Chris Columbus

For over twenty-five years, Chris Columbus has written, directed and produced some of the most successful box-office hits, which have established him as a major force in contemporary Hollywood film-making.

As a writer, he launched his career with the legendary films Gremlins and The Goonies. Columbus directed and produced the first two films in the blockbuster Harry Potter series and produced the third.

 More recently, Columbus has directed features such as the hit film Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief. As a director, Columbus has been at the helm of such films as Home Alone and Mrs. Doubtfire.

Interview: Chris Columbus

having devoted six years to Harry Potter and his friends, director Chris Columbus opted to spend time with those possessing a different sense of style than your average wizard: junkies, drag queens, and East Village activists. "These are the people I knew when I was a struggling artist," he says.

 "This is the environment I grew up around in the eighties when I was studying at NYU." This is far from Hogwarts. This is Rent, composer Jonathan Larson's masterpiece, which opens tomorrow. Recently in New York, Columbus spoke with journalists about adapting Rent for the movie screen.

Q: What's it like for you now, having done the Harry Potter films, and now turning to something like Rent, which is very edgy subject-matter? This is a real change for you, don't you think?

Chris Columbus: Yes. Honestly, as a director, at least for me, if I start doing the same thing over and over again, I'm going to get bored really quickly. I need a reason to get out of bed in the morning and get to work. I've been waiting nine years to do this movie, so I was obsessed.

And for various reasons, I couldn't do it. Other directors were attached to it. So, for me, it was really important to just do this film. And when I was finally told I could get this movie done, I was like a race horse at the starting gate.

Q: With the kind of movies that you've done, was there any resistance at all from Jonathan Larson's family to having you direct [Rent]?

Columbus: I don't think so. At least I never sensed resistance from the Larson’s.

Q: Some members of the press did wonder if you were right for it.

Columbus: Certainly, some people in the press were like, 'The guy who did Harry Potter and Home Alone is going to do this?' But I've always been stamped with that, for some reason, because I've done films that have dealt with the issue of family.

Q: If there's one similarity between the films, it's length. Rent, like the Harry Potter movies, is a long and faithful adaptation.

Columbus: Thematically, they've kind of been lengthy.

Q: For better or for worse. But they have family elements?

Columbus: Whether they were good films or bad films, you know... Home Alone deals with a kid who doesn't have his family, Harry Potter deals with a kid who's always searching for his family. And [Rent] is about a different type of family.

 So I'm always fascinated by those particular things. But that's a really extreme connection, in a sense. I just felt that I was the right guy to do this movie.

Q: Would you say Rent is a more personal movie for you?

Columbus: In an odd way, it is more personal for me, because I've lived in Manhattan for 17 years. I've lived in a loft. I knew all of these people when I was struggling at NYU. I knew these musicians and actors and artists. That was the world I knew.

Q: When did you first see Rent? Did you see it in its original Broadway run? Did you catch a a matinee of it?

Columbus: I saw it in 1996, with the original cast. I had never really experienced that kind of emotion in a theater before. It was just really emotionally powerful for me. I went back about five days later and saw it again.

Q: Can you talk about the casting decisions for the movie? When did you realize you were going to go with the original cast? Did you think you could do that?

Columbus: I didn't realize until I was casting the film that there were a few ways we could go with it. We could cast the film with entirely unknowns, or...

Q: Justin Timberlake and Christina Aguilera.

Columbus: That's what I was going to say. There is the pop-style version with Justin Timberlake, Christina Aguilera, and Usher. I went so far as meeting Justin, who is a terrific guy, by the way.

I don't know if you guys have ever met him, but he's really a sweet guy. But then I started to meet the original cast, and I realized the thing I responded to was the connection that they had, partially because of Jonathan Larson's death. You know, Jonathan tragically died the night before the first preview.

Well, that connected these people in a very strong way. There's a deep, intense connection when you're doing that play for 16 months. They did it together for 16 months, and they formed this really, really strong group. There's a chemistry there that, as a director, I had never seen before. And I wanted to catch that.

Q: Some people say that stage actors sometimes don't translate well when it comes to acting in movies. It's a different style and presentation.

Columbus: Right.

Q: Did you find that to be the case? How did you know that the original stage cast was going to be able to do this on film?

Columbus: I just met with them all and talked with them all, and carefully considered whether or not they could still do it. I realized that that connection was key.

I mean, these people originated these roles. So, if you go to see Rent now, you still see people - and this is not to take anything away from the actors that are doing Rent - but these guys are still kind of doing it that way.

The guy who plays Mark is doing a bit of an Anthony Rapp impersonation. These roles are different than the roles in something like Les Miz or West Side Story, because these people actually, really created them. And in a sense, it's another side of it.

The Jesse Martin you see in Rent is really close to the Jesse Martin I know, as opposed to the Jesse Martin from Law & Order. I think these people are closer to these roles, and that's the way they were cast.

Q: How often did you have to tone them down and say, 'You're not playing to the balcony. I've got a camera a few feet away from you'?

Columbus: (He laughs) A few times, yeah. I had to do that. And Idina [Mendez] was the most concerned. She asked me, 'Make sure my mouth doesn't look to big when I'm singing.' (He laughs) So, I was aware of that. That was the key.

And the key was really... I spoke with the original choreographer, Marliese Year by, and she said the choreography really shouldn't look like choreography. In other words, it came from within these actors. It came from within their characters.

And the only really traditionally choreographed number in the film was the fantasy tango sequence. Everything else should feel much more naturalistic. But, again, that took months and months of rehearsal to do that.

Q: Were you able to make time for a long reversal process?

Columbus: Yes, a huge rehearsal process. Five or six months of choreography.

Q: You did a complete re-recording of the original cast album? What were your impressions of the original, and what did you change, if you felt that was needed?

Columbus: As much as I love the music from the show, and the Broadway cast album was kind of the soundtrack to my life for 9 years. I listened to it constantly. I was a huge fan of it. But I always thought, and the actors would always tell me this:

The Broadway cast album was recorded in 3 days, and they were doing the show at the same time; so, they all had a lot of technical problems with it. And I also thought it leaned slightly a little too far to the Broadway side of it. I thought it could be closer to a really strong rock & roll record.

Q: You were able to get Green Dais’s producer to record the album fo you?

Columbus: I picked up [American Idiot] the day it came out, because I'm an obsessive music fan. I heard that record, and I thought: this is one of the best sounding rock records I've heard in the last ten years. I saw Rob Cavallo's name, and I arranged a meeting, and I asked if he'd be interested in doing the film.

 And he decided to do it. It really stemmed from two numbers. I was not happy with the quality on the tracks on the Broadway cast album of "Rent" and "Out Tonight," two really strong rock & roll songs that I felt could have some much stronger power. That's what Rob brought to it.

Q: Did you spend a lot of time in the East Village and around Alphabet City during the time musical takes place?

Columbus: Yes. Unfortunately, New York City has become a little bit like Disneyland now. Having lived here for seventeen years, it really was like that line in the film, "I'm a New Yorker. Fear is my life." That was our motto every day.

But now, it's changed a lot. To recreate Alphabet City in the late '80s was akin to almost doing a western or something. (He laughs) Because you go down there and there's a Starbucks on every corner, and wireless Internet cafe's, DVD stores... things that just couldn't exist.

Q: How did you get around this?

Columbus: We had to really, carefully pick and choose our locations. I wanted to shoot the entire picture there, but there's also an ordinance in Manhattan that says you cannot do music playback after 10pm, because of all the rock & roll videos that have been shot. So, we got one extension until midnight on a Friday night to do one song, "Glory on a Rooftop.

" Other than that, I was completely confused, because I had no place to shoot the "Rent" number. We were force to build that street on an LA back-lot, to shoot that particular number. For some scenes, we found some alleyways in Oakland. You know, recreating New York City in the '80s was extremely difficult.

Q: What were the major design differences between the musical and the film? What key elements did you want to capture?

Columbus: We wanted to get certain things. Some of the shows of Rent, and I've seen it fifteen or sixteen times, but, the Broadway version of it still holds on to some of those iconic images, or iconic wardrobe items from the original version.

 If you're seeing the play in Las Vegas or something, sometimes that stuff tends to get a little brighter and little too colorful, or cute. What we did, was we just basically went to old clothing stores, The Salvation Army, anything we could do to find clothes that felt appropriate.

And then we would get them as dirty and ratty as possible. Nothing could ever be too dirty for us. We'd put it on the ground, and people would dance on it, just to get it that look. I think Anthony [Rapp] still had his original sweater, and I think we made three or four other sweaters; just duplicated them, duplicated the worn look.

If you go into the East Village now, in some of those areas that aren't so gentrified, people are still dressing like that. Kids are still kind of dressing in that style. So, I wanted to make sure the film never felt too '80s. I mean, I didn't want to do Madonna with big hair and giant glasses; those sorts of things, you know?

Q: That you were wanting to do this movie for nine years, and you finally got the go-ahead, did the fact that Chicago was a success play into getting Rent made now?

Columbus: I think I owe a great debt to Chicago, and probably Moulin Rouge, because people are now interested in making musicals again. It's a valid genre.

The most difficult aspect about Chicago was some people, particularly some creative people around were saying, 'What device were you going to use in Rent to get these people sing? In Chicago we had points that triggered the musical numbers.

' They said, 'You can't just have people singing on screen.' And I was like, 'People have been just singing on screen as far back as 1929 in The Jazz Singer. It's a genre. It's and art form.' They said, 'Audiences won't accept it these days.'

Q: But you believed you could present this.

Columbus: I was convinced that we could do it if we created a realistic world; a world that felt like it was real. Then the songs would be acceptable.

 That was the reason why we start the picture with "Seasons of Love." It was our way of saying: This is a musical, and everyone can sit back and relax; people are going to be singing for the next two hours.

Q: Why is the time right for this movie right now? Why do you think the themes of this movie resonate now? Are they as powerful now as they were when the play first opened?

Columbus: Without a doubt. There were some studios that didn't want to make the movie. Thankfully, Joe Roth at Revolution loved the play, loved the music, loved the script, and agreed to make the film. But the people who didn't want to make the film said, 'It's dated and AIDS is no longer and issue.' I was horrified. I said to them, 'AIDS is a global epidemic.

AIDS is much worse than it has ever been.' We, as a country, have taken a huge step backwards since 1989, when this play was written. We need to see a film about acceptance, and tolerance, and particularly diversity. We're ignoring that, and we've become a little isolated for our own good. That's why I think the time is right.

Q: The musical Rent does have it's ardent fans. What would you say to those who disagree with some of your decisions, particularly the removal of a couple songs?

Columbus: Harry Potter truly was like an exorcism for me. I mean, after doing those, and by the time we got to the third movie, we realized: Let's concentrate on making the film and forget about people talking about it, and listening to the fans so much. Because being that faithful has its drawbacks.

I'd get a thousand letters from kids telling me to make the movies longer, and a thousand letters from patents telling me to make the movies shorter. (He laughs) I just realized: Stop listening to people and work on the film! So, when we got to the third film, we were like: Just think about the film.

I think that philosophy has continued in The Goblet of Fire. But it certainly inspired me. I'd always tell myself: I've got to think about the film first. And believe me when I tell you, [the movie] Rent didn't work with [the song] "Goodbye Love." It just didn't, so I had to cut. It's a much better film with that cut.

Q: Some people might say [Rent] is too gay for America. The movie is being sold without any real mention of the subject matter, of what it is. And it's PG-13 and everything. So, what do you think? Will audiences be surprised?

Columbus: Well, as I said earlier, I think people need to see this movie. They have to understand that these things are here. People have to be a lot more accepting and a lot more tolerant. Maybe it's just incredibly naive, but I think that fact that the picture was given an R-rating originally, and the MPAA gave me a list of things to cut.

 They gave me 5 to 7 language issues, and then gave me a list of 30 picture edits they wanted me to change. I talked to the studio, and they said, 'No, you don't have to cut anything. PG-13 would be amazing for us, because everyone would see the film. But just do what you feel you need to do.' So, I made 5 language cuts and I didn't touch the film at all.

 I didn't touch the picture. And they came back and gave us a PG-13. They said they felt the film was strong enough that ages 13 to 17 needed to see this film. I was actually impressed that a conservative group like the MPAA gave us a PG-13. Now, that may have its drawbacks. You know, if you're going to be taking grandma and little Joey to see Rent on Thanksgiving and they don't know what to expect.

 (He laughs) If they don't like it, they can walk out and get their money back. But, you know, it's okay to shake people up a little bit. I think it's important that people wake up and see this.