sitting on the wrong side of the camera. Its an early June afternoon on Stage 17 of the Warner Bros. lot in Burbank, and a photographer is about to take Singers picture for the purposes of this article. But were you to stumble in unawares, you might sooner think that the slender, boyishly good-looking man seated in a directors chair and sporting a distressed Superman T-shirt was an actor auditioning for a role rather than the director behind this studios $200 million revival of a long-dormant superhero franchise. Then again, looks can be deceiving. Just ask Clark Kent.
A few hours from now, Singers Superman Returns will have its first press preview and despite weeks of round-the-clock sound mixing, color timing and visual-effects sessions, theres still more work to be done, and more long nights ahead. This particular film, at this particular time, was a unique grind, Singer had told me earlier, noting that he shot Superman Returns halfway around the world in Australia while simultaneously executive producing a six-hour miniseries (The Triangle) for TVs Sci-Fi Channel and the hit medical drama House on Fox. But today, Singer puts on a game face. He jokes with the photographer about being scrawny and out-of-shape for a guy in a Superman shirt. Then, as the session nears its end, he suddenly leaps out of his chair, picks it up with both hands and holds it proudly above his head while a few more pictures are snapped. Its the least of the heavy lifting Singer has been doing of late.
After a decade in development hell and a revolving door of directors (Tim Burton, Michael Bay, Wolfgang Petersen and Brett Ratner among them), far-flung concepts (from the death-and-resurrection of Superman to a Superman-vs.-Batman celebrity death match) and potential Supermen (including Nicolas Cage, Brendan Fraser, Paul Walker and Josh Hartnett), Superman Returns finally took flight under Singers helm last spring and is now set to land in theaters across the globe on June 28, two decades after the caped crusaders last big-screen adventure. Then, millions of fans will weigh in with their verdicts a force, Singer acknowledges, potentially more powerful than kryptonite. Whenever you take any kind of franchise and you play it out, it starts to go into a temporary coma, he says, and when that happens, it takes a while, years even, for an audience to be welcoming to its return.
Rest of the article
http://www.laweekly.com/general/features/man-of-steel/13750/
