THE HARRIED DREAMBOAT: COLIN FIRTH PLAYS MR. BROWN
The otherworldly Nanny McPhee provides a stark contrast to the very human Brown household, overseen by the harried, lonely, and sometimes desperate Mr. Brown.  This central character - who provides the connective tissue between the comedic and romantic aspects of the film - was a crucial part to cast.  "Let's face it: we needed an impossible combination," says Doran.  "We needed somebody who was believable as the father of seven children, and we also needed a dreamboat, since the love story is a very important part of the film."  Kirk Jones had no doubts about who he wanted to play Mr. Brown.  "Colin Firth had always been top of my list," he says.
Equally acclaimed for his work in both drama ("The Girl With the Pearl Earring") and romantic comedy ("Bridget Jones's Diary"), Firth was game to exercise both disciplines in "Nanny McPhee."  "One of the most interesting maneuvers a story can make is to take you from tears to laughter and back again," says Firth.  While reading the script, Firth felt like a child being told a story.  "'Nanny McPhee' has all the elements that you want from a story, that you longed for in a story when you were a child," says Colin Firth.  "You wanted to be a little bit scared, well, a lot scared; you wanted perhaps to have a bit of romance.  It's a good solid story.  It doesn't reverse time; it doesn't go into some impressionistic zone.  It's very funny; its rather menacing; it has romance and a happy ending.  It really has all those fundamental, very old-fashioned story elements in abundance, working at a very high pitch.  It's the kind of thing that you hope children are going to sit there watching, wide-eyed, wanting more of, and I certainly felt that myself."
Mr. Brown, the widowed father of the seven Brown children, is clearly in over his head. He has no faith in himself, or his children, or, at first, the strange figure who appears at his door.  He is also muddled romantically, caught between longing for the counsel and comfort of his late wife and the need to release his heart for the sake of himself and for his children. "Mr. Brown is the embattled father of seven extremely naughty children and he loves them all to distraction," Firth explains.  "I think he's a very sentimental man who wouldn't deny them anything really and because he's recently widowed it's now incumbent upon him to try to keep order and really to keep his life on the rails."
"We live in a time in the story where very terrible things happen to people who fall into debt," Firth continues.  "The threat that hangs over them is basically debtor's prison for him, the poorhouse for the kids and the break-up of the family.  This is all of course black comedy but his real dilemma is the fact that he's got to hide it from them, he's got to hide his anxiety from them, what he wants to present to them is a smiling face."
Playing the father of these naughty children required from Firth a great deal of physical comedy, which he points out is both exhausting and panic-making.  "It's a paradox that the very lightest and silliest stuff is often the most agonizing process in reality," he says.
Throughout the production, Firth relied on Jones to provide the Nanny McPhee-like centre of calm amidst the madness of the action.  "It's a great strength," says Firth.  "Kirk is uncompromising in getting the shots he wants, yet at the same time very generous in letting other people's imaginations flourish.  If you want to try something different, he will always allow you to try it, but he's very determined when he decides the way in which we shoot."

THE SPINSTER AUNT, THE WIDOW, THE UNDERTAKERS AND THE COOK: THE PLAYERS OF "NANNY MCPHEE"
Mr. Brown's terrible dilemma is exacerbated by the demands of the children's formidable Great Aunt Adelaide Stitch, played by acclaimed actress Angela Lansbury in her first feature film role in 20 years.  "She's like the Wicked Witch of the East," Lansbury describes.  "She really is an arch-villain but she couches it all in phrases like, 'I never break my word.'  You watch her in amazement because you notice what an incredible nose she has, rather like Lord Nelson, and a tiny red mouth, which is the meanest mouth you've ever seen in your life.  I'm having a wonderful time doing this part because it's like going back to playing the sort of role that I haven't done in many years."
Known and loved by millions as Jessica Fletcher on the long-running series "Murder She Wrote," Lansbury's more recent career sometimes obscures her legendary history as a Grande Dame of stage and film - she is a four-time Tony Award winner for her work in Broadway productions of "Mame," "Gypsy," "Dear World" and "Sweeney Todd," as well as a three-time Oscar nominee for her performances in the films "Gaslight," "The Picture of Dorian Gray," and, most famously, as the manipulative mother in "The Manchurian Candidate."  Lansbury also starred in Disney's family classic "Bedknobs and Broomsticks".
Lansbury was amused and delighted with Thompson's dual role on the set.  "It's quite a rare and unusual situation, but this whole production is a rare and unusual one," she says.  "When you get a group of people who are so devoted to doing original new kinds of work, you are going to see a lot of wonderful inventive magic in front of your eyes."  Lansbury also saw something else from Thompson in front of her eyes - it was Thompson who was elected to stand off-camera and throw the pie that hits Aunt Adelaide in the face in one of the film's climactic scenes.  In her seven decades as a performer, Lansbury had never received a pie in the face.  Thompson accomplished the bulls-eye throw in one take, but both women confessed to being a bit relieved when it was over.
Imelda Staunton plays Mrs. Blatherwick, the Cook, who carries out her work in the kitchen with military zeal.  "She has been in this household for 15 years," reveals Staunton, an Oscar nominee and BAFTA winner for her work in "Vera Drake."  "She's always thinking she's going to go, but she's been there for quite some time and runs a bit of a strict kitchen.  It's a great opportunity for me to be mad and grumpy downstairs in this fantastic kitchen."
"Imelda has been a hoot," says Kelly Macdonald, who plays Evangeline, the scullery maid and Cook's charge.  "She's just mad.  She's got this mad, red, curly wig and mad, red face.  There's just a plethora of really great, funny, talented people in this film and I feel privileged to be amongst them."
Staunton did her part to maintain the atmosphere of humour both on- and off-camera - as did Thompson.  "We all knew Imelda was going to get tons of awards for 'Vera Drake' so we thought grab her now while the going's good!"
Also along are Derek Jacobi and Patrick Barlow as the mischievous and joking undertakers, Mr. Jowls and Mr. Wheen, with whom Mr. Brown works at the funeral parlour, Midgewaller and Sons.  Says Barlow, "We are his colleagues and we play pranks on him, which we find very amusing but he doesn't." "That's all we do," Jacobi adds, "make coffins and try and make him laugh."

SECRET TOAST: THE CHILDREN OF "NANNY MCPHEE"
Though Mr. Brown does not communicate his woes to his children, they have their own way of communicating theirs to him.  "They are the most badly behaved children in the history of the world, but there's a reason for that," notes Doran.  "They're actually wonderful children who are in a terrible situation that is making them behave badly and of course once Nanny McPhee understands that and treats them accordingly you begin to see how lovely and sweet they really are."
To find this vital combination of sweetness and mischief, children's casting director Pippa Hall cast a wide net to find children that would express not only their own unique personalities but also work as a family onscreen.
Limiting the search to the South East of England to ensure similarity of accent, the search encompassed professional actors, drama group children and, children who had never acted before but answered the call to an open audition.
The oldest child is played by the actor with the most experience.  Thomas Sangster, who played Liam Neeson's heartsick son in "Love Actually," plays Simon, the eldest of all the children.  "Simon is the team leader, so he rounds them all up and thinks up all the naughty ideas," explains the fourteen-year-old actor.  "He is also very separate from all the other children who are all younger than him.  He looks after them but behind everything he's actually quite sad." 
The rest of the group solidified, each with his or her own unique qualities that the filmmakers hoped would carry over into their roles.  In addition to Sangster, the Brown brood is played by a group of imaginative and spirited children:  Eliza Bennett as Tora, the oldest (and most responsible) girl; Raphael Coleman as Eric, the professorial mischief-maker; Jennifer Rae Daykin as Lily, the romantic; Sam Honywood as Sebastian, who is obsessed with food; Holly Gibbs as Christianna, the embodiment of the children's sense of loss for their mother; and twins Hebe and Zinnia Thomas as Agatha, the baby. 
Director Jones brought in acting coach Celia Bannerman to work with the children throughout the casting process and production.  Bannerman's mandate was to help the children discover their characters and understand the plot, leaving Jones to focus on the performances when they were on set.  A father of two boys himself, Jones's extraordinary patience kept the children in the cast up to professional standards without intimidating their vital spirits.  "I think it's very important to not get overly friendly with the children," Jones says. "They should know that they're there to do a job.  I always said to them, 'You come to the stage as professional actors and actresses,' and I think they rise to that challenge.  They enjoy that responsibility."
He also observed from the beginning of their work together that these characters were written with exquisite attention to detail in terms of how children actually behave.  When Mr. Brown sends the children to bed without supper, the food-loving Sebastian, played by Sam Honywood, is horrified.  "I play basically a really hungry character," says seven-year-old Sam.  "He always sneaks down to the kitchen with the others.  And he sometimes does stuff in the kitchen that's really, really naughty."
When Evangeline, the scullery maid, comes to their room, Sebastian asks, "Could you bring me some secret toast and jam?"  When she ignores him, he changes his tactic:  "All right, forget the jam, just some secret toast!"  "Kirk just loved that detail," says Doran.  "These kinds of beautifully observed pieces of behaviour are what make Emma's writing so good."
Emma Thompson describes the spectre of working with so many children over the film's 12 weeks of production as "blind terror."  "A film set is not a child-friendly environment," she explains.  "It's dark, it's dusty, it's hot, they have to concentrate, be quiet, and above all, perform."
Jones approached each day with the children in terms of things that could possibly go wrong.  "There are tight restrictions, as always, with their education and the amount of time I have with them.  I just have a little chat with them to say, 'Let's just remember why we're here.'   They're very good kids.  They like to have fun and play around, but as soon as they come onto the set, in general they are very, very good.  I'm thrilled with their performances."  Thompson adds, "They have coped with it all absolutely brilliantly.  Over the months I have become much more interested in watching them than anybody else because they are absolutely wonderful, totally engaging."  "The children are the stars of this story," adds Lansbury, "they're so real and charming and wonderful, it's very hard for me to be mean and nasty to them."
The desire for a fairy tale ending holds true for the children as well.  "Children get such enormous satisfaction from adults loving each other," says Thompson.  "They want the adults who love them to love each other - the two things are of almost equal importance, I think.  Seeing their mothers or fathers loving and being loved gives children everything that they need to know about that later on."

FROM SCULLERY MAID TO FAIRY PRINCESS: KELLY MACDONALD AS EVANGELINE
"Poor Evangeline!" writes Christianna Brand of the Brown family's maid in the first Nurse Matilda book.  "She was dreadfully put upon by the rest; but she was a cheerful little lump and I don't think she really minded."  In Emma Thompson's adaptation of the Brand books, Evangeline has been expanded from a cheerful little lump into a full-fledged woman played by Kelly Macdonald, the young star of "Trainspotting," "Finding Neverland," "Gosford Park" and "The Girl In The Café."  And the film version of Evangeline very much minds how much she's put upon at the Brown house.  She loves Mr. Brown, but he doesn't seem to notice her at all.  She loves the children, but they dismiss her feelings for them as an obligation of her job.  She does her best at her work, but meets with nothing but criticism from the grumpy Cook.  And she longs to be "an educated lady" that a gentleman might love, but she knows it's just a hopeless dream.  Only Nanny McPhee seems to recognize Evangeline's sad longings, but she keeps quiet about what she sees as she does about everything at the Brown house.
Macdonald describes Evangeline as "an angry little person.  She's got far too much to do in the house.  They've not got a lot of money coming in and they've only got Cook and herself to help them.  She can't read and that's a real problem for her.  And so, Lily, one of the children, is teaching her to read.  She's sort of ashamed of that."
Unlike Mr. Brown, Evangeline understands instinctively how to deal with the children's naughtiness.  She knows when to be strict and when to laugh at their pranks:  "You've been doing measles!" she remarks cheerfully when she sees their crayon-spotted faces on the day they pretend to be sick.
As the story unfolds, circumstances whisk Evangeline away from the house, only to have her return as the educated lady she'd hoped to be.  "Evangeline is a character who starts out looking like a grimy scullery maid and ends up looking like a fairy princess," Doran explains, "but Mr. Brown doesn't see any difference, and that's one of the themes of the story.  There's a Norwegian proverb which says, 'That which is loved is always beautiful.'  It has resonance not only for the way the family sees Nanny McPhee, but for the way Mr. Brown sees Evangeline.  It even applies to the way the children come to think of a stepmother.  It never occurred to them that someone they loved could be a stepmother."

LARGE WARTINESS: NICK EDE AND PETER KING TRANSFORM THE CAST
Nick Ede and Peter King approached their costume and make-up design work very much as a team.  "This is the first time I've ever worked on a movie where the make-up person's first question was who was costuming it," says producer Doran.  "Nic and Peter created the characters together - building, with the actor and director involved, a look for the characters that Emma has written."
Creating Nanny McPhee's look was a subject of constant discussion among the filmmakers. "It had to be scary, but not too scary," says Peter King, who created myriad wizard, trolls and hobbits on "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy.  "It had to be funny, but not too funny or it would detract from the more profound themes in the story."
"What we began with was the two warts and the nose and the single eyebrow and the tombstone tooth, but it was really Peter and Nick who said, 'Maybe we shouldn't just change the four things on her face; maybe her whole body should change," Doran recalls. "Maybe her ears begin to get smaller, and her hairline begins to recede.  Maybe it's a wig at the beginning and maybe it's Emma's real hair at the end. And maybe the nose grows smaller gradually instead of all at once."
Nanny McPhee's extraordinarily gradual change as she grows closer to the Brown family proved a delightful challenge for King.  "We had to start off somewhere quite extreme so that we could do that many changes and turn her into Emma at the very end," he explains. 
The transformation required Thompson to wear a prosthetic nose and ears, pumpers inside her mouth to pad her cheeks, warts, a tombstone tooth, one eyebrow, and, of course, a wig.  To form Nanny McPhee's unusual body shape, Ede experimented with different layers of sculptured padding before both he and Thompson were satisfied that they had best emulated the silhouette in Edward Ardizzone's original illustration, which they'd agreed could not be topped. 
Since Nanny McPhee wears only black, Ede sought fabrics with texture to them to ensure the costume would read on film.  Howells had recently been to Ghana and mentioned to Ede the exotic and breathtaking fabrics he'd seen there.  The lead drew Ede to a shop in Cricklewood with loads of textured fabrics from which to choose, including some from Africa.  "I found a black brocade for the skirt, and then this extraordinary crimped fabric for the blouse," he describes.  "We did, in fact, spray a very light layer of pale grey paint onto the blouse, just to bring it up a little further and give it more depth."
As Nanny McPhee changes from bulky beginnings to the silhouette of Emma Thompson herself, Ede created five different versions of the same costume to accompany her transformation. 
The creation of Colin Firth's wardrobe grew out of the filmmakers' mandate not to strand the film in any particular time period.  "If we'd had to stick to the period it would have been very difficult because it was a deeply conservative time," says Ede.  "I wanted to make him look wonderful, as did Peter.  He had to look absolutely brilliant."
So, letting go of period, an experience he likens to "jumping off a cliff," Ede added much more fullness and fluidity to Mr. Brown's costumes, creating a wardrobe of rich fabrics in bold colors.  He even added a couple of inches to Mr. Brown's top hat.  "I think it's much easier for the audience to accept a costumed piece if it's outrageous or if it's understated, so we've got a mixture of the two," he notes.
Ede was particularly excited by the prospect of dressing the statuesque Angela Lansbury, who "looks fantastic in the clothes."  For Aunt Adelaide, he created costumes which are extremely sophisticated and regal-looking but all in shades of grey to match her very sour mood.  "She's a woman of money, a terrific snob but she has great taste that's very muted, no colour there at all," describes Ede.  "Hers is the nearest thing we have to a period costume but of course I had to ruin the whole thing by giving her the completely wrong period hat."
Since the hat winds up on the donkey's head, "you couldn't have a little 1880s pill box," Ede laments.  "It had to be a big Edwardian hat."
Her distinguishing characteristic - an absurdly large nose - became Peter King's second most challenging prosthetic, as the appendage only shows itself in profile.  "The whole designing of Aunt Adelaide's nose was front-on," says King.  "You couldn't see that she had a different nose at all.  It wasn't until she turned her head that you actually saw this 'hooter the size of Scotland' as Emma described it."
Lansbury wore the prosthetic nose like a pro, even thought it was the first of her career.  "She was incredibly amicable and very surprised at how easily it went on.  I think because of that she went with it and then sort of innocently fell in love with it and couldn't imagine not having the nose."
Mrs. Quickly, played by Celia Imrie, is dressed in outrageously flamboyant costumes in vibrant shades of pink and green, with custard yellow hair.  "Mrs. Quickly and the clothes are one and the same in the film," says Ede.  "We're very fortunate that Celia's a wonderful actress and she wears them with gusto."
Mrs. Quickly also expresses her love of all things shepherdess in her styling.  "I think she thinks of herself a little bit as Marie Antoinette, so I did a sort of quasi-1770s/third half of the 18^th Century dress with overtones of Victoriana.  It's an extraordinary conglomeration, really.  And the rest of her costume just went from there."
Ede concentrated on making the children's basic costumes as contemporary-looking as possible, working with denim, corduroy, and knitwear in muted colours. "I've used clothes that would fit in any period, basically," says Ede.  "But more important than that is that modern children will be able to identify with them.  We didn't want them to look ridiculous - unless we wanted them to look ridiculous, and, of course, in their Sunday best they do look ridiculous.  Kids will go, 'Uggh!' when they see them, which is what it's all about."  "Everything about their best clothes is exaggerated," says Thomas Sangster, who plays Simon.  "Everything's over the top, which is a really nice feel.  It feels like you're living in fairytale land."
Ede also found himself having to dress animals for the first time in his career - chickens in tiny white mopcaps, a donkey in a hat and shawl, a pig in oversized pearls and a baby bonnet, and Bassett Hounds in straw hats - while King was charged with the task of applying make-up to a pig and dyeing baby lambs acid green and fuchsia pink to match Mrs. Quickly's wedding dress.  "It was an interesting experience," muses Ede.  "But in the end, I think I prefer people.  They stand still, and they don't eat their hats."


A HOUSE ANY CHILD WOULD LOVE TO LIVE IN: CREATING THE WORLD OF "NANNY MCPHEE"
EMMA THOMPSON & DIRECTOR KIRK JONES