The fantastic four: first steps- Behind The Scenes Talk (Pedro Pascal, Joseph Quinn, Vanessa Kirby)

Please welcome our stars of Fantastic Four, First Steps. Let's get going with Eben Moss-Bachrach. Eben, there you are. Good to see you. Next up, Joseph Quinn, the wonderful Vanessa Kirby and last but not least, Pedro Pascal. Welcome. It's so great to have you here. Did you enjoy last night? Was it exciting for you to see out the turnout? I mean, I hope that you felt the love of the city and the fans because it was quite impressive how many people turned up and cheered and got really excited. Was it enjoyable, Eben? Yeah, it was a great surprise. Felt so welcome. Really exciting. Very encouraging. Yeah, they're very understated in Germany. They told us we were going to a cocktail party or something like that. That is a typical German cocktail party that you experienced last night. Incredible. I think it's probably that in Mexico was the biggest. Sorry, France. We had an amazing time in France, but that was that was that it took our breaths away, really, when we got to the event and the German fans and felt like felt like we were floating with their love and cheers. Fantastic. We're very much looking forward to the movie. It opens in Germany on the 24th of July. I have a question because this is number 37 out of the Marvel Universe. And what I was wondering, is there like an exclusive Marvel star club where old members call up the new members? Eben, did you get a call from Mark Ruffalo, who portrays Hulk, about how to deal with motion captioning? Yeah, there's a there's a clubhouse in Burbank where we all hang out. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I you know what I did, actually? I got a really nice, very long, thorough text from Mark Ruffalo, because. This is my character's performance capture, and I was a little anxious about that. It's something I've never really I've never done before. And Mark immediately. I don't know. Somehow he got wind of my insecurity about it. And he was really generous and sort of went through the whole thing with me. So, yeah, actually, that was nice. Yeah. Vanessa, did you talk to Florence or anyone out of them? Marvel Universe about Marvel and what it's like to be a superhero. I didn't talk to Florence, but I wish I had. She's now a great friend. We'd only met a couple of times, but I think she's amazing. I mean, she's truly amazing. We're doing Avengers with her and every day she's just incredible. But I did speak to Jake Gyllenhaal, who played Mysterio in Spider-Man. He was really helpful. And Sebastian Stan as well. I spoke to you briefly. Who's done it forever? And then it's so interesting because now we're on Avengers and you're with all these guys that have done it for 18 years. And it's just an amazing thing to be a part of when, you know, these guys have grown up together. They've had families. They've gone through life and they're still united in this type family here. And we're a new family coming into their family. And so this movie is so much about family. But I think I've learned that the whole Marvel Universe, we're number 37. It is a family where everyone kind of it's amazing they managed to thread them all together. And yeah, we're the newbies. So next time we should throw a German cocktail party at the Marvel exclusive club gathering. Joseph, you've been a part of some really amazing movies. Gladiator, A Quiet Place, a fantastic series, Stranger Things. But this is something completely different, especially now that we heard from Vanessa that you are continuously performing as as Johnny Storm. What was it like when you received the call? I heard that you were in Croatia with a couple of friends hanging out when they called you to tell you that you would be the next part. Yeah, you heard correctly. How did you know that? Yeah, I was in Croatia. I don't even know that. Yeah, I was in Croatia and I got a call and I was with some friends and I'd had a Zoom chat with Matt Shackman about maybe a month before. And it was a general meeting. And he was telling me that he was developing this Fantastic Four thing. I was like, oh, that's great. Good luck. Heard nothing. Genuinely didn't think anything was going to come from it. I got a call. It was Matt and he said, so are you going to do it? I was looking at my friends, I was like. Like that, and then I told them that I've been offered this part and they said, well, you've obviously got to do it. So, yeah, I guess. I guess I'm going to do that then. That was a very surreal day, certainly. Yeah, but it's great to spend it with friends and basically share that emotion and, you know, the offer with people that you like. I mean, that's probably the best part of it, isn't it? Yeah, I think it's funny, isn't it? Because I guess one's ego can either suppress the scale of it or magnify the scale of it or whatever. And I think that yesterday I was very struck by just how much this means to people, you know. And on the day that I found out, I remember I was thinking that can't be that, you know, it's it's certainly surreal, but it's very moving and meaningful to see how much, you know, people were waiting from like eight in the morning yesterday just to come and hang out. So that's, you know, quite something. And thank you for spending so much time with the fans. I think that's what they really love about it as well. Pedro, I read this really interesting story that in order to sort of capture the movements of elastic limbs that you studied an octopus and the movement. Or is that like a true or false story or a rumor that is not true? Well, octopus have been my favorite. Animal for a very long time. I had a strange experience with an octopus when I was young. Share it with us if you want to. Is that something that shouldn't be told at 10 o'clock in the morning? We had caught an octopus and I remember it was like keeping it in a bucket. And I would I just noticed and maybe I'm making up half the story in my mind, but it would it would surface, it would look at us. And then it would go down, you know, and I just noticed it do that a couple of times until we were distracted enough and it waited to escape. And then at that point, I understood how intelligent they were. And and anyway, so they've I've got I've got like I've got like a poster of an octopus in my home. And, you know, years before this job came my way and as a cast and and between Vanessa and I, we've been very exploratory in a lot of different ways on how to flesh out these relationships and in these family dynamics. And at one one point, she asked if my character was an animal, what would it be? And I hadn't thought about it, actually. And I thought, you know, well, you'd definitely be in the water. And I saw her eyes kind of like bright. And I was like, am I warm? And she's like. And I was like, well, I guess I'm an octopus. And she's like, that's what I guess you were. And I was like, yeah, and you're a dolphin. And she's like, I am. And so anyway, so it was more like that. I wouldn't call it research, really. Just sort of like active imaginations and. Vanessa. Yeah, it's more like it sounds weird, it sounds a bit. It's more like the energy or the essence of the characters is helpful. It's a helpful tool to imagine what are the qualities of that, you know, and and I don't know if Sue is a dolphin was a helpful idea because they are really warm. They're affectionate. They're really friendly. They're very front footed. They're confident. They lead their great mothers and they can be really brutal if they attack you, which is uncommonly known. And they're sensual. And there was there was something about that which helps me. You know, if you were ever stuck in a scene, it sounds silly acting thing, but it does it is it is ground you sometimes when you're like, OK, just get out of my own mind and just be in the animal of what the person is like. And it was really fun. That was a fun animal to to embody. One of the most important things about a superhero movie most of the time are the suits. I mean, that's what the fans are waiting for. What was it like, Joseph, Vanessa and Pedro to see each other in that suit for the first time? What did you think? What was it like, Joe? Well, there's nowhere to hide in those things. So I think there was a collective was quite revealing and vulnerable for us all to kind of bear. This is what I'm working with. And it was exciting. I think, as you said. The suits are when superheroes put on their suit, so pivotal moment. And I think the fact that there's all four of us in this thing, the fact that we all are this this one kind of entity, this one unit, and to all for all of us to be wearing the suits that day, the first day that we saw it, it was I remember being excited and then also quite galvanized and encouraged and determined to do more sit ups. I think Vanessa and Pedro. The first thing we saw each other wear was the astronaut costume, and they'd made it very true to the Apollo 11, you know, with the 60s style and stuff. And it was the first day and we were shooting when the Fantastic Four go up to space for the first time before they're changed. So that is fully human. And it was really moving because it was so it wasn't fantastical in any way. It was very, very real. And we're in this space suit and we'd studied how astronauts get ready in the process they go through. They even have a ritual where they play cards. So we had to play cards. We had a last meal and then we suited up and it was just really special. And everyone looked so amazing. And it felt it grounded it in something that's not just, you know, about superpowers. It wasn't. It felt like these were four humans that were real, you know, and they had all this hope and optimism and then stuff. And then we knew that before and after those that those that is who they were before. And then we had to play the after and it was really useful. And everyone looked really good. And it was also very historically accurate. Like our suits were like perfect replicas. We had these oxygen tanks that the astronauts had to have. They were even shooting this scene in 16 with 16 millimeter and eight millimeter cameras from from the 60s. So it was yeah, it was very it placed us in the time, I think, in a really smart way. I think it was wise to start there. Yeah. But next to the astronaut suit, Eben, I didn't leave you out. I left you out on purpose because your change is even more drastic than to the others. You know, regarding the suit, because you had to wear a motion capture suit. You talked about it yesterday. The rock, Jennifer, and then the stand in with the suit. What was it like for you to experience yourself as the thing on the big screen, fully digitized with VFX? Before we started shooting the this company called the Imaginarium that Andy Serkis started, did did all of our capture this really great team. And they have this thing called the Magic Mirror where they have cameras around and monitors. And so in real time, I can see a crude rendering of what the thing looks like. And I was allowed to sort of explore and play in there and see how it moves. And then it's upstairs and door frames and I can interact with things. And this is before we we we shot it all. And then these guys joined me. Right. You guys came into the Magic Mirror. They could see and interact and see what he looked like a bit. But yeah, then, you know, months and months later, I would start to see little little scenes, just little bits of what the guy what what what my guy was looking like. Yeah, it's it was it was it was hard, truthfully, just because you don't you don't know exactly how it's going. So it's I was flying blind a little bit for a while. It looks awesome. Definitely looks great. Pedro, I know that you were a little bit reluctant to take on the role of Richards, but then a walk through New York trying to buy a lemonade changed everything. Could you fill us in on that story? Because I think it has something to do with Matt, the director and his his daughter. You've done your research. I have to I have to argue I was never reluctant to play the to play the role. Quite the opposite. I was quite jealous of everyone that was in it. And Joseph and I were on Gladiator together. And and he told me that he was going to be doing fantastic for me. We had a nice, a nice, like long walk together and we talked about it. And I was doing my best to be very encouraging and supportive while biting down my own envy. And then so when it did come around, it had a special kind of sparkle of magic to it, because I knew that Matt Shackman was was was doing it. And Matt Shackman is somebody that I've known for 26 years. We had the same talent manager together when we started. He was a child actor and much too smart to to to stay. Once he went off to Yale to to study drama. And then once we were both out of school, we had the same manager looking after our careers. We almost became roommates. He was not impressed with my apartment, so he rejected it. But we stayed in touch. We've been sort of witness to each other's careers for the, you know, for over 26 years. And so we had our first conversation about it. And we ended up really catching up for hours about life and his family and just the last, you know, all the years that had gone by and everything that we've been going through and stuff like that. And so it really wasn't a meeting about, will you do this movie? It was more of a catch up. And then that following Sunday, I've made this into a way too long story. I'm really, really sorry. But that following Sunday, I was with my friend and we were going for a walk and also doing a little catch up. And I said, I think my I think my life is going to go in a direction that I wasn't expecting it to, because I've just had this meeting with Matt Shackman and it's Fantastic Four. And I did I thought that they were I wasn't going to, you know, they anyway. I think that this might be happening. And just as we were discussing it, this person walks by and says, get ready to buy some lemonade. And I was like, well, what does that mean? And there's like there's a little girl who's going to sell you some lemonade and there's no way you're going to get around it. And I was like, all right, we go around the corner. We see this little blonde girl, little six year old voguing, you know, like on the street. And then she she sees us and then she pauses and she runs and she stands behind a lemonade stand and we get there and she's like, you know, charmingly sells us lemonade. And then I'm like buying the lemonade and I hear, what are you doing here? And I look up and it's Matt Shackman and it's his daughter selling me lemonade just like the Sunday after the meeting. And anyway, we bought the lemonade and went on and my friend was like, I guess you're doing fantastic four. And I was like, you're damn right, I'm doing it. That's a nice story. Thank you for sharing. Thank you so much for the long story. Sorry. No, but to go a great story. Now we have time for questions from our fellow journalists. The lady right here in the second row, please. If we could get her microphone. Hi, I'm Anne from IGN. And since we were talking spirit animals, I'm an orca. Just to let you know. And I would like to know about the set pieces, because some of you guys work with like big directors on big projections like really Scott put like ancient Rome in there. How was it with Fantastic Four? Is there a lot of CGI or did the things we saw in the trailer really exist, like the spaceship, the living room, the kitchen? What about that? Yeah, to to to incredible detail, actually. And from the Baxter building, our bedrooms, our kitchen, our living room, Times Square, our spaceship, Galactus's what is it planet? I never really came to understanding the story. But his ship, it was his ship and and it was all it was mostly practical effects, actually, and and and practical sets and even small models that were shot and and large scale sets and and. Yeah, we had Eben there the entire time in his fractal suit, and he would do all of the scenes with us. And thank God we had you there the whole time. I don't know what it would even have been like if you hadn't been there. And and and it was all very, very anchoring, physical, practical elements that built the world around us and informed very much the world and story that the world we were in and the story that we were telling. And I said, did did you like the sets that make it easier to get into that rhythm of a superhero family? Yes, it did. It was all I mean, everything was built. And thank God, because doing stuff on a blue screen, we have to imagine it's just really hard. And I think people assume that that and that that happens a lot in these kinds of movies, but also because it was retro future, right? So it had a lot of futuristic qualities, but also very sort of heavily rooted in our known 60s. They had to they had to be specific about the world they were creating. Otherwise it would have felt like computery. You know what I mean? And it had to feel very real and ground this family in this kind of epic story. And so that was just incredibly useful. Some of the spaces were big because like his laboratory, Reid has this laboratory and they designed it so architecturally incredible. And it was so huge and it was huge. And I always imagine that Sue was about going to redesign it in a year or two. She's just giving him some because all these spaces were so beautifully, incredibly designed. It wasn't just nothing was cliched. Everything was. So when we walked into our living room and you have this little 60s kitchen and this little 60s fridge, all these 60s products and stuff, it was amazing. It felt like we were doing a period piece, except with lots of technology and other things in our alternate universe, because we had to create something that was based in the 60s, but was a different earth. It's like a multitude of versions of us out there. And this was just one one version of that. And Herbie, right here in the first row, the gentleman with the yeah, I'm a do it right in the middle. You know, I'm going to go on. I have a question. Yeah, this is Mark Harapetian, publisher of the culture magazine Spirit, a smile in the storm since the 16th living year. I really love to watch the 27 minutes fragment, especially the 1960s sky captured me a lot for me. It's the best period in mankind, as I know, because content and style have a perfect combination and everything was handmade. So my question to you, all of you, director Matt Checkman approached to shoot in a similar way to Stanley Kubrick. Using specially camera lenses, practical elements, as you say, Pedro, and models and miniatures, among other things. Was this perfectionism combined with the fact that he himself was once a child actor helpful for you actors during filming or sometimes it's hinder you? Also, long question, short answer. Joel. OK, let's see how short it is. No, no, I'm just kidding. It was it was I think when you're working with the director that is has a very singular vision and has there's a bullseye in his mind in the target, which he's determined to hit. It is you have to surrender to that as an actor. You come up with your ideas. You bring your interpretation of the character to the table. And that was very collaborative. He was he would listen to things. He would take stuff on. He knew when it was right to listen to his instinct and when to listen to ours. And sometimes they would be the same instinct. Sometimes they wouldn't be. I think it was what he'd done with WandaVision and that texture, that retro future world that he built when you apply that this family and this world, I think it was it just really made sense. And you watched him put it all together, grow with his his his determination grew. And he was it was it was inspiring. He knew what he wanted, definitely. And I think he knew what he wanted out of us, which is great. That wasn't that long. No, it was a great answer. Yeah, a bit long. Eben, you already talked about the way that it was shot. What was your feeling about what Matt did on set, especially creating that word? With a production of this size, I think the challenge for a director is to keep these two simultaneous things, something on a very big macro level. This is this. We're in space. There's different planets. There's really, really large scale stuff. And then there's very small scale stuff, the color of the jello mold. You know what is like what fish are in the window of the fishmonger in the Lower East Side. And you really do need somebody that has a strong sense of the story. When I the first time I read the script, it was very hard for me to contain all the images and what the story was in my head, because it is so vast and galactic in a way. And Matt really just always had his thumb on what the story was and what the world was. And it feels very authored that way. I found it very reassuring. Did it surprise you, Pedro, after knowing him for such a long time that he paid so much attention to detail in the way that he worked? I mean, did you know from the history that the two of you have that he would be that way? I didn't know. Early days, he was developing theater projects. I would go out to Los Angeles for pilot season, and he would sort of anchor me to an experience of a play that was being developed within a theater community in Los Angeles because he sort of he moved out to L.A. after college and kept his career going there. Became artistic director of the Geffen Theater, which is the most prominent theater in Los Angeles, and really sort of elevated the the the the theater community that L.A. is not typically very known for. And and so and then I am a major consumer of television. And so I would always see his name pop up on all of my favorite shows. It's always sunny in Philadelphia. Mad Men, Game of Thrones, Fargo, you know, and I would always reach out to him. And I was like, that episode was excellent. So I saw him as a director, just kind of gain more and more momentum. That WandaVision made perfect sense. And and it was incredible to see him in in all of his talents and and attention to detail lead something like that. And and then, of course, this just seemed like the the the the perfect next step that I knew he would that he would would would build with with all of this kind of attention to detail, but also so much care, you know, a sort of like a visual earnest, innocent warmth and and and love. For for for the world that we're all meant to experience. Thank you. A question from the lady with the blue shirt in the fifth row, and then we move on to that side. Hi, I'm Teresa from Kino. My question is for Vanessa. You make playing Sue look so easy, but she has a lot of different roles to fill. Mother to be a superhero, a public figure, loyal teammate, supportive wife and caring sister. Which aspect came easy to you and which stress and which one put you and pushed you to your limits? Sorry. Thank you for such a nice question and for saying that about her. I felt all those things when I went back to the comics and from 1961. And it's amazing to see how the different artists had. You know, had written her over the decades and how much she changed, and therefore we knew we were doing a 20, 20, 20, 25 version of of them all. And many people have contributed to who they are. So we were just one part of it. So I felt like our job was to try and take all those elements and make into one sort of one essence, really. And that felt right for our movie. And in the in the script, it was definitely surreal playing a pregnant superhero, particularly because the baby is kind of the heart of the story. And that felt well, in one sense, it felt well, how amazing to have that that emotional weight. You know, we're not just defending saving the world. We are as superheroes, but we're actually protecting this baby. That's a newborn. And this new mother and father and family there that the baby has changed their lives forever. And so that really helped the grounding of it. But I was I was nervous, too. I was nervous because I think in we've seen a lot of tropes of mothers and wives and new mothers and new mothers with babies. And I was very sensitive to. I mean, you guys all felt it. I was continually thinking about it sometimes too much, you know, of, oh, God, how do I not fall into any cliches, you know, and what was amazing about the film and what it was so unbelievably moving to me is that she didn't have to sit on the side. She didn't have to take time out. She wasn't no longer part of the team because she had to go and be a mother. She was a mother and she was working and she was a also had these, you know, had many things to to face and deal with. And the baby was a part of that and was everybody's responsibility. And she would also, you know, she was able to be in her power. And that's what women can do. And honestly, she taught me that. And I'm going through my own journey with it right now. And I'm I get emotional sometimes thinking about the fact that I lived through that. And I had these three incredible men by my side who just, you know, in the movie metaphorically, but also in life, were just totally there with me and didn't. You know, I wasn't Sue or I would never was never sidelined because of that. And I think in the, you know, conditioning and over the centuries that's happened, that's happened a lot. And it's doesn't need to be that way. And so it was a very yeah, it's a very moving journey for me. One last question by the super villain in the fourth row on the side with the weird sunglasses. Steven, you told everyone my disguise. Just like it's a moment. It's the moment. Even in this universe, you recognize me. Yes. Hello. It's good to see you. So, Johnny Storm. Attack. So the question is, even in this world, what makes all of you fantastic? Maybe Johnny Storm says something nice about Ben Grimm. Maybe Mr. Fantastic says something nice about his wife. And maybe Miss Invisible says something nice to all the teammates. And one last question. Why is everyone talking about Galactus and not the Mole Man? Mole Man, always underserved. It's so true. Get back underground. Characters or actor or people? So as characters, as characters, actors, one in the same. I, you know, I one thing that I and I don't know if it'll answer your question well, but one thing that I loved. Defining Reed by was his relationship primarily to his family and to his partner and and to his wife. And in this kind of like delicious way, thinking about, you know, to think of it in a less casual sense, a kind of deep codependency on on on on. And how contrary that is to somebody who works alone. So so much with a chalkboard and in his lab. But really, his identity is completely linked to these people in his life. And she really is his leader and that he can't. And it's a it's a coexistence completely. And without without her and without them, he's he's he's he's he's nothing. He'd be devoured by his own brain. Are you in love? Yeah, exactly. Joe, is there anything that you can say about Eben or the relationship of your characters in the movie Something Nice? Something nice. Yeah, of course. I think my favorite thing about Ben is his heart, his warmth. He's he's kind of like the the heart of the family, the the the fireplace, as it were. And I think there's something despite his kind of what's going on aesthetically, there is something so vulnerable and warm and kind about him. And I think that that it roots the film in that there's something familiar about him. He takes family seriously. I like that about Ben. Vanessa. About who? About let's pick Ben. Ben again. Back to you, babe. It was well, it was amazing because their relationship, Reid and Ben, you know, they've been friends since college. Sue's been on the scene for quite a long time. And so he's like another brother. And, you know, we had many moments. We really thought about early on, didn't we? Well, we thought we really want these guys to share looks and to have an understanding between them. That was their own special kind of relationship. We've continued that in Avengers as well. It's really special. And there is he's like a brother to me. And Ebenezer's like totally like a brother. And it's just so beautiful. And I'm really grateful for that because it's your partner's best friend. But they become yours and you have your own individual relationship with them. And I think it's really meaningful to see. And also, we really try to imagine, you know, these guys were astronauts, which is quite, you know, extreme job and life experience to do that. So we reimagined that we were grounded in that. But then they went up to space and they had this. We really imagined it was very real. There was a cosmic radiation, you know, belt that they went through and altered their fundamental, you know, DNA, which isn't completely implausibly impossible. Just like when we did, we did those, you know, studying space, didn't we? And finding out things like a planet out there spinning so fast, that it's not you can't see it with the human eye. You wouldn't be able to see it because it's moving so fast. And there's things out there that are just, you know, real that it's hard for us to comprehend. So we imagine that. And then when they came back, imagine coming back to Earth and being human, but having these weird things happening to you. And it's all completely individual. And the only thing you have is each other. And we've all gone through it, but we're all dealing with our own individual things. And so that was a very we had to imagine that these people decided to live together, be together, work together. That's very intentional because what they've gone through is, you know, traumatic. And they've tried to make a different way by doing it. So it didn't feel like, again, it didn't feel fantastical or magical. It felt very real and very, very human. So I think that's why they're so united. Joseph, Vanessa, Pedro and Evan, thank you so much. It's been fun. It's been way too short. The press conference. Thank you for coming to Berlin. All the best of luck. And please do come back to Berlin. And this is your applause. Thank you so much. Vielen Dank. Thank you. Famous around the world. Please welcome the fantastic four. Mr. Fantastic. Invisible woman. Human torch. I love you, Johnny. And the thing. Hey, what time is it? Say the thing. That's not really something I say. It's clobbering time. That's just in the cartoon. Never late for Sunday dinner. Let's see. Hey, what time is it? It's dinner time. Get inside. I herald his beginning. I herald your end. I herald Galactus. What is that? Get us out of here, man. Hold on. Are we safe? I don't know. The clock is ticking. We are going to find a solution. We are going to make it right. You don't want to just crush him? Hide that. The four of us will face the danger. We will protect you. Family. It's about connecting to something bigger than yourself. We'll face it together. As a family. What time is it, Ben? No. What time is it, Ben? No, Johnny. Say it. I don't want to. Say it!