Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes Director Reveals The Studio's One Request For The Film [Exclusive Interview]
This post contains spoilers for "Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes."
The majority of people currently alive today have never known a world without the "Planet of the Apes" franchise. French author Pierre Boulle first published his novel "La Planète des singes" in 1963, and the world has been fascinated with an alternate (or possible, depending on how you view things) future where our own hubris have destroyed humans, and highly intelligent apes are now the dominant species on Earth. "Maze Runner" and future "The Legend of Zelda" director Wes Ball is the latest to sit in the director's chair, delivering "Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes," the tenth film overall in this legacy series.
The film follows the events of the previous trilogy ("Rise of the," "Dawn of the," and "War for the Planet of the Apes") a few hundred years later, where a young ape named Noa (Owen Teague) sets off on a journey after his clan has been attacked by a rival group under the control of the ruthless Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand). On his way, he meets a human woman who he initially believes to be feral, but when she reveals that she can not only speak intelligently but has a name, Mae (Freya Allen), Noa begins to question everything he's ever known about the past. Disney and 20th Century Studios' newest "Apes" film boasts the longest runtime in the series yet, and is, for my money, a phenomenal addition to the pantheon. I recently had the chance to speak with Ball one-on-one to learn more about joining this beloved series, how he knew Owen Teague was the successor to Andy Serkis' Caesar in the recent trilogy, complicated villains, and whether or not we'll ever see his "Mouse Guard" adaptation.
Note: This interview has been lightly edited for clarity and brevity.
Wes Ball didn't want to make a direct sequel
This movie has so much story about Caesar and his legacy, both well-intended and somewhat corrupted. What was it like working on a legacy franchise while also working on a story that is all about legacy?
Yeah, yeah, that was the key I think for us. If we couldn't crack that, I wouldn't have made the movie. If it was just a direct sequel, I personally would not have been interested in it. The fact that we can stand on our own a little bit, but still have this spirit of the previous movies hanging over our story, it gave richness to the story in really unique ways, I think. So, that was a very conscious decision that we got to explore what has happened to the myth and legend of this great ape that we all fell in love with, and how Noa comes to interact with that story, different versions of the story, and how it changes him into this character that he ultimately becomes by the end of the movie — forever changed.
It was great. It was really, really fun to play with, and I was very aware of the expectations and the desire for it to be good. We all had the same desire. I'm a fan of all these movies, the previous three, the original '68 one especially. So yeah, we hope we've made something that fits, that belongs with all these other movies with us. We're the 10th movie of the franchise over 55 years, and hopefully, we're one of the good ones.
Ball is a huge fan of the original Planet of the Apes movie
I'm glad that you brought up the incorporation of the older movies, because there's a bit of Lawmaker [John Huston's character in 1973's "Battle for the Planet of the Apes"] in some of Caesar's story. How do you determine which aspects of the older movies to incorporate in this new one?
I mean, that's the beauty of it. We have this great wealth of the Caesar storyline behind us, and we get to look forward to that '68 version of reality there. And it's nice guidelines, actually. They're very far away, so you don't feel constrained by it at all, but you get to think about, "How did they get to that place and where did that come from?" And we get to explore all that stuff here, which is great. You know what I mean? That's just good stuff to mine. So it comes from just a place of love of those originals. And Rick [Jaffa] and Amanda [Silver], who really started this whole reboot with "Rise," and they came on as writers and producers on this movie, they've been thinking about those questions for a long time, too. We're in good hands moving forward, I think, if we're lucky enough to make more.
Thinking about your introduction to "Apes," I would love to know what your story is with this franchise.
It was the '68. It was the original "Planet of the Apes." I was a kid. I don't really remember my first reaction of the movie, honestly. I was probably so young. My dad was probably watching it on TV or something. I'm sure the concepts went over my head. I don't remember having reaction to the Statue of Liberty or anything, but I remember those images. Everyone through the grass, all that stuff — apes on horses. I remember the set designs. So those images are etched in my brain, my early sponge of a mind for movies. That's where my DNA begins, I think with that original '68 movie.
I love that. For me, it was seeing Paul Williams on Late Night in full ape regalia singing and smoking cigarettes.
Probably like, "What is this?"
That was exactly it. I was like, "What is happening? What is this?!"
What about the people whose first thing is the musical on "The Simpsons?" That'd be amazing. [laughs]
The studio wanted Kingdom to be 'a little lighter' than the recent trilogy
Absolutely. But thinking about the original series, there's always a sense of humor. There's a playfulness in a lot of the original stuff, and then I would say in the most recent trilogy, these are very serious Ape movies. I was so pleased in watching your movie, that there is a little bit of ... there's this humor in here. So I'm curious, when you're working on this, where do you determine, "Okay, we need to have Raka have his jaw drop and drop the blanket. We need that reaction"?
That was the only thing that the studio asked, was could we find a tone that was a little lighter, I suppose, without compromising all the things that made these movies great — which is mature storytelling and real stakes and real drama and conflict, all that stuff. And I was happy to go there because my instincts naturally go there anyway. We thought of this more as an adventure movie. It's a young character this time. He's very innocent, and that's probably where the humor comes from, is that innocence. Or that sense of being behind on the knowledge of things. And there's more that we actually had to cut out for time, but maybe we'll get in there for another version of the movie or something.
But yeah, just try to give people a good time in the theater. Try to have some nice, contemplate big ideas next to a campfire, but also run into the fields being chased by giant gorillas and also just some fun moments where you can smile and have a good time and meet these characters, fall in love with these characters. We tried.
Oh, absolutely. When it first started, I was so excited to see Noa and his little crew. I'm like, "Oh, this is a coming of age/hero's journey for him. This is wonderful." Such a refreshing choice.
That's good. That's good. Cool.
The connection between Kingdom and I Am Legend
I was also thinking that Mae almost feels like she's being pulled out of Richard Matheson's "I Am Legend" in the sense that –
She carries with her the darkness of the previous movies that surround all humanity.
Yes! Yeah, she's carrying it with her!
They are responsible for where this world ultimately ended up. But I think what's interesting about her role is that she changes almost to become more optimistic and hopeful by the end. He offers peace, and she takes it with her to her world. So it's interesting that she starts in a dark place and ends in a place of [optimism]. The dynamic and relationship that forms between these two characters, as complicated as it is, as it becomes, is going to be crucial moving forward. You know what I mean?
Absolutely. I mean, there's definitely this lesson of learning from your community, learning from those around you, because when we do see her, we know as the humans watching this ... we know how we treat apes.
Yeah, sure.
When [the apes] get into the vault and they open the book, my first thought was, "Oh, they're going to see, there's going to be a zoo. They're going to know, and everything's going to be destroyed!"
And Proximus just told him that! Proximus was right.
Because he's right! He's right!
Yeah. That's a cool bunch of interesting little things there.
On creating the complicated Proximus Caesar
I'm so glad you brought up Proximus, because he's this character that I don't think we see enough of anymore, which is a ruler that has righteous anger and is right. But of course, it's not maybe the most polite way of going about things.
That's right. Maybe he goes about it the wrong way. And that's a question about — Noa has multiple father figures that show up in his life in this movie, and all of them end. And it's going to be interesting to see how those different ideas, these little angels on his shoulder whispering to him, how he's going to choose where to go into the future. That's going to be really fun to explore, I think, if we're lucky enough to keep going with the movies. About just how this character's innocent, blank slate of a character is changed forever by the end, by the things he's learned. You know what I mean? It's kind of cool.
Because ultimately with coming of age stories, coming of age isn't just yourself coming of age. It's also getting to that moment where you realize the adults in your life are fallible, and they're not perfect.
Which, to me, is a big moment growing up, when you realize the elders in my life are wrong and fallible. That's a big idea that Noa has to arrive at: to question the people that came before, but without losing a sense of respect and honor for it. So that's the trick. That was a cool idea, I thought, that we touched on, at least lightly.
I definitely think the teen years and into the early 20s are some of my favorite characters to look at, because this is when they are their most passionate and they have their biggest quest for justice –
And it all crumbles around them.
They all think they're invincible, and then they have to realize things are falling apart. Things are hard. They don't have as much power as they once thought that they did.
Yeah, totally.
So getting to see a character explore that through this, but be in the world of "Planet of the Apes," I thought was such a wonderful choice.
That's good. That's cool.
Ball acted like an ape to direct his actors
Another thing I wanted to talk about is the visual effects in this are beautiful and the world that you've built is lush, and you feel like you are in it and immersed in it.
That's great! Yeah!
As a director, how do you figure out how to give direction to people not knowing 100% what this final product's going to look like?
I tend to write in pictures early on. Sometimes it's not even in the script, and it ends up winding up in the script because we find it in the image. My approach is visual. I'm better at taking text to the visual, not putting a vision down to text. I work on the different side of things. So I rely on the writers to help us move forward. A lot of it is me showing them all that artwork, giving them a sense of it, and then just acting it out for them like an idiot, running around trying to make everyone see the same thing. That's the trick for me for these kinds of movies, is somehow you get them seeing the same movie in their head. And then you rely on them to make choices based on that, and you trust them to go forth.
It's a collaborative kind of art form, as I always said, and that applies both to my cinematographer, Gyula [Pados] and my production designer, Dan Dorrance, and my editors Dan [Zimmerman] and Dirk [Westervelt], who did this fantastic job. That's the job, I guess, is to kind of corral everyone into [going in the same direction]. Hopefully, it all works out in the end.
Why Owen Teague is the perfect Noa
Owen Teague has to carry this entire movie on his shoulders, and I think if you know his work previously, you're like, "Oh yeah, he's capable. He can do this." But I think a lot of people –
I think this will be an introduction to him for people, this movie.
Yeah, I don't think a lot of people are as familiar with him. So what was it about his audition, his performance, where you were like, "That's it. That's my Noa"?
Yeah, it was his tape he sent in, and I tend to cast on instinct. I don't overthink it too much, and I don't know, I just, "That's him. That's him." And it was just immediate. You know what I mean? He was like the second tape that I saw, the first or second tape that I saw.
Oh, wow!
And I was terrified. "How do we find someone who's going to fill Andy Serkis' shoes? How are we going to do this?" And this tape shows up: "Oh, this is going to be easy." And then I kept looking of course, just to see, but I kept going back to Owen. It was so perfect. And then you talk to him, and he's just a nice guy. He's so humble, but he cares so much about doing his best, and he works hard. And I think he deserves a lot of credit for carrying the load of the responsibility that was on him for this movie. He carried this movie. Like you said, he's a straight man. He might not get a lot of the credit, I think. All these colorful characters are around him. But the movie works because of him, and all the characters that interface with him as a character. So he deserves a lot of credit, I think.
Absolutely. I mean, he's the beating heart, and so without him, everything would fall apart.
Ball still has hopes for Mouse Guard
I have time for one last question. I'm one of the people who is forever mourning "Mouse Guard." I assume you are as well.
Me too! Rise up!
So I'm curious: What did you learn from working on that project and how you've moved forward with your career and other projects that you've worked on? What have you taken from "Mouse Guard" that still lives on in your filmography?
Well, I definitely love it. I think it's the most special thing ever. It's got to be made some point. Hopefully, I can help that happen at some point. That's where I met Matt Reeves. That's where I met Andy Serkis. I started to learn a bit about the process of motion capture, even though that was going to be a full-on "Avatar"-level [production]. It wasn't going to be live-action. I got my feet wet with what I was going to be doing here in Apes. So I guess it was a natural choice for the studio, after the "Mouse Guard" thing went down and they said, "What would you do with 'Planet of the Apes?'" I can see the jump there, but I'm with you. I love it. And there's so much more you've not seen that we did. It's incredible.
My whole heart's just dying. [laughs]
I mean, that little thing that I released out there was done before we even had a script and before we developed the studio and built all the sets and did all the concept art. I had so much stuff. It's amazing. It's just sitting there on a hard drive waiting to be woken up. So we'll see. We'll see what happens.
Hopefully, after this, people will be like, "You know what? What about that 'Mouse Guard' thing he was working on?"
Yeah, do some apes, do some mice, do some dinosaurs next, and then do some squirrels or something. Be the animal guy.
"Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes" is playing in theaters everywhere.