MOVIES
Macht welcomes change in ‘Spirit’
The first thing Gabriel Macht did when he found out he had been cast to play “The Spirit” was rush out to find background material. He purchased a book that contained later Spirit comics by creator Will Eisner.
That upset Frank Miller, director of the film version of Eisner’s work, “The Spirit.”
“I bought ‘The Best of Will Eisner,’ which had all of the color versions of the comic he had done many years after the inserts in newspapers. Frank Miller saw that I had picked that up and he said ‘Don’t read that. Let me give you my picks.’ He sent over a massive binder. It had all these great stories. The drawings were in black and white. There was so much nuance and details. And there was tons of humor. They were really, really funny,” Macht says.
There was certainly nothing typical with the way the movie was produced. “The Spirit” was shot over a 2z-month period entirely inside a soundstage in Albuquerque, N. M. Everything inside the soundstage was painted green.
The green approach is neutral and would allow all of the backgrounds and props to be added by computer after the actors were done. Miller used the same technique to make his feature film “Sin City.”
Macht had confidence Miller’s vision would be a tribute to Eisner’s work.
“There has been a lot of concern that we are not doing ‘The Spirit’ exactly the same way with the blue suit and red tie. But Frank and Eisner were friends for years. So who better to bring ‘The Spirit’ to the screen? Frank has made it innovative and visually unique,” Macht says.
Macht’s only concern is that some moviegoers will bypass the film because it is so visually different. He stresses there is enough romance and humor in the movie to make it accessible to everyone.
“The Spirit” is a real change for Macht. His television and film background is more typical from films like “Why Would I Lie?” and “A Love Song for Bobby Long” and the television show “The Others.” It was his work on stage that helped him adjust to Miller’s way of working.
“In theater, all you can rely on is your imagination. You are always imagining what’s beyond the lights,” Macht says.
He adds that even when he is shooting a movie in a real location, he has to imagine that he is in a real place. That’s because he works while staring at a crew of more than a hundred people operating huge lights, cameras and microphones.
Macht was introduced to the unique way fantasy and science fiction films are shot through his father, Stephen Macht, who also is an actor. Macht would visit his father while he was working on sci-fiprojects from “The Six Million Dollar Man” to “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.”
Growing up, Macht was not a big comic book fan. That may have been because he started acting at a young age. He did like TV versions of comic books, from reruns of the ’60s “Batman” series to “Super Friends.”
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