Talk: Looney Tunes: Back in Action

Henson

Is there a source for the Creature Shop having been used on this film? IMDb doesn't credit them, but we all know that's not conclusive. David Barclay doesn't mention Henson for that film on his resume either. —Scott (talk) 15:26, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

They weren't involved at all; credits and production presskits give credit to Barclay alone, acting independently. The puppets in question weren't animatronic, just stand-ins, really; Bruce Lanoil and Barclay operated and did scratch tracks for the character voices. I'm going to delete this. -- Andrew Leal (talk) 15:42, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. —Scott (talk) 15:47, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I think that might be too hasty -- as User:Animation Geek pointed out, the official movie site mentions the Creature Shop in the Production Notes:

"Assisting Fraser and Elfman in achieving seamless performances with their animated co-stars were veteran puppeteers Bruce Lanoil and Dave Barclay. The Jim Henson Creature Shop created the reference puppets under the supervision of Barclay, who has been puppeteering since the age of four and got his big break on The Empire Strikes Back as an assistant puppet maker and assistant to Frank Oz, who played Jedi master Yoda. The talented pair are not only puppeteers but also comedic actors, and were able to ad-lib with the cast. Their off-camera performance and antics provided a key basis for the character relationships." -- Danny (talk) 16:29, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't think its too hasty at all, but I'll email David Barclay. The screen credits only acknowledge Barclay and Lanoil as "Technical Consultants," and only that single website mentions Henson. And it wouldn't be the first time advance publicity falsely mentioned them because a Creature Shop puppeteer was involved. -- Andrew Leal (talk) 16:34, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Well, we do have a source now. So if someone has a way to contact Barclay, we should do that. —Scott (talk) 16:43, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Like I said, I e-mailed him. His PerformFX freelance company website has an image of their work on Back in Action on the front page. Again, may not mean anything, but with only a single production note as proof (the DVD featurettes with Barclay don't mention Henson at all), I'm incredibly skeptical. -- Andrew Leal (talk) 16:53, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Lo and behold, a very quick answer from Barclay, which clears up things. The Creature Shop was involved, but only in the earliest phase, and these were later abandoned, which probably explains why only the one note mentioned it. Here's his full response, for the record:

“Yes the Creature Shop was commissioned to build the Bugs and Daffy puppet stand ins. Pete Brooke sculpted the two characters, Phil Jackson molded them and cast the latex/polyfoam pieces, I build the joints and fitted out the all puppet parts and various limbs etc, and heads, and Pete painted them.

Eric Goldberg (director of animation)wanted the puppets to be smaller than originally sculpted and delivered.

So, on the shoot, and now payed by warners, I rebuilt and reduced the puppets by 15% to make them fit Eric's needs.

Not a PerformFX gig, but I did all of the puppet building, the first phase on behalf of the creature shop, the second phase directly for Warners.

For the re-shoot sequences, a few months after principle photography completed, I built a dozen oversized toy Pepe Le Pew's with one fully animatronic radio controlled hero for a sequence that was eventually cut from the film.”

So, I'm still not sure what to do with it. We now have proof there was a connection, but likewise, we know that the puppets used in the shoot, and in the image Danny uploaded earlier, were redone by Barclay and didn't involve the Creature Shop. In either case, the results aren't visible on screen, since they were utterly replaced by the animated characters. So, the entry is relevant, but is it right to call it a Creature Shop Film? It's almost an Unfinished Project, in a way, like Dragonheart. -- User:Aleal 18:14, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, I think the Dragonheart comparison is good. I would say put it in "Unfinished Movies". Anybody else have a comment? -- Danny (talk) 18:18, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I'd agree; since Animation Geek's been vindicated, I'm leaving a message, though, so they can weigh in (since they didn't get enough input the first time). Also in this case, Jenna Elfman should be unlinked. Though a full connections cast list would be worth adding (Robert Picardo was in it, for example, and there's some voice actor connections). -- Andrew Leal (talk) 18:22, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

We already have a Looney Tunes page. Maybe we could just include this trivia fact on that page, and delete this page. --Minor muppetz 18:33, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I think putting a section about Henson's efforts on the project onto the Looney Tunes page would be the best solution. -- Brad D. (talk) 19:52, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

Scott stuck it in Unfinished Movies for now, but there's not a clear consensus. I don't think it does much harm as its own page, but it might be easier dealt with on a Looney Tunes page. I don't really like the images on this page, since the poster isn't relevant, and the image of the puppets is of the re-worked versions, so the pics don't really have any Henson relevance at all. Merging could solve that. -- Andrew Leal (talk) 17:22, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

It's nice as a companion article to Dragonheart as far as projects-that-started-with-Henson-involvement-but-didn't-finish-with-them go. I agree about the relevance of the images though. If we found pictures of the Creature Shop puppets, that would be awesome. —Scott (talk) 17:26, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

"Unfinished" status

I'm not so sure if this should count as an "Unfinished Movie." The puppets were supplied purely for the purpose as on-set reference; my understanding is there was never any intention to feature them in the final film. TenCents (talk to me!) 00:58, January 3, 2012 (UTC)

See the above discussion. One of the reasons we classed it as unfinished is that ultimately the Creature Shop puppets weren't even used for on-set reference, but rebuilt. So in the end it wasn't even involved for the behind the scenes purposes. -- Andrew Leal (talk) 02:02, January 3, 2012 (UTC)