London Comic Con is hosting an Ender’s Game panel next week and Launchies wanting to attend can now apply for a free ticket in the door at their website.
Exclusive Panel Q&A with Stars and Filmmakers
7th October 2013 – West End – London
Guests
HARRISON FORD, ASA BUTTERFIELD, HAILEE STEINFELD, BEN KINGSLEY
Director and writer GAVIN HOOD
Producers BOB ORCI and GIGI PRITZKER
Includes never seen before footage and props from the film
Producers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci spoke with Elle magazine for the September issue and talked Star Trek and Ender’s Game.
Another of your upcoming films is the Ender’s Game adaptation, which hits theaters in November. What drew you to this project?
RO: I read that book as a child. The same uncle who got me into Star Trek actually got me to read that book. I just thought it was fascinating that you could have young protagonists in a very adult-themed book, dealing with real issues like war, peace and leaving your family. It didn’t talk down to anybody, and both children and adults liked it. At the time I read it, it seemed unfilmable, but today we finally live in an age where the technology is available to do it. All the pieces came together and it was something we just couldn’t pass up.
I have to admit I’m a little confused by the photo and the magazine credit, since it’s clearly from an Asian magazine, but still love the photo of the two of them!
You are reading Part 1 of a five-part Ender’s Game set report series scheduled for the next week.
As of today, it’s been 464 days since I was on the set of Ender’s Game in New Orleans, Louisiana, staring up at vast green screens and sets in what can only be described as complete and utter awe. Never in the week leading up to that day had I imagined the place I ended up in.
I live in Hawaii, so when my journey began, I was put on a 10 hour direct flight from Honolulu to New Orleans. Seven hours into the flight I was ready to jump out of the plane, but consoled myself with thoughts about what was to come. I met Erin Gross from Ender’s Game Fansite at the airport and we shared a cab to the hotel.
After checking into one of the most gorgeous hotels I’d ever been in, I looked out the window to check out my view, then relaxed until it was time for dinner with Erin. I’d already “known” her by name through our Hunger Games websites, but this was the first time we’d spent some serious time together. It was great to finally talk with someone doing the exact same things that I was doing and who also loved Ender’s Game.
We met up with Kelly from Ender News, who would later become my podcasting partner in crime, and Cassandra from Ender’s Ansible. After a bit of chit chat, we said good night. I tried to prep questions, tried not to get too excited about the next day, and tried the impossible task of falling asleep.
In the morning, we met in the lobby and found a group of other press that would be touring with us including journalists from HitFix, IGN, J-14, and Nerdist. We were given Ender’s Game set badges (which I still have!) and hopped into a van to be driven out to Big Easy Studios at the old NASA Michoud Facility.
Once we got on site, we were taken to the production offices and lead into a conference room wallpapered in concept art and notes. I saw refreshments to the side including my weakness, strawberries, but I was too excited and almost too nauseated to eat. Bob Orci, the producer, was in the room. I’d had no idea he’d be there and being a big fan of a lot of his work, I was more than a little starstruck. Then we sat down and he and fellow producers Lynn Hendee and Linda McDonough proceeded to spew out everything I could have ever wanted to know about the movie they were making.
Ender’s World
Although they hadn’t yet taken us on a tour of anything, the initial producer’s presentation was a gold mine of imagery. If you can recall how long we all have been analyzing and scrutinizing each of the stills and imagery that come out, imagine having 50 of those flash before your eyes in a matter of minutes. I had to force myself not to shriek, “STOP! Go back! I didn’t stare at that one long enough!” Still, Bob Orci continued to flick through them one after another.
An International Fleet school on Earth. Image courtesy of Summit Entertainment.
Even though I’m a longtime fan of Ender’s Game, I admit I never put too much thought into the world that the Wiggins lived in on Earth. Judging from the still above, which Summit provided to us for this report, Ender lives near some type of metropolis. But while in the book, the Wiggins live in the city, that won’t be the case with the film. The Wiggins in the film will live in a home closer to what you may have imagined Bean visits in Shadow of the Hegemon.
“We want[ed] what’s happening on Earth to contrast to the technology of space. So many sci-fi novels present a dystopian future, kind of an ugly place, we wanted to present Ender’s world as one worth saving, one that’s become utopian in many ways.” said Orci. He showed us a slide of a beautiful home with classic columns. “Just like the Vatican is alive and well the way it’s been existing for the last five hundred years here, […] why wouldn’t there be classic houses?”
The Wiggin home is utopian indeed. We were shown photos of Harrison Ford as Colonel Graff and Viola Davis as Major Anderson inside a very picturesque living room, presumably when they’ve come (together, I might add) to take Ender to Battle School. Last month, we actually got to stand in that very same living room at the Ender’s Game Experience at Comic Con.
While a lot of the stills they showed us have been erased from my memory by time, one that managed to stick with me is an overhead shot of Valentine looking up at something with a sad look on her face, presumably at that point Ender is already gone. I can’t remember if it was a mobile or something else, but it could possibly be the plane hanging from the ceiling of his bedroom.
The homes aren’t the only things carrying “classic” themes. At school on Earth, the classrooms are designed after typical science classrooms just like one that you might have learned in yourself. When it comes to Battle School, however, you can see the contrast Orci talks about when you compare the classroom you know with this image (below) of a classroom in Battle School. We also saw a still with Ender facing off against a rather intimidating Stilson.
Some of you may remember we all got to see a photo of Ender’s monitor last year and during the presentation they showed us a photo of Ender sitting on a medical examiner’s table, with some concept art of the utopian society shown on a window behind him.
In the trailer, there’s a shot of a rocket shooting into space and I’m assuming that this is Ender and Graff launching from Earth to go to Battle School. Orci mentioned that they’d started with concept art of a space shuttle taking off like an airplane, but they were promptly shot down by SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, who they’d been consulting with. “[Musk] said, “No, that would never happen. Since you’re trying to get up, just point the damn thing up.””
The Comic Con rush isn’t over, guys. During the convention, Clevver TV caught up with Asa Butterfield and Hailee Steinfeld as well as producer Bob Orci and director Gavin Hood, but while they released their interview with Hailee and Asa weeks ago, they only made the ones with Bob and Gavin available on Youtube a couple of days ago.
In this one, Bob Orci talks trying to get the Ender’s Game movie done in a way that would keep the integrity and storyline of the book. Spiderman and Star Trek fans can look forward to brief mentions as well. Watch it below!
Watch ClevverTV’s interview with Asa and Hailee HERE!
During the obligatory Comic Con press line, Ender’s Game producer Roberto Orci talked to Zap2It about spoilers in the trailer, sequels, and the Orson Scott Card controversy. Asked about why this new script was the right one to finally make an Ender’s Game movie when the book had always been called unfilmable, he answered this:
I heard various pitches of the movie over the years that totally changed the ending and made it like ‘Star Wars’ in a sense, like totally like ‘and then they go and they blow up the Death Star,’ essentially. Completely changed what the intent of the book was. … We just thought audiences have seen everything nowadays. They’ve seen all the big spectacle, now they can handle this movie, and it’s still spectacle but it’s still a young protagonist in an adult situation dealing with war and peace and tolerance and all kinds of other things.
Since I cover The Hunger Games, I end up watching a lot of videos of MTV’s Josh Horowitz, who is a fantastically hilarious nerd. When I heard he’d done an interview with Harrison Ford I knew immediately it would be good, but I had no idea it would be 20 minutes long. Watch the entire hysterically funny video of Josh interviewing Harrison Ford and Bob Orci of Ender’s Game below. It’s got weird things called telephones, nerd quizzes, and Harrison’s thoughts on the con.
Here’s our video interview with producer Bob Orci and Gavin Hood outside the Ender’s Game Experience.
Gavin did talk to us a lot more about Ender and Bonzo after we’d turned off the camera, so Liz will have to help provide us some of those bits with the notes she took afterwards.
To provide some context on why this is so short, we weren’t even aware we’d be able to do this, so we had nothing to ask. We stood at the very end of the press line and they seemed anxious to leave, with their press people saying we could only talk to Gavin. So when our time came we had really only came up with two things to ask them since we didn’t want to be rude. However, they seemed more than happy to talk to us further, so Liz and I would like to thank them for that.
In the future I’ll definitely make sure to have lots of things to ask at the ready for emergencies such as these. 😉
Producer Bob Orci sat down with What’s Trending at Nerd HQ during Comic Con to talk about the process of making Ender’s Game. He speaks about getting the movie produced, casting Harrison Ford (or rather being cast by him), aging up the kids, and shooting the movie in sequence so that Ender’s physical growth would match Asa’s. I also think he and the interviewer are having a speed talking contest.
