Interview: ‘Alice Through the Looking Glass’ Director James Bobin Dishes on the Fantasy Sequel

Wyatt Muma ’18 / Emertainment Monthly Assistant Editor

James Bobin has a long history of being apart of some absolutely great comedies. As Alice Through the Looking Glass is about to be unleashed on the world, he discusses his inspirations and his favorite parts of diving into the zany world of Wonderland.

While the film has never been seen based on both Lewis Carroll’s books, and the original Disney movie, from a fan’s perceptive, it seems based more heavily on Through the Looking Glass, with the inclusion of two characters from the first book. And my question is, will this movie go back and cover story elements from Through the Looking Glass that were left out along with the additional storyline created solely for the book or will it be just a continuation of the first movie with the script, with a completely original storyline?

James Bobin: Yeah, good question. Well, the book is obviously very important, particularly important to me, because growing up in England, I read this book 100 times. So I know it pretty well, but also that meant that I knew going into this, that the book’s story is rather unusual. It’s really an analogy with a chess match, whereby Alice becomes the queen to makes moves and write chapters. And this is where it’s a very strange sequence of events. It’s beautiful and great, but doesn’t really work as a driving narrative, to sit down to watch for an hour and a half. So I was really quite keen to kind of combine elements in the book along with the things I thought were important to the story.

So you’ve taken on such iconic characters in your direction experience, from The Muppets to Alice in Wonderland. How do you deal with the pressures of adapting such classic stories while still putting your own original touch on them?          

JB: I mean, really for me, lot of it is, filmmaking is so subjective and based on your own personal opinion to a degree. I feel both with The Muppets and Alice Through the Looking Glass, you have a very clear idea of what they mean to me. And then my implementation of the work arises from that. So I have a sense of what I think they are. Like with The Muppets I remember them very clearly from my childhood. I remembered why I liked them, and so I wanted to try and make them feel like that again. But you are also aware of the responsibility because obviously I’m not the only person who loves these characters, everyone loves these characters. So, all you can do is try and treat your own sense of what they are.

Did you feel obligated to follow the style set forth by Tim Burton or did Disney and Burton, being a producer on the film, kinda allow you to handle the sequel in your own manner, in your own way?

JB: Yeah. It’s both, really, again Tim’s visual products, they’re strong and so beautiful. But they just looked incredible. And I love that world looking from the character’s side, I think that is something I couldn’t really – I didn’t want to change, the way it was done. I think really when you’re making a film which is a sequel you have to stay true to the original design in the sense that it feels like the same universe and the same world. But what was good about this film is that it was both a sequel and a prequel. Also geographically, it’s a different location and [there are] different places we visit which we haven’t been to before.

How do you approach creating the unique areas of Wonderland? Does your process involve your own sketches or more in-depth concept art?

JB: Yes. Both, really. When you read a script, you can’t help but visualize it neatly in your head. And so that’s just your own brain creating images for you. That’s often very based on the things you’ve read and the world you’ve been affected by. It’s not instantly in your head, but it’s very personal, that sort of thing you come up with. So often I would do sketches. ‘Cause I like drawing.

You mentioned that you built lot of sets in real time for the movie. And then you mentioned you built the set of Wit’s End. So I was wondering what the process was like building that.

JB: Oh yeah, Wit’s End is the town in the movie. It’s basically the place where the Hatter’s family has a shop and sells hats along with where the Red and White Queens grew up. But it’s that really, design-wise, it’s a blend of influences. I’ve often enjoyed walking around small English villages and understanding how they grow through time. With design, well, they weren’t really planned, they sort of – we call it higgledy piggledy in England. And it’s the sort of thing where things were built on top of each other all the time.

You get a real sense of place through time. And so when I was designing with Tim, I went to this place that felt like it’s been there for a long time, and developed [the feel] in a very random way. We didn’t really necessarily obey the laws of architecture to a degree, because through time buildings settle and move. And so I wanted this place to feel like that. At the same time, [I wanted it to] have an element of magic. I think the idea of Wonderland to me is the idea of history plus magic. I really wanted to have the sense of why these buildings almost shouldn’t stand up. Because of the angles they’re built at, it should be impossible.

And so with [Wit’s End] it’s a mixture between, I guess, the Cotswold that is in England, and my old town, Dubrovnik with trees on the roof, and strange clouds growing throughout it. So, it needs to have both the feel of historical, fantastical, and time having passed there.

Could you discuss the experience of directing Johnny Depp in one of his most eccentric and iconic roles as the Mad Hatter?

JB: Well, I mean, Johnny’s done the job before, he knows his character very well. And when he created the character with Tim, he very much was aware of how this character is played, how he works and his strengths et cetera. So for me it was kind of the question of using that knowledge in terms of shaping the character for this film. Because in this film, what I loved about the way he played the Hatter, was that it wasn’t near sort of obvious, you know, page 1 idea that he’s crazy. He plays it in a very vulnerable way. And Johnny’s best characters, I find, are characters that have a great vulnerability about them. And so in this film they’re very keen to use that as a kind of emotional design to provide an engine for the movie. Like the idea of saving the Hatter, who’s a very simple, unaffected way of having Alice take on this task. And so [Johnny’s] kind of trying to create a sense of that tragedy in his life. Very quickly in the beginning of the film, Alice and he have a special relationship, and we see that change and develop. It’s a bit careful idea of trying to make him into a more vulnerable character [and different person] and then when he comes back towards the end he’s him again. But yeah, Johnny was great and very interested in all that, in talking about how that worked- how the Hatter is different in this from the beginning. And then at the end, [he] comes back more towards the guy in the first movie.

So I view Alice as one of the strongest female leads in recent cinema. What does the character of Alice mean to you, and to cinema as a whole?

JB: What was of great appeal to me of – and to everybody I hope, is that I really feel that Lewis Carroll had this amazing perception of Alice Liddel, who was a real girl who was growing up in a time when women’s roles in the world were very different. I think he felt that things were changing. I think he imbued her life with the way he saw girls and women at the time, as being capable of independent thought [and] not being defined by other people. I think this stuff is so strong for Alice, and I think that’s, in many ways why she does make impact today, because it feels like an ideal, which was very ahead of its time. And yet it’s still relevant today, because the solution hasn’t arrived. You know, look at how many women’s protagonists there are in cinema, very few. And that needs to be addressed. I’m incredibly proud of the fact that the film has a theme of a female protagonist, [and] I think it’s incredibly important, because Lewis Carroll started this, and I think that he would be pleased with the progress that’s been made. But by no means has the job been done.

This interview has been condensed from its original form. Alice Through the Looking Glass opens everywhere May 27th.