[IMG:L]Welcome to Willard, a small town lost in the idyllic world of the ’50s–where rotting zombies carry the mail…
The comedic horror Fido is set in sock-hop era America, in an alternative universe where zombies aimlessly roam the Earth. However, it’s only after The Great Zombie War that the government and the corporation Zomcom, working in alliance, have been able to get the problem successfully under control. The entities were able to do that using a special collar that makes the zombies docile, allowing people to use them as servants. When the Robinson family buys their own domestic zombie, their son Timmy takes him on as a pet–and names him “Fido.”
Fido, one of the more unique takes on the zombie genre, which was popularized with George Romero’s Night of the Living Dead, stars Henry Czerny, Carrie-Anne Moss, Tim Blake Nelson and Billy Connolly.
I got a chance to talk with the the title character ‘Fido’ himself, Billy Connolly, and the film’s co-writer/director Andrew Currie.
EDITORS’ NOTE: Writer Daniel Robert Epstein, whose work appeared frequently on Hollywood.com and many other Web sites, passed away unexpectedly on June 13, 2007 at the age of 31. Few film and television journalists could claim to have written as knowledgeably or enthusiastically about the science fiction, fantasy, comic book and horror genres, and in a bit of irony that would have likely amused Dan, his last article for Hollywood.com focused on the undead. And thanks to his fine writing and the perpetual qualities of the Internet, Dan’s spirit will continue to endure long beyond his days as well.
Hollywood.com: When the name Billy Connolly was first proposed, were you like, “Can he do this kind or role?” or just like, “Let’s get him!”
Andrew Currie: My girlfriend, Mary Anne Waterhouse, produced Fido, and had worked with Billy Connolly in the past. When she brought up his name, I was immediately interested because I’d seen his standup. Also, I immediately watched Mrs. Brown. After I watched that and I saw that there was so much life and intelligence and warmth in his eyes–and he expresses so much with them–that really drew me to him as [someone to play] Fido.
HW: What was the makeup process like?
[IMG:R]Billy Connolly: The most traumatic thing for me was having my hair whipped-off on the first day. The hair person was a girl named Sanna [Seppanen] and I’ve worked with her on a lot of films. She just went, “Sit down, Billy” and she cut it all off. It was a baptism of fire. Then everyday I would go and lie down in sort of a dentist chair, and I would strip to my underwear and they would paint me with silver paint and put ravioli on me. It was like a big piece of ravioli on each cheek and then they painted over that and the same with my hands. At the end of the day the children in the film were ripping it off me.
HW: Doesn’t sound too pleasant…
BC: At first I loathed it, and then like everything you loath, you say to yourself, “Look, this is stupid. I’m condemning myself to agony here, stop disliking it, find something you like in it.” At that point, the special effects people found the right order to do my makeup and I would sleep. I used to come in the morning and just lay back and fall asleep and they would do my body while I was asleep and they would wake me up to spray me and that was lovely. It became a joy–so everything worked out absolutely great and it’s a wonderful thing. The strangest thing were tea breaks and lunch, you forget you’re a zombie and you’re talking about politics with somebody at the table–and you forget you got a bullet hole in your forehead and you’re silver.
HW: Did they give you special teeth too?
BC: Yes, the teeth were absolute hell. The false teeth fit over your own teeth, so you have like four sets of teeth in your mouth which sets your mouth at a funny angle. That was great in a way because you don’t look like you anymore; and in another way, it’s an encumbrance because you have to speak with them and it makes you slobber. So I kept having to slurp, and that seemed to freak people out.
HW: When you were out and about in costume, did you get recognized?
BC: Very rarely. Even by Scottish fans in Canada. One time when I was having lunch, a man actually said to me, “You sound like Billy Connolly” and I said, “Yeah, I should.”
HW: Did you educate yourself on zombie lore?
BC: No, because I didn’t want to resemble any other zombies. And I didn’t want to go into the real zombie ‘Haitian stuff’ because I wanted to be completely original. The director told me how to walk on the first day because you don’t want to look like you’re in a Michael Jackson video. So we got it down to this shuffle of the feet not far off the floor.
AC: Yes, a little bit. Even though it’s not the stronger film in the trilogy, I was certainly influenced by [George] Romero’s Day of the Dead. It had a scientist that was trying to teach a zombie named Bub. That really triggered that whole idea of what ‘humanity’ rests inside the zombie, so it certainly was an influence.
HW: Billy, how did you figure out how to portray Fido?
BC: I played the guy as a disabled guy, I didn’t play him as a zombie. He was a man who was stricken by the inability to communicate, other than by his eyes. The movie is really about anything that’s alien. It’s about alien people, whether they’re immigrants or people among you who are different from you; and you can take lots of lessons from it.
HW: What about the origins of the name “Fido”?
AC: “Fido” certainly has a history within certain countries. But what was really interesting was when we were at the Gérardmer Film Festival in France they didn’t know that [the name] “Fido” represents the cliché of the dog– so it became slightly confusing for them.
[IMG:L]HW: When you have that idyllic, suburban situation and Dylan Baker shows up, it makes everyone a little nervous after his obsessive, predatory role in Happiness. Were you trying to play on that persona?
AC: It’s funny because Happiness was one of my all time favorite movies. And [likewise] being a huge [David] Lynch fan, I love the idea of creating an idyllic world, and contrasting it with what’s bubbling underneath. I think Dylan really fits in beautifully with that. He’s just such a bright, funny, wonderful human being; and what I loved about him was that he got the humor of his character’s fears so well. I’d met with a couple of other actors in discussions, and one of them in particular just didn’t see the humor in it–and Dylan was just the opposite.
HW: How difficult is it to create, literally, an entirely other-worldly, multi-faceted place on a low budget?
AC: It’s pretty tough, but the most rewarding part of directing for me is the creation of a world. Early in the process, I worked with a conceptual artist. I had a lot of key images in my head that I really felt strongly about, so we created some nice 11”x17” color pieces. I started working with my music composer on and off for about a year before we shot. So by the time I came to shooting, I had a lot of elements already in place.
HW: A lot of the films in this style interrogate the American government’s competence. Is the fundamental idea behind this film that the forces in charge of this world are corrupted by corporations?
AC: Yes, it was that idea more than anything else, that the government and the corporation, Zomcom, has become one unit. They have started controlling the community through fear and pushing theory. The film starts off with a ‘black and white’ [ethos] that is really a propaganda film for school kids.
HW: What are you working on next?
AC: What I’m doing, potentially, is working on a really interesting vampire script that I can’t talk about too much right now. I’m also writing a script called The Truth About Lying and that is about a guy in his late 20’s who is a compulsive liar and a Walter Mitty-esque daydreamer who hasn’t really got very far in life yet. He blames his stagnant condition on the fact that his father died in a parachuting accident when he was only a one-year-old. The crux of the whole story is that he finds out that it’s all a lie–and that his father wasn’t his father at all.
HW: Do you see Fido as a franchise?
AC: There’s definitely a lot of backstory material. I’ve never really seen it that way, but it’s a quirky story. I guess if there’s real interest, I could see it expanding and maybe getting someone else involved.
HW: Billy, what did your kids think of Fido?
BC: My daughter, Scarlett, came to see the movie the other night. I asked her, “What was your favorite bit?” and she said, “When you smell her perfume.” [Chuckles] That is the ‘sexiest’ bit in the movie, not only when I do it, but when she gets what I’m doing. These are the moments that blow me away in the movie. I like to trust the director to choose what he thinks is the best–and it worked out great. The smallness of seduction is something that’s missing from film. I think film excels at it when they get it right.