Dedicated to Baz Luhrmann’s spectacular spectacular film Moulin
Rouge!
****************************************************************
If this page
looks out of proportion & there are no frames, please click here.
Last Updated:
*MR News*
Ø
Okay, I’ve finally had time to update! I know it’s been forever,
but I do have lots of new stuff. First of all, there’s lots of exciting
MR-related news; see below for that. As for the page, I’ve added heaps of new
pictures, mostly lots and lots of screencaps. New
galleries are: Christian & Satine, Other Characters, and Production Numbers & Groups. I’ve
posted the shooting script as
well, although that’s a work-in-progress, & right now only goes up to the
end of “Like a Virgin”. I’ve also updated the Links and Quotes pages, as well as the Summary and Script.
I’ve updated the pages on Ewan and Nicole
to include their latest projects and some new movie descriptions. I’m also
trying out a slight renovation of the look of the page as a whole (as you can
see), which is about half finished, as well as a new title: “L’Amour Fou”, from the Red-Curtain trademark sign, which not only
reflects the theme of MR (& all of Baz’s work) but also my ever-so-slightly
obsessive feelings about MR! J
I’m still on
a high, because last month I went on my first-ever trip to New York for a few
days, and while I was there I got to see Baz’s La Bohème!!! Both the city & the opera were just spectacular spectacular! (Despite the fact our
trip got cut short thanks to the fact that it coincided with the “Storm of the
Century” …lol, okay, maybe the decade… But
OMB,
it was even better than I thought it would be— & let me tell you, I was
expecting it to be pretty damn great! Of course, I almost didn't get to see it at all, since me & directions do
not mix well...
What happened is, after I FINALLY got to NYC (a day late,
since all the roads were closed leading into the city on Monday due to a
massive snowstorm, and we had to turn around halfway there—I was so worried I
wouldn’t get there at all!) on Tuesday morning, I thought I was home free: I
already had my ticket bought and paid for, all I had to do was pick it up,
which I was going to do that afternoon. Well, because we'd
been delayed a day in getting there, there was a change of plans, & we
never got near the theatre, so I had to pick the ticket up that night. I was
going by myself, since I couldn't convince my friends
to come, damn those heathen unbelievers! Lol, well,
no, they would've come, but they aren't obsessed like
me, and tickets are so expensive they couldn't really afford it anyways... So, they left the hotel about 7 to go see a movie, & I
was still getting ready. We planned to meet outside the theatre afterwards,
& my friend who's been to
Now, normally I'm the kind of person who leaves for things
about 5 minutes before they start, but I was so excited about LB, & I didn't want to miss a minute
of it, so I actually ended up leaving at
So the cab lets me out at 44th & B'way,
which I found out was right in the middle of
Anyways, I got to the theatre at about 1 minute past 8, and ran up to the box
office and gasped out, "I need to pick up my ticket!" Thank
Baz again that they hadn't sold it & that the show was late in starting,
and so I ran into the theatre and sat down, and 20 seconds later the lights
went down & it began.
And it was just incredible. I
mean, "Spectacular, spectacular, no words in the vernacular can describe
this great event..." I'm
even more amazed by Baz's genius now than ever before, if that's possible.
After about 2 minutes, I forgot that it was in Italian, which I don't know a word of, because of those great 1950's-era subtitles,
and the music was so emotional too, so that really conveyed a lot of what was
happening. And I thought they were all really good actors too. And lots of great little touches in the direction; Mimi
and Rodolfo are so cute together when they’re looking for her key in Act I; I love the way Baz has them both put their candles out accidentally-on-purpose-- and
then when they get to the café in Act II—their relationship is overall adorably
lovey-dovey (without being too sickening!) in the first half, and movingly
tragic in the second, just like it should be—; and there’s amusing
juxtaposition between their relationship & Marcello and Musetta’s…
And the sets were just incredible, too, CM really outdid herself. They
came out into the audience a little way, built around the boxes, so there were
people standing up there, like on a second-story apartment. And
the bohemian's garret, and the street scene at the Cafe Momus...OMB, the street
scene in the second act was the most incredible thing, because you saw the
stage hands putting it all together, and the crowd assembling, and the makeup
artists coming out to do touchups, but then all of a
sudden the whole theatre lights up (lights were strung right to the middle of
the ceiling over the audience) and the music started, and it all just burst
into life, and it was amazing, 1000x better than the whole thing happening
behind the curtain. The whole audience just gasped. And
there was this gorgeous, gorgeous scene with just Rodolfo & Mimi on a
street in the snow in the third act that was so beautiful, and so sad because they’re
trying to break up but they can’t…
And there were lots of "Moulin Rouge moments". Especially at the end of the first act,
Mimi & Rodolfo are declaring their love for each other on the ledge outside
his garret, with the big "L'Amour" sign—it was straight out of CWM,
and then they exit, and the stage goes dark except for the neon red sign in the
dark, it was magical. I also didn't realise how much comedy there was in it, it
was like MR in that respect too, how it would switch between broad comedy with the
bohos goofing around, to tragedy, with Mimi near
death. And of course, the character of Rodolfo is
quite a bit like Christian...except, Satine is more like Musetta, the 'hooker
with a heart of gold', and her stuffy English sugar daddy who foots the bill.
Well, actually I suppose she's a bit like a blend of Mimi and Musetta....And
then of course, there was the death scene, which was so sad...Mimi was saying
the same things as Satine when she was dying, and then Rodolfo ends up sobbing
over her body...
Well, anyways, I got a bit carried away at the souvenir stand
afterwards, because I just had to have a pink beret like the one Rodolfo gives
to Mimi, and then I got a poster & a lovely glossy big programme, and I was
going to buy a t-shirt to, except I was running out of money so I didn't, but
now I really wish I had...I've since bought the CD too, and I just ordered the
DVD of the Australian production from Amazon...
And of course the whole time I was there I was looking out for Baz and CM, just
in case they were back from Sydney, but I never saw them L
I swear to Baz though, every other person in that theatre was either a man with
silvery grey hair, or a woman with blonde hair and glasses...including the two
couples sitting in front of me. I did see the
girl who played Mimi leaving the theatre after the show though.
Oh, and if Baz and CM don't get every Tony they're
eligible for, I shall personally hunt down every voting member & see they
get what's coming to them. J
~Recent Moulin Rouge - Related News~
*CONGRATULATIONS TO NICOLE FOR WINNING THE BEST ACTRESS OSCAR!!!
The show went on in the end, and in what was one of the most
surprising (in a good
way!) Oscar ceremonies in a while, Nicole managed to hang on to
her lead (despite
losing at the SAG awards to Renée Zellweger) & win “by a nose”
(& the only reason
I’m resorting to that cliché is to quote Denzel
Washington as he announced the
winner). Her win this year was surely influenced by her loss last
year for Moulin
Rouge. The
question now is, can she make it a double (or a hat-trick of nominations)
next year, with 3 potentially Oscar-worthy roles in 2003 (Cold Mountain, Dogville,
and The Human Stain)? If
she does win next year, with Adrien Brody presenting
the
Best Actress statuette, she’s sure to get one hell of a gift
basket at any rate! ;)
Anyways, lots of pictures and a
transcript of her lovely speech are here.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* Another award for Nicole to add to her collection! She won
the BAFTA (British Academy Award) on February 23rd, beating out,
among others, Halle Berry, who of course beat HER at
the Oscars last year…well, of course the BATFAs got
things right, after all, they’re the ones who’ve given Baz a Best Director
AWARD, when the Oscars won’t even give him a NOMINATION! *I will not hold a
grudge against AMPAS, I will not hold a grudge against AMPAS…* Anyhoo, back on topic, big congrats to Nicole!!! Things are
definitely looking up for the Oscars this year, it will be a big upset if she
doesn’t win. And it’s about time!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* Another Oscar nomination for Nicole! This is 2
in a row now, just like the Globes, but let’s hope that this year she’s the
winner! She’s actually the odds-on favourite for the win this year, & it’s
Renée Zellweger, also a second-time nominee for Chicago, that is suffering from the musical-comedy curse. The other
nominees are Julianne Moore in Far From
Heaven, Salma Hayek in Frida, and Diane Lane in Unfaithful.
The ceremony is on Sunday March 23rd at 5:30pm PST/8:30pm EST. Good
luck Nicole! J
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* NICOLE WON THE
GOLDEN GLOBE FOR BEST ACTRESS IN A DRAMA!!
Congratulations,
that makes two in a row and three total! (she won for
To Die For in 1996 as
well as last year’s for Moulin Rouge)
She’s a shoo-
in for an Oscar nom now, and probably the front runner to win,
with
probably the most competition coming from her Hours co-star Julianne
Moore in Far From Heaven.
The Hours producer Scott Rudin praised her
as “a character actress who looks like a movie star.” She gave a
lovely
speech, which hopefully I can get a transcription of, but here’s a
few
lines of it for now:
“It was a tricky movie in terms of the
subject matter and I’m just
grateful that it got made. This year
there’s been an enormous
amount of really good performances by
women in television and in
cinema. I say to the writers, please keep writing for us, we’re very
interesting.
And to the directors, please keep taking chances and
giving us
complicated, rich characters to play.”
There’s lots of pictures, of course, &
they can be seen here. The large
earrings she’s wearing are old Indian ones that she said brought
her
luck, but she decided not to accessorise with the red clown’s nose
a
friend gave her as a joke on the infamous false nose she wears in
the movie.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* Ewan’s new movie
with Renée Zellweger, the retro romantic comedy Down With Love, is set to open on May 16th,
and the trailer has just been released, you can see it here.
I’ve also made some screencaps
from it, & those are here.
This looks like it’s going be really cute and funny & I can’t wait to see
it!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* Big congratulations to Nicole, who’s been
nominated for a Best Actress in a Drama Golden Globe Award for her role as
Virginia Woolf in The Hours. The Hours is up for 6 other awards,
including Best Picture, Drama & Best Director. You can watch the awards
show at 8pm on Sunday January 29th.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* Well, it looks like Baz’s Alexander the Great is turning into a
Red Curtain Trilogy reunion of sorts: Nicole
Kidman has been cast as Olympia, Alexander’s (Leonardo DiCaprio’s)
mother. In a related story, filming has been postponed—for about 20 years. No,
apparently Nicole will appear as-is for scenes involving Alexander as a child,
and then for scenes with him as a grown man she’ll have old-age makeup. As for
the filming, it has only been postponed from winter 2003 to fall 2003, which
has to do with Leo’s schedule as well as problems with the financing—Fox has
pulled out because of the cost, but they have since been replaced with
DreamWorks.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* The Original
Cast Recording of Baz’s La Bohème is now for sale, as a 1-disc
highlights
album, with
all three casts singing different parts of the score. I’ve found it difficult
to track
down, but it is
available to order from Amazon.
I highly recommend it, it is just gorgeous, gorgeous music, so emotional, &
it comes with an English translation in the booklet for those of us who don’t
speak Italian!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
*La Bohème premiered in
New York on December 8th to excellent reviews. Yay!!
The New York Times gave it
an absolute rave, they didn’t have a bad thing to say!
Pictures above of Baz and Catherine Martin at the
premiere, click for full-size image. I can’t believe I get to go see this, it’s
going to be so amazing! Oh, & Vogue had
a fantastic spread of LB pictures and
excerpts from Baz’s diary while he was developing it (also some MR stuff in there too!) in their
December issue. You can read the article here.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* Baz’s La Bohème had its San Francisco premiere
on October 16th. It got a glowing review from the San Francisco Chronicle
(Hurrah!), and you can read that here.
Also, you can read about the party here. As you can see from the
picture above of her, Baz, and Catherine Martin, Nicole Kidman was there, along with some other celebrities. (you
can click on the pictures above to see a bigger image) Also,
there’s some articles from the recent past on Baz & La Bohème, from the New
York Times and The San
Francisco Chronicle, and there’s also an article on Catherine Martin, from The San Francisco Chronicle.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* Entertainment
Weekly published its annual power list in its October 18th
issue, and both Nicole
Kidman & Baz Luhrmann got a spot
on the Entertainers list. Nicole was number 16, a huge jump from her #46
position last year, and only the 3rd woman on the list, and the 2nd
actress (Julia Roberts, at #4; Oprah Winfrey at #8 was the other woman). Baz
got in at number 48, which isn’t bad, considering he wasn’t even on the list
last year. I thought that was a very pleasant surprise, since he isn’t exactly
the most commercial director, which is what usually means power in Hollywood,
and he’s sometimes suffered for it. (*cough* Oscarsnub
*cough*).
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* Happy
Birthday to Baz Luhrmann, who celebrated the
big 4-0 on September 17th!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* I don’t
think this is anything official yet, but apparently Nicole Kidman might be
doing a remake of Guys and Dolls with
Vin Diesel! ROTFLMAO! Sorry, but the idea of Vin Diesel in a musical is hysterical to me. I mean,
obviously he’d be playing probably the Marlon Brando role as a gangster (incidentally, the role Baz Luhrmann played
in High School), and not a lovelorn-poet type like Christian, but still, he’d
be a singing and dancing gangster!
Seriously, though, I’ve said it before & I’ll say it again: I’m so happy
musicals are making a comeback! And it’s all thanks to Baz! And I think Nicole
would be great in this role. But I just can’t get past the mental picture of Vin Diesel singing & dancing, lol.
But, like I said, I don’t think this is for sure yet, just something Vin Diesel said, and I keep reading it everywhere.
Another
project Nicole is said to be interested in is a movie of the Sixties sitcom Bewitched, where she would play the main
character, suburban housewife—and witch—Samantha. Mike Myers is also reportedly
in discussions to play her husband, Darren.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
* Update on La Bohème: tickets for the Broadway show
went on sale on Sunday September 15th, & the show opens on
November the 26th. There’s a really neat website up for it here, where you can
order tickets, see the trailer, get downloads & get more info. The Bazmark site is also finally
up, but all that’s there so far is the La Bohème trailer and a link to that
site & the MR one.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
*Update on Alexander the Great: I previously said
Leo was being considered for the title role even though he had been previously
linked to a Martin Scorsese Alexander project; I’ve since read that Martin
Scorsese has abandoned his own project and is now hoping to produce Baz’s. As
for Leo, he may do a biopic of Howard Hughes instead, & Baz is considering
other actors for the role, including Josh Hartnett. (?!)
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
*Baz has finally announced his next project!
From The Hollywood Reporter:
“Director Baz Luhrmann
is tossing aside his dance shoes and brushing up on ancient Greece. The Moulin Rouge filmmaker has committed to
bring producer Dino De Laurentiis’s historical epic
about Alexander the Great to the big screen (HR 7/23). The project, based on a
trio of novels by Italian author-academic Valerio Manfredi and adapted by Oscar-winning scribe Ted Tally,
will be distributed domestically by Universal Pictures with 20th Century Fox
handling international rights. Luhrmann is looking to start production on Alexander in the first quarter of 2003
in Morocco. Luhrmann said in an interview that he has had a lifelong
fascination with Alexander. With this project, the director hopes to launch a
trilogy of epic films now that he has completed his musical trio – Strictly Ballroom, William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge. “The Western culture that we know and respect today
would not have existed without Alexander,” Luhrmann said, adding that the
project will chart Alexander’s epic journey, externally and internally, in much
the same style as the 1962 feature Lawrence
of Arabia.
De
Laurentiis optioned Manfredi’s
novels more than a year ago and began working to condense their 1,200 pages (HR
5/3/01). A month later, Tally came aboard to adapt and Universal joined the
project (HR 6/26/01). Several months ago, Luhrmann began meeting with Tally and
then went location scouting.
“He’s
one of the best directors in the world; he’s a genius,” De Laurentiis
said of Luhrmann’s addition to the project. “Any producer who wants to develop
the story of a great man like Alexander needs a director with a vision.”
Producer
Martha De Laurentiis said of the appeal of Alexander:
“He went through so many things in such a short life. Now, we are concentrating
on a finalized version of the script and focusing on the ‘why’ of Alexander.
Baz is the perfect director to do that. He’s going to create a new language for
this type of film.”
While
the title role has yet to be cast, Luhrmann already has a vision of who Alexander
was as a person. “Alexander was the first recorded cult of personality – while
he was still alive – in human history,” the director said. “He was almost a
deity.”
Luhrmann’s
involvement on the De Laurentiis movie puts the
Universal/Fox project ahead of several competing projects. They include the
Oliver Stone-directed Alexander
project at Intermedia that Colin Farrell is said to
be eyeing; an IEG project with which Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio have
been toying; and a 10-part HBO miniseries that, according to sources, has been
put on hold.
Luhrmann,
repped by ICM, most recently directed the
Oscar-winning Moulin Rouge for Fox.”
Okay, not exactly what I had imagined
he would choose, but I’m still really excited to see it. An early 2003 start
date probably means it will be released at Christmas 2004, or possibly Summer
2004 at the earliest, given Baz’s propensity for perfectionism (= long shoots
& post-production), and the fact that the film will probably be targeted as
an Oscar contender. (Historical epics tend to do better than musicals, so
hopefully Baz will finally get his due!) I’m guessing that even though it isn’t
a musical, it will make excellent use of the soundtrack, and hopefully there’ll
be a love story in there somewhere, since Baz does them so well. (I know
absolutely nothing about Alexander the Great, but surely he at least had some
sort of mistress? Maybe even a…courtesan?) And I’ve got all my fingers crossed
that Baz will make another musical again, sometime. So please don’t lose those
dancing shoes, Baz.
UPDATE: I read that Leonardo DiCaprio
is being considered to play Alexander, which kind of surprised me, since I’d
heard before (and it says in the article above) that he was attached to Martin Scorsese’s Alexander the Great project. Leo has, of course,
worked with Baz before, as Romeo in Romeo
+ Juliet, so it will be interesting to see what happens…
As well, the budget for this movie is far bigger than the one for Moulin Rouge, at a reported $140 million
dollars. The shoot will be in Morocco, with the King of Morocco expected to
provide the use of his personal army (5,000 soldiers & 1,000 horses) for
the battle scenes.
For past
updates & news, click here.
This film is
about: Truth Beauty Freedom But Above All LOVE
-------------- BEGIN BRAVENET CODE --------------
--------------- END BRAVENET CODE ---------------
