Les Misérables: new behind-the-scenes trailer released
Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, director Tom Hooper and many more in four-and-a-half-minute featurette
Calling all Les Mis fans who can’t bear to wait the four long months until the release of Tom Hooper’s film adaptation: this new four-and-a-half-minute, behind-the-scenes featurette might go some way to alleviating your blues.
The extended trailer, featuring interviews with principal cast members, producer Cameron Mackintosh and director Tom Hooper, largely focuses on the decision to record all the musical numbers live – a move that required actors to sing the musical’s iconic songs to camera over and over again, with live piano music playing through an earpiece. Once filming completed, the piano was then replaced with a 70-piece orchestra to recreate the musical’s powerful scores.
Hooper, who won a best director Oscar for 2010’s The King’s Speech, explains: “I thought there was an amazing opportunity to do something genuinely groundbreaking. Singing live has such a profound effect on the power and realism of this story.”
Leading man Russell Crowe adds: “There’s an emotion level to singing live that just can’t be recreated in the studio.”
In addition to interviews with all the cast members, viewers are also treated to a spot of Hugh Jackman’s Tony Award-winning singing, as well as the explanation behind Anne Hathaway’s fragile and raw rendition of I Dreamed a Dream: “There seemed something selfish about trying to go for the ‘pretty’ version.”
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Les Misérables' star-studded cast includes Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe, Anne Hathaway, Amanda Seyfried, Eddie Redmayne, Helena Bonham Carter and Sacha Baron Cohen. The film is set for UK release on 11 January 2013.
