12:00 am - 01/30/2013
Marie Lu Talks Legend Movie As Book 2 Hits Shelves
As we await the rest of the cast of Divergent to be announced and mark off the months until Catching Fire’s release (about a million years from now, right?), there’s plenty to keep our minds full of paranoid visions of a dark future that can only be saved by a couple of brilliant teenagers. Take, for instance, Marie Lu’s Legend trilogy, whose second book, Prodigy, hit shelves today. If you haven’t picked up the first, let us assure you that it’s not to be lumped brainlessly with all the other dystopian young adult novels out now — largely because of its unique characters, who take turns narrating their story. There’s 15-year-old Day, the Republic’s most-wanted criminal, whose ability to run from authorities and basically leap buildings in a single bound (parkour-style) helps him complete all sorts of Robin Hood pranks, stealing from the government to feed the poor. And then there’s 15-year-old June, the Republic’s star prodigy, who’s about to graduate early from military academy when her older brother (and only family member, since her parents’ death) is brutally murdered, she thinks, by Day. Their interaction is as tense and emotionally complex as the Jean Valjean/Javert conflict in Les Miserables, which Lu says was a partial inspiration for the story.
We caught up with Lu at San Diego Comic-Con last July, shortly after the screenplay for the Legend movie, which is being produced by Wyck Godfrey among others, was handed in to CBS Films. And it wasn’t hard for us to imagine a big showing for the film at one of the Con’s giant halls sometime in the future. “That would be amaaaazing. My fingers are crossed!” Lu said.
While she’s been in the loop on the screenplay, she doesn’t know what will be done as far as casting the movie, especially since it doesn’t yet have a director. (Warm Bodies‘ Jonathan Levine was once attached, but MTV reports that he’s since dropped out.) “I know you can’t find someone that’s exactly the way that I picture them in my head. I think they’ll do a pretty good job casting them in general. There’s only one character that I wrote with an actor in my head, and that was Metias, June’s brother. I always pictured Ben Barnes. I just love Ben Barnes. I’m going to cast him in anything that I write. I’ll squeeze him in there.”
Our big question is whether the movie adaptation will attempt to stay true to the mixed racial backgrounds of the characters. Day, for instance, is of Russian and Mongolian descent, with blond hair and blue eyes.
“My fingers are crossed that they will at least keep the casting open to the ethnicities that are mentioned in the book,” Lu said. “That would be ideal. I know you can’t always find a half-Asian, half-Caucasian actor who is perfect for the role … who has blue eyes and blond hair.”
OP: btw its because of white supremacy that they never show Day's face in this trailer (don't want to cast him as white cuz he's not, don't want to get an asian guy b/c you know why)
Now that we’ve read Prodigy, we can tell casting won’t be the only challenge of bringing these books to life. It will be capturing the action as teenage revolutionaries hide out in underground bunkers, fly airships out of Las Vegas, and fly airplanes into the streets of Denver. And then also have the kind of love triangle that would make Marius, Eponine and Cosette proud.
“I cried into my pillow a lot at night,” Lu told us when describing how hard it was for her to write the action-packed romance of book two. Oh, man, were those tears worth it.
source
Alex Pettyfer for Day
Whitewashing in Legend?
Marie Lu Talks Legend Movie As Book 2 Hits Shelves
As we await the rest of the cast of Divergent to be announced and mark off the months until Catching Fire’s release (about a million years from now, right?), there’s plenty to keep our minds full of paranoid visions of a dark future that can only be saved by a couple of brilliant teenagers. Take, for instance, Marie Lu’s Legend trilogy, whose second book, Prodigy, hit shelves today. If you haven’t picked up the first, let us assure you that it’s not to be lumped brainlessly with all the other dystopian young adult novels out now — largely because of its unique characters, who take turns narrating their story. There’s 15-year-old Day, the Republic’s most-wanted criminal, whose ability to run from authorities and basically leap buildings in a single bound (parkour-style) helps him complete all sorts of Robin Hood pranks, stealing from the government to feed the poor. And then there’s 15-year-old June, the Republic’s star prodigy, who’s about to graduate early from military academy when her older brother (and only family member, since her parents’ death) is brutally murdered, she thinks, by Day. Their interaction is as tense and emotionally complex as the Jean Valjean/Javert conflict in Les Miserables, which Lu says was a partial inspiration for the story.
We caught up with Lu at San Diego Comic-Con last July, shortly after the screenplay for the Legend movie, which is being produced by Wyck Godfrey among others, was handed in to CBS Films. And it wasn’t hard for us to imagine a big showing for the film at one of the Con’s giant halls sometime in the future. “That would be amaaaazing. My fingers are crossed!” Lu said.
While she’s been in the loop on the screenplay, she doesn’t know what will be done as far as casting the movie, especially since it doesn’t yet have a director. (Warm Bodies‘ Jonathan Levine was once attached, but MTV reports that he’s since dropped out.) “I know you can’t find someone that’s exactly the way that I picture them in my head. I think they’ll do a pretty good job casting them in general. There’s only one character that I wrote with an actor in my head, and that was Metias, June’s brother. I always pictured Ben Barnes. I just love Ben Barnes. I’m going to cast him in anything that I write. I’ll squeeze him in there.”
Our big question is whether the movie adaptation will attempt to stay true to the mixed racial backgrounds of the characters. Day, for instance, is of Russian and Mongolian descent, with blond hair and blue eyes.
“My fingers are crossed that they will at least keep the casting open to the ethnicities that are mentioned in the book,” Lu said. “That would be ideal. I know you can’t always find a half-Asian, half-Caucasian actor who is perfect for the role … who has blue eyes and blond hair.”
OP: btw its because of white supremacy that they never show Day's face in this trailer (don't want to cast him as white cuz he's not, don't want to get an asian guy b/c you know why)
Now that we’ve read Prodigy, we can tell casting won’t be the only challenge of bringing these books to life. It will be capturing the action as teenage revolutionaries hide out in underground bunkers, fly airships out of Las Vegas, and fly airplanes into the streets of Denver. And then also have the kind of love triangle that would make Marius, Eponine and Cosette proud.
“I cried into my pillow a lot at night,” Lu told us when describing how hard it was for her to write the action-packed romance of book two. Oh, man, were those tears worth it.
source
Alex Pettyfer for Day
But you know me. I'm here for this, no matter what time of day. It wakes me up more than coffee.
- oh and I'm not surprised re: hyped book
I liked it better than Divergent at least
The world building was ASS
Publishers/authors/agents don't understand that when I was a teen and read YA, I wanted someone to identify with, not someone like Bella Swan who claimed to be plain but was actually probably Miranda Kerr in a baggy coat. I couldn't get ONE boyfriend much less have two hot guys fighting over me.
Come on, people. Not ever 17 year old girl is a supermodel in a small town with paranormal boys fighting over her.
I liked Angelfall a lot up until they got to the Angel nightclub. It got a bit convoluted then and lost the whole dystopian feel IMO.
California Blue by David Klass is still one of my all time favorite YA novels, and I am sad to say not only is it unpopular, but will never have a movie done about it since it has no paranormal/romance elements. It's about this teen boy living in a logging town, who loves to explore wildlife. He discovers a new species of butterfly, and in the process pits himself against the entire town, as their living depends on destroying the butterfly's habitat.
Also, Unwind by Neal Shusterman. But it's about abortion, so that'd never happen.
He's not half Mongolian, but he's half-Asian. He's the right age. He also has the athletics/fighting abilities too. Just put a blond wig and blue contacts on him.
Edited at 2013-01-30 06:53 am (UTC)
But he's going to be a looker in ten years if all goes well.
It's sad. I know the author did a Q&A the other day and she mentioned how she has no control over how the cast will turn out. I feel like Day's going to get white washed. Also wasn't the girl's dominant ethnicity suppose to be aboriginal or something?
Edited at 2013-01-30 07:03 am (UTC)
same as when twilight first happened all the vampire books were pushed to the front.
He wrote a blog about having a meeting during comic con and he's very vocal about white washing, and the main character in his book is a poc.
"I’ve written before about race-bending in movie casting, and my opinions of it are layered but generally very solidly on the “don’t do it” side. Last summer at Comic-Con I had a meeting with a big-name production company about a potential PARTIALS (and no, I can’t yet tell you who it was), and one of the biggest questions I asked them was if they were prepared to actually cast an Indian girl as Kira (not Native American, but actual Indian). It’s very important to me to get this right.
One of the best movies I saw in 2012 was Argo, a based-on-real-life story about a CIA expert extracting hostages from Iran; it was excellent, and I loved every minute, and I think Ben Affleck deserves a Best Director Oscar for it, but Affleck also played the CIA guy, who in real life was Latino. The closing credits showed a fascinating slide show of side-by-side photos, comparing the movie characters and sets and images to their real-life counterparts, and I wanted to stand up and cheer for their amazing attention to detail…but then we got to the shot of the very white Ben Affleck, followed by a shot of the very Mexican Tony Mendez, and it felt jarring and wrong. Yes, Affleck did a good job in the role–his acting wasn’t as stellar as his directing, but it was good. But how cool would it have been to give that same role to a Mexican actor? Someone who’s sick of playing drug dealers on Breaking Bad, or gangsters in Southland, and would absolutely nail a role as a handsome, dashing, Mexican-American hero?
And how cool would it have been–and this is the much bigger point for me–for a Latino kid or teen or even adult to be able to go to the theater and see this amazing movie and be presented with a hero who looks like them, someone they can identify with, someone who lets them see themselves in a leading role? I didn’t understand the real importance of this–of kids who want to see themselves as their heroes–until my daughters started asking me for more books and movies about girls. Growing up white and male I could always see myself as the heroes of my favorite stories, but it isn’t that easy for everyone else, and a movie like Argo, or PARTIALS, or even The Lone Ranger is an amazing chance to do that. I don’t believe that casting the wrong race is inherently evil, but I do think it’s a tragic missed opportunity. We should be going out of our way to find and create those opportunities, and then do the very best we can with them. And The Lone Ranger, instead of taking that opportunity, appears to have run the other direction."
My advice to the author-- If you want a character to be Asian don't give him blue eyes and blonde hair, Hollywood is going to run with that and just make him white.
Edited at 2013-01-30 09:41 am (UTC)
Especially since most (if not all) authors are looking to get their book on the big screen and have no control over casting.
I think in my head they were pretty much in their late teens anyway.