CITY OF EMBER MAYOR FULL

Murray: What’s that supposed to mean? (Laughter) Well, he’s the only one that’s eating three squares in the whole town, so he’d be the only one that would be putting on any kinda weight. So I felt like as long as I was really, really successful in talking the talk, that the disappointment would be there just like a gasp. So, I just thought of when you’re most disappointed is when you talk the talk and you don’t live up to it. I’m a father figure and I’ve probably disappointed on occasion. And I think a mayor can be a father figure who can disappoint you. I tried to think of, like, what they made of this guy, what this mayor was. And I thought, “They already know what’s being spoken about and I don’t.” So when I read it, I read it from their point of view. And when I told my sons I might be in “City of Ember,” they said, “Oh! You’re gonna be the mayor?” And I hadn’t even read the script yet. I found that the book was a book that kids in America read in school now. Q: What type of research did you do to prepare for your role as the Mayor? And I figured this guy’s good enough to work with by my rigid standard. And she said, “Oh, you’re gonna love this director, this Gil Kenan, you’re gonna like him.” So then I figured out who he was and I saw “Monster House,” which I’d already seen some of on the satellite. She was on horseback somewhere in the valley. So I got the script and went, “Caroline Thompson wait, is that the one?” And it was the one. And I thought, I could work with this writer. The temperature was about 130 degrees, and all people did was drink rum straight and dance.

CITY OF EMBER MAYOR FULL

There was a full orchestra with, like, six horns. We went out to a bar that was a diner during the day on Lincoln Avenue. And I opened the script and it said “written by Caroline Thompson.” Caroline Thompson’s a writer that I met a long time ago when I first went to California and my agent sent me around to meet other writers.

Q: How did you get involved with this project?īill Murray: I can’t remember who, but someone sent me the script.

He also gave some juicy bits of info on the currently-scripting Ghostbusters 3, as well as his voice role in another children’s film – Wes Anderson’s animated adaptation of Roald Dahl’s The Fantastic Mr. Murray came to New York to discuss the film, its magnificent production design, and its political implications. Along the way they meet the resistance of the corrupt, dimwitted Mayor of Ember, played by the great Bill Murray. With time running out, two young children use an ancient parchment to navigate their way out of the labyrinthine city. City of Ember is the latest entry into the children’s fantasy film pipeline, but aims for a darker, more serious tone than predecessors to the screen such as “Potter” and “Narnia.” It concerns the denizens of the eponymous underground city, which was built exactly 200 years prior to shelter its citizens from the environmental disaster at the earth’s surface for 200 years! The power is beginning to fade from Ember’s generator, causing mass blackouts and panic.

City of ember mayor