Bette Midler, James Marsden, and Christina Applegate Press Conference
Did singing help you get a handle on voice work?Bette Midler: "There are some parts of it that are quite musical. The timing is very important in this kind of work because the phrasing works with the mouth of the character. Once the mouth of the character is moving, you have to phrase along with the character that’s drawn. That is musical and if you listen to that, you can hear where the beats are skipped and where you drop a beat or when you rush and catch up a little bit. I will say that the fact that I’ve sung for a long time has really helped a lot with that. Yeah, really, really helped a lot. I don't think it helped the character but it helped me get through the sessions."
What is it about voice work that appeals to you at this stage?
James Marsden: "It’s the fact that you can just sort of roll out of bed. Vanity gets set aside. You really don’t have to worry about going through the works. I mean, I’d be lying to you if I told you that wasn’t a part of it. That’s definitely one of the fun elements of it is that you get to go and really focus on one tool, your vocal performance. I don't know, voice work specifically, usually it’s not that big of a time commitment. You can go in for a couple of days or a couple of months here and there and just go in and play. I like being able to go in and just play. Again, you don’t have that luxury on film sets, or television sets. Time is money and time’s money in the studio as well, but you really do. One of the great things about getting in there and working with Brad is we just would run the gamut. What didn’t work would be set aside and what worked would be enhanced and embraced and then given to the animators. You don’t get that sort of safety net a lot of the times when you’re working on a film set. It’s about, 'We need the shot before lunch. We need this. The lighting setup’s got to be this.' It’s all you when you go in and give a vocal performance. And there’s a playful element to that that I like and would love to continue doing voice work."
Bette, if anything happened to your fabulous hair in real life, would you also go maniacal and try to destroy the world?
Bette Midler: "No, no, no, never. Something happens to my hair in real life every day and I don’t. A long time ago when I first worked in the theater, I was in Fiddler on the Roof. I came into Fiddler on the Roof and I was just a kid. I think I was 19 or 20 or something like that. One of the girls who was in Fiddler was a brazen Puerto Rican girl and she was famous. The reason she was famous was because the opening night she had done something to her hair. She had tried to straighten her hair or something and her hair fell out, literally, and she didn’t even blink. She went out, she got a piece, she slapped it on, she went out, she gave the performance of her life. I mean, she went on and became a really famous opera singer and I never forgot that. I thought, 'Wow, check that out. She didn’t even bother. She didn’t waste any time.' From that time on, I never thought twice. I just look around, grab a piece, put it on."
Could you compare this to being a Chipette? In that, your voice was changed, and in this, it’s your normal voice.
Christina Applegate: "Very different. Considering the Chipettes, I think it could be anybody, you really don’t recognize it because it’s just [high-pitched gibberish]. That’s a little bit more taxing, as far as doing the Chipmunks, because you have to talk a lot higher than you normally speak and really slowly. So, and everything has to be incredibly exaggerated, so you really feel ridiculous, and the process is a little bit longer to do that. And then they just speed it up and it doesn’t sound like you. You try to put as much personality into that slow speaking, so that when it speeds up it sounds like something great, you know, quirky and sassy. But with this, I found I didn’t want it to push too much because I think what’s great about these movies is the human quality that all these animals have. That’s why kids love it is because they can just think, 'Oh, this is really happening because there’s this human inside there. There’s this real person that I can relate to.' It took me a minute to really find what that was, to get Catherine as strong as she was, but not make her unlikable as well."
James, what do your kids think of your family roles, X-Men and talking dogs?
James Marsden: "They’re sort of over it now. The whole thing’s been demystified for them. I have a four year old daughter and a nine year old son. What’s really interesting is when my daughter is four years old, when my son was about that age, I got excited because I thought, 'Oh, they’re going to get to see their dad in this film.' You forget that a child’s mind at that age, that what they’re seeing on screen is real to them. They don’t see the manipulation. They don’t see the smoke and mirrors, the Hollywood. It’s very real. So I remember thinking, 'Oh, they’re going to love this. It’s going to be great.'"
"My son when he was that age was sort of freaked out by it. When he saw me in X-Men, well, first of all he probably shouldn’t have been watching that. I showed him my scenes and I later realized just the concept of seeing me in person and then seeing me on screen… Then he grew up and sort of got into it a little bit. Now he’s sort of over it. It’s like now I’m sort of this dorky dad in the movies or whatever. But my daughter is getting a kick out of it now. So it’s one of the reasons why I like doing these types of films, so that I can be a part of something that I can enjoy with my kids - if they’re into it."
Is there the Divine Ms. M in Kitty? Was world domination always a plan?
Bette Midler: "Oh, always. Always. I think a lot of female entertainers kind of think about that when they start out. Yeah, I do."
