From Rebecca Murray,
Your Guide to Hollywood Movies.
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Freeman and Oldman – A Team to be Reckoned With: Morgan Freeman ('Lucius Fox') and Gary Oldman ('James Gordon') were paired up for interviews to promote Warner Bros. Pictures’ “Batman Begins” and they set the tone the second they walked into the room. Joking about the seating arrangements, Oldman and Freeman began the interview with some good-natured banter before settling into “Batman Begins” promotion mode. Asked if they’d been sitting together all day, Freeman responded, “The whole bleeding day,” which now that I’ve typed this isn’t as funny as it was in person. It’s one of those things you have to be there to appreciate I guess.

This “Batman” Movie Isn’t Campy: While there’s a smattering of humor in “Batman Begins,” it definitely isn’t in the least bit campy. Instead, “Batman Begins” tackles more serious subjects including how we handle fear, corruption, and the desire to see justice served. Oldman really appreciated the tone of “Batman Begins.” I like what it stands for, that it’s right and wrong, good and bad and you know, that justice prevails. The family, for instance, even though it occupies a very, very tiny part of the movie, really a few minutes of screen time, it resonates with you. You carry that mother and father. It carries you. It really carries all the way through, [it’s a] theme through the movie. It’s about compassion. Yeah, I thought it was most unusual in that respect,” said Oldman.

Freeman added his take on this latest “Batman” incarnation, “It’s a fully realized story I think. You know we’re all familiar with the Bat guy so that familiarity sort of demands something else, which is I think what Chris [Nolan] fell on – actually deliberately. That we have now a very familiar character and all of a sudden we realize well, hey, I didn’t know that about him, you know? I mean we knew that his parents were killed by some guy, but we don’t know what happened to him. We don’t know how he got to be Batman. You know, where did he get all this stuff? Where did he learn how to fight? And this whole thing with the Ninja concept, that was perfect.” Oldman further explained, “It makes sense of all this. It’s all functional. Well it’s all functional - as to his character.”

Oldman on His Prior Knowledge of “Batman:” “I wasn’t ever a huge fan of comics. Just not one of those kids, you know?,” said Oldman which prompted Freeman to interject, “He was reading Gibson and Chekhov.” laying along, Oldman said, “In the original language. No, I liked movies more than I [liked comic books]. And then I caught the series in the 60’s with Adam West. And so I used to stay in and that was before the days of… What is it? Same time, same bat channel. And this is before videos. I remember having like one of these things [forming a box with his hands], but it was like a very archaic sort of version of a tape recorder and you would actually tape shows off the TV and just have the audio. You’d put it right up next to the TV and then the power would go down or the five shillings would run out. The meter would go in the middle of your show, you know what I mean? And that dot would go on the TV and you’d go, “Hey mom, I’m in the middle of Batman!” So yeah, I used to watch that show. That’s the one I really sort of remember. It doesn’t hold up. I saw it last week.”

The Point of Recording Audio Off of the TV: “It was long before I wanted to be an actor. You know that wonderful, wonderful movie [with] Dustin Hoffman, ‘Lenny?’ Who’s the director? Robert Fosse, and I remember before I’d even ever seen the movie, I found the record. I was given the vinyl and I thought it was music and I put this thing on. I don’t even know how I came by it - it was in an attic somewhere or someone had it - and it was all those monologues. [It was] the soundtrack from the movie and so I just learned them all before I even had an idea that I even wanted to be an actor. So I used to be at school, I was the only 14 year old, 13 year old, walking around going, ‘Eleanor Roosevelt gave Lou Gehrig the clap,’ and they didn’t know what I was talking about.”

The Status of Future “Batman” Movies and the Next “Batman” Villain: Are Freeman and Oldman signed on to do another “Batman” movie? Freeman said, “I’m not lined up. They don’t line me up,” to which Oldman responded, “They’re gonna call you. I think so.” “Your mouth to God’s ears. The conventional belief is that they’re gonna call me, but…,” sighed Freeman. Rumor has it the studio is planning on more "Batman" films and Oldman said, “I think Christian [Bale] signed up for three. I’m signed up to do the next one. They’ll be calling you, so... And we got, we’ve got the Joker next. We have the Joker.”