|
One of the most compelling figures of the 20th century, Howard Hughes was an influential innovator, savvy industrialist, glamorous motion picture producer and quintessential American risk-taker - but he thought of himself first and foremost as an aviator.
With THE AVIATOR, director Martin Scorsese focuses his storytelling lens on the most prolific period of Hughes' life: the period from the mid-1920s through the 1940s, when Hughes' daring-do and passion for flight drove his pioneering efforts in both aviation and the movies. A time of rampant invention, turbulent love affairs and savage corporate battles, this was also the time when Howard Hughes' high-flying ambitions first met with the costs of fame, fortune and his own obsession with perfection.
In making this film about a man fascinated by technology and driven by dreams of the future, Martin Scorsese used cinematic innovations to recreate the reality of Hughes' world. Merging digital technology with classic techniques of lighting, costuming, set design and miniatures from the 20s, 30s and 40s, Scorsese and team have painstakingly forged the look of THE AVIATOR to resemble how the film might have appeared to audiences had it been shot in the two-strip and three-strip Technicolor of Hughes' heyday. The result brings Scorsese's modern aesthetic to a viscerally alive American past.
WRITING HOWARD HUGHES:ABOUT THE SCREENPLAY
Though he is remembered today as the eccentric billionaire who became a mysterious recluse, few know the full story of the industrialist Howard Hughes - nor how Hughes, as a young man in love with risk, beauty and technology, became a towering figure who made bold leaps in business, aviation and movies, only to lose himself in a world of fear and paranoia.
This is the story that comes to the fore in Martin Scorsese's THE AVIATOR. The project originated with Leonardo DiCaprio who, after reading about the biography of Hughes at a young age, became passionate in his quest to make a film about this uniquely American life.
DiCaprio was well aware that several big Hollywood stars had tried to no avail to make movies about Hughes before, but DiCaprio decided to take a different approach - he wanted to focus on Hughes' explosively creative and visionary youth, rather than his descent into madness in later years. DiCaprio originally brought the idea to director Michael Mann, who in turn brought in screenwriter John Logan ("Gladiator"). DiCaprio and Mann decided to take a different approach.
They wanted to focus on Hughes' explosively creative and visionary youth rather than his descent into madness in later years. After Mann chose instead to produce the film, he and DiCaprio had a short list of directors.
Topping it was the director Mann and DiCaprio esteemed most, Martin Scorsese. He agreed to direct.
Mann and his Forward Pass partner, Sandy Climan, working with executive producer Rick Yorn, then secured financing for the film from Initial Entertainment Group and Miramax. Initial's Graham King joined Mann as a producer, and Miramax partnered with Warner Bros. for domestic distribution.
King, having worked with Scorsese as an executive producer and financier of GANGS OF NEW YORK, feels strongly that Scorsese's love of movie history and filmmaking techniques mirrored the same qualities in Hughes in a wonderfully synergistic way - and that Scorsese brought his own sense of risk-taking and invention to making the film.
"Marty is so terrific with detail and creating period realistically, and he has so much love and respect for the era of filmmaking during which Howard Hughes made his mark, he was clearly right for this story," says King.
He continues: "Marty has certain things in common with the character of Howard Hughes in THE AVIATOR in that he's someone who's very precise in what he wants, who can invent things, who loves the process of making movies. We thought this was a chance for Marty to do something unlike anything he's done before - a story set in Hollywood. It was such a pleasure to work by Marty's side, everyday, on set."
"Howard Hughes, the aviator, performed feats of incredible bravery in his life, and I was drawn to the script," Scorsese says. "Here was a Nineteenth Century-type figure who was a pioneer in two of the greatest phenomena of the Twentieth Century: aviation, with his innovative designs and speed records, and filmmaking, with such movies as 'Hell's Angels' and 'Scarface.' Hughes was also a great showman, but his story is the story, ultimately, of greed, corruption and madness."
"When I developed the screenplay with John Logan for over a year and a half, the earliest decision was to end the picture in 1947, with the first day of the rest of Howard's life," says Mann. "and that was because we decided the most interesting central conflict…the most personal…would be between the visionary Hughes, and his mental disease…including his awareness of it and all that it cost him in human terms, isolating him…"
Logan had been astonished by the sheer vastness of Hughes' life. "There was so much in his story that fascinated me: American history and biography and the kind of large, complex characters that I love to write about," he notes. "Also, I felt from the beginning that Leo was perfect casting for the role of Hughes, so I was very excited to write with him in mind."
Logan spent an entire year researching Hughes' life, reading every book, memoir and archival materials he could get his hands on - and coming away with an entirely fresh vision of Howard Hughes as less of a myth and more of a brilliant, yet flawed, human being. "It was a fascinating process of discovery," he recalls. "I think most of us start out with a certain image of Hughes -and it's usually the man at the end of his life, the crazy, deeply eccentric recluse in his hotel room with long fingernails and empty Kleenex boxes as shoes. But I found someone else altogether. I discovered Howard as a vibrant, young hero who was a driving force in both aviation and Hollywood at their most glamorous."
He continues: ""I started by reading all the standard biographies and then branched out into the other areas in which Hughes was concerned. I read about aeronautics and engineering and why Hughes' innovations were such amazing achievements; I learned about the world of commercial aviation and the corporate battles between Pan Am and TWA; and I also read about the days of early Hollywood filmmaking when silent film gave way to sound, about the fights over the Hollywood production code, and about the lives of the many magnificent women with whom Hughes was romantically involved."
When Logan at last started writing he decided to concentrate the time frame of the story between two major milestones in Hughes' life: opening with the production of "Hell's Angels" in the late 1920s, when Hughes was just barely an adult, and culminating with TWA's emergence as a major international airline in the late 1940s. Between these two junctures of high achievement, Logan began to explore the torment and tumult at the center of Hughes' character so as to provide a glimpse inside both his dreams and his demons.
As with any film biography, Logan had to make some dramatic allowances along the way in order to fit the story to the art form. "Covering twenty years of a man's life in a couple of hours necessarily meant that I had to compress some events, combine characters and shift around chronology," explains Logan, "but the aim was always to capture the man, if not everything that happened to him, as truly as possible."
Adds Graham King: "Howard Hughes led such a tremendous life, but John Logan found a way to distil it down to the most compelling and entertaining parts of the story, between the daredevil stunts of 'Hell's Angels' to the triumph of Hughes flying The Hercules. He shows many different elements of Howard's reality that people don't really know about, from the Senate hearings to his love affairs."
Once Martin Scorsese came aboard, Logan was inspired to explore the story in even greater depth, delving into every aspect of the larger-than-life character's internal makeup. Logan, Scorsese and DiCaprio worked together for months, fine-tuning the story in their own ways. "Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio were the most exacting, supportive and willing of colleagues, and they challenged me to write the best script possible," Logan says. "What was important to each of us was to maintain a high level of honesty as we adapted the details of Hughes's story. Marty and Leo are fanatical about the truth and were committed to understanding the character in the depth of his soul."
He continues: "The structure of the story didn't change so much, but it was more the approach to various scenes, the intensity of certain incidents. Marty brings an incredible visual panache to telling a story, and he has such an artistic feel for momentum, for keeping the action on track that he brought an enormous amount to the process. And Leo has a wonderful ear for period dialogue, for what seems appropriate to the character at any given moment. He was very creative about pitching story ideas and dialogue. Each of us is an alpha personality, and we all loved to talk about Howard Hughes, so it was like electricity shooting out of the room at every meeting."
Although Hughes had affairs with a number of famous women, Logan also chose to narrow the story focus down to two of the most important in Hughes' life. "We decided to focus first on his relationship with Katharine Hepburn, which is considered to be the most important relationship of his life, and secondly with Ava Gardner, who was a part of Howard's life for two decades," comments Logan. "We concentrate on these two great, great stars not only because they represent two very different kinds of women but also because of what they represented to Howard in his life: each had a grounding effect on him, easing his fears and doubts."
Logan also explored some of Hughes' medical maladies - his childhood loss of hearing that made him nearly deaf as well as the undiagnosed obsessive-compulsive disorder that combined with his deeply-rooted germ phobia to provoke some of his strange behavior. "Howard was acutely aware of his fragility," Logan says, "He had a constant fear of going mad."
"I think he felt the darkness out there pressing in on him and knew that one day he would lose the battle, as he did. But to me, the man's self- knowledge is what makes him so interesting and poignant, a sad, lonely yet brilliant man--a tragic figure."
Summarizes Martin Scorsese: "One of the most fascinating elements of the story of THE AVIATOR is seeing this extraordinarily handsome and bright young man, so full of life, become a man who's tortured by his own shortcomings."
Adds Leonard DiCaprio: "Howard Hughes is probably one of the 20th century's most iconic and mysterious figures - and in some ways the more you learn about him the more mysterious he becomes. There are so many facets to Howard that it makes him an endlessly fascinating character. Just when you think you have him figured out, there's another layer to the story. He was a dreamer and a visionary, but the irony of it all is that even after all of his accomplishments - huge industrialist, pioneering aviator, big-time producer and director - at the end of the day he felt very much alone."
BEING HOWARD HUGHES: ABOUT THE CASTING
Leonardo DiCaprio has been fascinated by Howard Hughes for a decade - ever since he first read Hughes' biography - and pursued the role with a passion, becoming an executive producer on the film. Yet, he admits that even when THE AVIATOR began to take off, DiCaprio remained a little daunted by the immensity of the character. A man of such huge contradictions - at once gallant and doomed, visionary and mad - poses many challenges and added to that was Hughes' worldwide renown as a symbol of unimaginable wealth and eccentricity.
"So many people already have a strong impression of Howard Hughes - and that alone made the role intimidating," says DiCaprio. "To me, this meant I had to come off as authentic as possible."
To achieve that authenticity the actor lived and breathed Howard Hughes for months, reading biographies, listening to tape recordings, watching old movies - and even going so far as to learn how to fly the daredevil aerial manoeuvres that seemed, ironically, to keep Hughes grounded during his most productive years. As he delved further into the character, DiCaprio found himself relating to elements of Hughes' life, especially Hughes' struggles with celebrity and relentless pursuit by the media. "He was the last private man in America," DiCaprio comments.
"Despite his ambition, he had a strong need for solitude and I can definitely empathize with that."
Most of all, DiCaprio believes Hughes represents the kind of adventurous, risk-taking, slightly unhinged personality that tends to make a large impact on the world. "He was an incredibly complex man, but the one thing I think you can say about him is that he took chances that nobody else dared to imagine during his time," he says. "He loved aviation and movies, and he made a lasting mark in both worlds."
Still, for all the glamour and adventure in the story, what really got to DiCaprio were the most emotional and intimate scenes when Hughes is naked and alone with only his fears keeping him company. "The best times for me were when we were filming the isolated Howard Hughes - then, it was Scorsese and I working together in the zone, so to speak, making things up as they came along, improvising, digging very, very deep," he says. "For me, those are the greatest of memories making this film."
Producer Graham King was impressed from the outset by DiCaprio's drive to play Howard Hughes. "You could tell this wasn't just another actor going after a normal role - he was truly passionate about it," says King. "He lived this screenplay for so many years that there was a lot of emotion behind it. When Leo would talk about Howard there was a sparkle in his eyes and you could really envision him in the part. Once on the set, it was just remarkable how he carried it off, transitioning from a young man full of ideas to the older Howard with his demons."
King explains that DiCaprio even consulted with experts in the field of obsessive-compulsive disorder to better understand the illness that troubled Hughes even as he was making pioneering efforts in aviation and film. "Leo knew that he had to play Hughes dead-on," says King.
"He gives a surprisingly emotional performance that I think really captures the man. And I have to say that I've never seen an actor work as hard as Leo did everyday on THE AVIATOR."
RECREATING HOWARD HUGHES: THE FILM'S DESIGN
THE MUSIC
FLYING WITH HUGHES: ABOUT THE SPECIAL EFFECTS
THE FILM'S COLOUR SCHEMES
ABOUT MARTIN SCORSESE
ABOUT SCREENWRITER JOHN LOGAN
|
|
