The Golden Compass
Set Visit: Deborah Forte on The Golden Compass
"This project for me started almost 11 years ago when I read the manuscript for The Northen Light, which is the name of The Golden Compass in the U.K.," she said. "When I read the manuscript for the book, I thought to myself, 'Who is this extraordinary writer?' I had never read Philip's work before. And wherever he's going, I want to go with him. And it struck me that this material was singularly visual, emotional and cinematic. And I called him about making a film and he said, 'Okay, I think it's a good idea. Even though films never get made from books that are options, let's see what happens.' It took a very long time. It's 10 years later now and it's been a really interesting journey."
Starring Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig, Forte really got her dream cast. "When Philip and I sat down to talk about the film 10 years ago, we both said that our first pick for Mrs. Coulter would be Nicole Kidman. We had our little dream cast lunch session that all producers have and very rarely are able to realize. And many years later, we do have Nicole Kidman. We have Daniel Craig. We have a fabulous cast, Tom Courtenay and Jim Carter. It just goes on and on with wonderful actors, Simon McBurney, who populate this story."
The star of the film is young Lyra, played by newcomer Dakota Blue Richards. "Most of all, I'm very proud of the fact that we have found Dakota Blue Richards who is our Lyra, because she is both an uncommonly good actress and personified a lot of characteristics of Lyra as a person. It's one of those really wonderful moments when we asked New Line if they would allow us to move forward with an open casting call for this film, which is sort of weird on a very big movie to cast an unknown, and they said, 'Yes, let's see who you can find.'"
The production held three casting calls to find Lyra, but discovered Richards early on. "Just by way of an anecdote, I keep in close contact with Philip and he kept calling me to ask me how it was going and if we had seen any promising candidates. I said to the casting agent, 'Just send him the DVD with the [first] 40 kids that we selected because it's going to take weeks to go through them and we have two other locations, so we'll keep him busy for a while.' And he called me 48 hours later and said, 'It's one of two girls.' And one of them was Dakota. And he went through another month long exercise to make sure that he looked at everyone and turned over every stone, but he knew all along that he wanted Dakota. And we're very, very, very proud of her and the way that she has been part of this film and she's a very, very important part of this film."
The Golden Compass comes to theatres on December 7th.
For movie stills, full synopsis and addition info, go to The Golden Compass
Movie Page.
More Golden Compass set reports coming soon on CanMag.Com.
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