'Kung Fu Panda' director takes on 'The Little Prince'
Why would Hastings-on-Hudson film director Mark Osborne want to make a movie of a 73-year-old classic children’s book after his success with a blockbuster kids film like “Kung Fu Panda”?
One reason: Destiny.
“When I was in college, I was given the book by my girlfriend,” Osborne, 45, tells The Journal News.The two-time Academy Award nominee’s journey toward making a big-screen version of “The Little Prince” — based on Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s beloved 1943 illustrated novella — began more than two decades ago, as the result of a young woman’s romantic gesture toward the Trenton, New Jersey, native.
“She gave me her copy of the book when we were going to have to separate” after his decision to transfer from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, where he was studying general art, to California Institute of the Arts in Los Angeles to focus on animation.
She wanted “to keep us connected,” he says. “She would quote from the book in letters to me.
“I found them recently and I just started bawling. … She said we’ll always be together: ‘It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye,’” he adds, citing a quote she used.
Osborne eventually married that girlfriend, Kim, and they have two children. Kim is a jewelry artist who also works as assistant librarian at Springhurst Elementary School in Dobbs Ferry.
So Osborne was thrilled when some French producers approached him shortly after the release of “Kung Fu Panda” to see if he wanted to tackle the classic book.
“Kung Fu Panda” was Osborne’s second Oscar-nominated project, after his 1998 nod for “More,” a stop-motion short. "Panda" earned an estimated $633 million worldwide, securing an enduring place in the pantheon of family entertainment and spawning a couple of sequels directed by others.
While eager to take the job, Osborne says he had some conditions.
“I told the producers very clearly I didn’t want to go down this road unless I was going to be given the support to really honor the book and to do this the way I really felt would be a bold, artistic approach to how to pay tribute to the book,” he says. “That was really the goal.
“I knew that in order to do this properly I was going to have to take risks; I was going to have to take some chances,” he adds.
One of those risks was his decision to present the magical-realism of Saint-Exupéry’s novella, which tells of an unlikely friendship between an adult aviator and a mysterious blond boy who claims to come from Asteroid B-612, as a story within a story.
Osborne’s film opens with a computer-animated segment in which a harried, over-scheduled little girl befriends her kooky next-door neighbor. The old man turns out to be the aviator of the original story.
But in the movie’s world, Saint-Exupéry’s book doesn’t exist, and the aviator fears he’ll die without anyone hearing it.
“I really believe the book has had a profound effect in our world,” Osborne explains, adding that his big-screen take tries to illustrate that by creating “an alternate universe where that book didn’t exist.”
The aviator is voiced by Jeff Bridges, one of a huge cast of stars, including Rachel McAdams, James Franco, Benicio Del Toro, Marion Cotillard, Paul Rudd and Ricky Gervais.
To tell the aviator’s story, the film shifts from modern, computer-generated animation to hand-crafted, stop-motion animation that brings the book’s original watercolor illustrations to life.
Osborne says the 5-and-a-half-year process of making the movie has been a real family affair.
Daughter Maddie, who’s now 18, inspired the character of the little girl at the center of the movie’s modern story, and she and brother Riley, 14, provided voices for characters in the “scratch” phase of development.
While Maddie wasn’t able to stay with the project — Mackenzie Foy of “Interstellar” replaces her as the little girl — Riley remains as the voice of the title character.
“It’s been a very involved process for us,” Osborne says of his family. “I say we made it together because we all moved to Paris for two years” during preproduction.
Then, when production was moved to Montreal, the family settled in Hastings and Osborne commuted to Canada.
“My wife grew up in Yonkers, so this is a very familiar area for us,” he says. “When the project moved to Montreal, this was our solution. We didn’t want to move the kids around too much during their high school years.”
While the movie will land in theaters on March 18, the Lower Hudson Valley is getting sneak peek on Sunday, when it’s screened at the Jacob Burns Film Center as part of a fundraiser for the center’s educational programs.
Sunday’s event, “Viewing & Doing: An Afternoon of Film and Family Fun,” part of the film center’s 15th anniversary celebration, pairs hands-on filmmaking fun with a movie screening.
“We were so fortunate with the timing for an event in March that it coincides with having a sneak preview of ‘The Little Prince’ — and it’s by a local filmmaker,” says Edie Demas, the film center’s executive director.
“I can’t wait,” says Osborne, who will be participating in it. “It seems like such a cool day they have planned. I’m going to be there with my family. I’m really looking forward to it.”
New City-based journalist Steven P. Marsh blogs about the performing arts at www.willyoumissme.com .
If you go
What: “The Little Prince” preview screening, part of “Viewing & Doing: An Afternoon of Film and Family Fun.”
When: Noon, March 6
Where: Jacob Burns Film Center, 364 Manville Road, Pleasantvillehttps://burnsfilmcenter.org/
Tickets: $40, with family packages starting at $175. Available online https://burnsfilmcenter.org/booking/family-viewing-doing/ or by calling or emailing Melissa Tepe at 914-773-7663, ext. 436, mtepe@burnsfilmcenter.org.