A Report from the Set

Matthew Vaughn

“I’m at that stage where I feel like a boxer against the ropes,” the director said as his crew prepared for the next shot on a location set in Long Beach. “I’m just throwing punches and taking them as they come and making sure I don’t hit the canvas.”

“We’re filming at the moment, we’ve a lot to get done,” said a weary Vaughn. “I’ve never worked under such time pressure. The good thing about the independent world is I never even knew if I was going to get distribution. I’m used to finishing a film and then crossing your fingers that someone is going to like it. This is totally doing it the other way around. We’ve definitely got a release date and we’ve got to make it.”

Asked if he’s concerned about the glut of superhero film competition this summer — with “Captain America: The First Avenger,” “Green Lantern” and  ”Thor” – Vaughn said that, if anything, it’s the other guys who should be nervous. “With ‘Green Lantern,’ I don’t know about that one, I couldn’t get my head around the trailer, to be honest … look, I will say the following: X-Men as a brand is bigger than Captain America, Thor and the Green Lantern, all put together.”

James McAvoy

“This isn’t a reboot, so I’m not replacing anyone, in which case you might want to try to be as different as possible and stay away from what had been done before,” James McAvoy said on Monday during a break from a rescue scene that required water-tank work. “This is a prequel, so I’m the same character, just younger, but the challenge for me – and for Michael — is to show the same person in a different place in their life; to show someone before they’re this bad guy, before they’re this saint. Charles wasn’t always a … monk, this selfless, sexless monk that he becomes.”

Bryan Singer

“It is an excellent cast,” Bryan Singer said. He added that no one is more aware of the high-bar set by McKellen and Stewart. “I’m very sensitive to it. Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy are two of the best actors working today and that was needed to fill those shoes. Short of digitally recreating Patrick and Ian in their 20s I cant think of anyone who would be more equipped for this than these two guys. The challenge of that is what attracted James, I’m sure of it. That’s why the guy who starred in ‘Atonement’ would want to play a comic-book character in the first place because it was a role established by a really fine actor.”

“The biggest challenge is introducing an audience to these characters in a different time – characters the audience is familiar with but now see played by younger actors and in a story taking place in a different time. We have to establish this universe. We had the challenge with the first ‘X-Men’ film, which came at a time when there were no comic-book movies [of this sort] and no template to launch from and yet you’ve got to do that. You have to put your characters out there and introduce them to a quizzical public that sort of recognizes them. But that very thing is the exciting part of it.”

http://herocomplex.latimes.com/2011/01/19/x-menfirst-class-three-exclusive-photos-and-a-report-from-the-stressed-out-set/