The Creatures

Howard Berger and his award-winning makeup magicians had been waiting two years to return to Narnia. "We were chomping at the bit to go back for the next film and get a chance to revisit all the Narnian inhabitants we helped create for the first film," Berger says.

Berger was eager to create the new, wilder look of the creatures of Narnia, who have been living in hiding for centuries when the film begins. "In PRINCE CASPIAN, we had heavyset fauns, old-age fauns, female dwarves, African-Narnian centaurs and their families. The minotaurs are now on the side of good. We have a new hag, a werewolf and the satyrs are back, but all redesigned to be more animal-like."

The task would require a large staff of experts ranging from concept artists to creature-suit fabricators, from hair designers to latex-piece manufacturers. "We estimated close to 3,000 makeups on the film, which would keep the foam department busy almost 24/7 for the next nine months. We ended up applying 4,600 makeups by the end of the shoot, which is, I believe, a world record," Berger reports.

Berger and a team of more than 40 special makeup artists gave birth to the film's more fantastical creatures. "My favorite Narnians are the dwarves," Berger says. "We had two fantastic dwarf characters in the film: Trumpkin, played by Peter Dinklage, and Nikabrik, played by Warwick Davis. We designed some very intricate makeup applications to transform them into Narnians."

When the role of Trumpkin was being conceived, director Adamson knew that Dinklage was his first choice to play the role. "I knew when I saw 'The Station Agent' that I wanted to cast him," the filmmaker says.

"He's the first actor we cast for this movie," exclaims Johnson about Dinklage. "He's just phenomenal."

Once signed on, Dinklage turned to the books-which he did not read as a youth-for research and inspiration. He describes his character as "curmudgeonly" but adds "too much of that and you're not going to want to spend time with him on the journey. Let's just say that the Pevensies annoy him, and he'd rather have a glass of wine back in his tree."

Before agreeing to take the role, Dinklage caught a glimpse of what Trumpkin might look like when he visited with Adamson in Los Angeles for an introductory meeting. The filmmaker showed Dinklage some of the pre-visualization materials, "some computer animation of what appeared to be these big battle sequences," the actor remembers.

"I sat there in this room filled with computers and watched as my likeness came up in these computer images," he continues. "I had never seen anything like that before. It was weird, really, but I felt like I couldn't say no at that point."

Even with this unexpected peek at Trumpkin's appearance, Dinklage had no notion as to what Berger and his team would devise to transform the blue-eyed actor into a vivid Narnian creature. Berger and Tami Lane, who both earned Oscars® for the first movie, rendered him unrecognizable, except for his piercing eyes.

Working from a concept painting of what Berger envisioned for the character, Lane began the daily two-and-a-half-hour transformation by shaving Dinklage's head completely and painting it. She dyed his eyebrows before gluing on latex face pieces. Finally, the makeup artist tacked on the intricate hair work that turned Dinklage into a fantastical, otherworldly creature.

"The last thing was a really long, red beard and wig made of yak hair," Dinklage says. "And somewhere there's a yak on top of a mountain who's very cold. And I'm sorry. However, because we filmed in the summer in Prague, it was not the coolest of makeups for me.

"With a lot of makeups, you can lose the actor underneath them," the actor continues. "Howard and Tami really managed to make me look completely different and still allowed my expressions, my emotions, to come through."

"Peter brought so much life to the character," says Berger. "I always say that a makeup is half successful if we do our jobs right. That, plus the performance, made Trumpkin truly alive and believable. We gave Trumpkin his look. Peter gave him his heart."

While Lane concentrated her daily efforts on actor Dinklage, fellow makeup artist Sarah Rubano won the assignment to metamorphose Warwick Davis into a character the actor himself calls "sour inside."

"Howard's makeup was loads of help for me in understanding the character," says Davis. "Then you find the character's voice. Then Isis' costume, which was such an immaculate piece of workmanship...while the detail may not come across for audiences, subliminally, it's all there. As an actor, it makes you feel so at home in the character. I lived, worked and fought in those clothes. You are then placed in the surroundings, the sets, and magically, you are in Narnia."

"Warwick is an actor who has been able to imbue all of his characters with something

different," notes producer Johnson.

"That's what I prize most in an actor-

surprises. I think his Nikabrik character is

very surprising because he is irascible, yet

speaks real logic. Nikabrik has really paid

for the fact that Narnia has been under the

thumb of the Telmarines. So he has some

real surprises as a character up his

sleeve."

Davis was intrigued by a clever

illustration of the character done by one of Berger's associates at KNB, John Wheaton. "It was brilliant, because it was me, but as an old man. It was my photograph over which he painted the character concept. It captured Nikabrik perfectly."

When Davis looked in the mirror after the marathon session, "What I saw was the character in three dimensions that Howard's artist had portrayed in two dimensions," the actor notes. "It was astounding."

Another daily visitor to Berger's trailer camp was English musical-theater star Cornell S. John, who plays Glenstorm, the powerful Afro-Narnian centaur who aids Prince Caspian and the Pevensies in their fight against Miraz.

"For Glenstorm, Andrew wanted a tall and imposing actor of African descent," casting director Stevens remembers. "Glenstorm is a wise, spiritual character who is also a great warrior, so he needed to move with grace and dignity. We did a global search that went as far afield as Africa and found Cornell in London. We had known and admired him in many leading roles in musical theater and opera, from 'The Lion King' to 'Porgy and Bess.'"

John endured a lengthy makeup process that transformed the actor into one of mythology's quintessential creatures, the centaur-half man and half horse. Latex face appliances combined with green-screen tights over which the VFX magicians superimposed the body and legs of a horse turned the soft-spoken actor into one of the film's most imposing creations.

"I'm 160-percent Mike Fields, the guy who did my makeup," John states. "In the beginning, I had no idea what I should look like. I was hoping for something that expressed honor, pride and tradition. Because centaurs can live for hundreds of years, there's no age limit on this. I put myself at 170 Earth years. This face of Glenstorm is the face of time."

And, as they did on the first film, KNB created life-sized animatronic puppets and suits for the CGI character of Aslan for use on the set during filming.

"Andrew wanted him to be 15 percent larger," says Berger. "We were able to utilize the digital scanning information from the first film and have Cyber FX mill out a new sculpture 15 percent larger than the first. We ended up with a very large lion in the shop."

The face of Reepicheep, the swashbuckling mouse, did not come from the brush of one of Berger's talented artists. Instead, the rodent was born from the strokes of a keyboard mouse, through computer software under the control of VFX co-supervisor Wendy Rogers.

"I grew up on the Narnia books and Reepicheep was definitely one of my favorite characters," director Adamson says of the gallant, honorable and noble mouse who wields "a tiny little rapier," in author Lewis' description of the character. "He was ingrained in my imagination. The trick here was finding the right voice. He was difficult to find, but we finally cast Eddie Izzard for the part."

The filmmakers auditioned over 100 voices to find the right actor to bring the character to life, says producer Mark Johnson. "Eddie Izzard's voice came closest to the seriousness of the character and yet didn't in any way repel us or not let us have immediate affection for Reepicheep."

Once the filmmakers chose Izzard, Rogers focused on physicalizing the character. "Reepicheep is a big mouse, some 22 inches tall," Rogers explains. "That will take some suspension of disbelief. At that size, we still have to make him feel like he's a mouse. We have to find the correct balance between anthropomorphizing Reepicheep and maintaining the fact that he is a real animal-a mouse.

"The voice actor plays such a big part in defining the character," Rogers continues. "It's not the fact that the animated character resembles the actor playing him. The actor may do some mannerisms or a physical flourish, like wave a sword. We have lipstick cams at these recording sessions to capture that. That helps our exploration of who the character is."

Of all the Narnian characters London-based visual effects house The Moving Picture Company (MPC) had to create for PRINCE CASPIAN, Reepicheep was the one requiring the most art direction and overall attention to detail, says MPC's Greg Butler. "One of the first challenges was that a very big mouse would be hard to keep looking 'mousey.' We wanted to make sure Reepicheep didn't end up looking like a rat. We also had to work out an anatomy that was based on a mouse, but still allowed him to sword-fight, wear armor and walk on two as well as four legs."

"This story is Reepicheep's introduction," says Adamson. "Dawn Treader will be his story. What we've done is establish him for the next Narnia adventure. I didn't really get to exploit him like so many other characters. But he is so worthwhile and interesting."

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