ScreenCrave.com » Stephen Chow

Does Green Hornet Have a New Kato?

Krystal Clark — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 22:26:33 +0000

Let me preface this article by saying this is a mere casting rumor that I’ve decided to entertain. The big screen adaptation of Green Hornet has been plagued with so many casting and directorial issues that I decided to report on what seems to be some positive news. According to IGN, Korean actor Kwon Sang-woo may be up for the role of Kato, the martial arts master and sidekick of the title character.

The Korea Times is speculating that Kwon Sang-woo has auditioned for the role recently vacated by Stephen Chow. They state that, “the actor recently passed an English audition (attended by Seth Rogen and Michel Gondry) for the part, and we’ll hear an official announcement next month.” The actor has already made a name for himself in his native country, where he’s had success in both television and film. If he does land the role of Kato in Green Hornet this will be his American film debut.

I’m happy that there’s some movement on the Kato front, because people are acting as if no one else besides Chow can play the character. I say give someone else a chance to shine!

What do you think of Kwon Sang-woo as a possible Kato in the Green Hornet?

Seth Rogen Speaks out About Green Hornet

Krystal Clark — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 17:15:32 +0000

In my opinion the entire development of Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg’s Green Hornet has been a disaster. The film’s release date has gotten the shuffle treatment several times, and one of its main stars have dropped out. So in the recent wake of Stephen Chow’s exit as Kato, people are wondering what the hell is going on over there. Over at First Showing, they’ve gotten several updates regarding the films status, including some choice words from it’s lead actor, Rogen.

Rumors have been swirling that this movie is dead in the water, but Rogen is stating the exact opposite. “We’re building sets,” Rogen says. “There’s more people working on the film every day! They traditionally don’t spend millions and millions of dollars on movies that are dead.” Even though that is true, you can’t deny the problems that have been surrounding this film from day one. Mostly, the animosity stems from fans of the old TV series, and the late great Bruce Lee. The character of Kato is sacred to some people being that it was the role that exposed Lee to a larger American audience. Now that Chow is out we’re kind of wondering what’s next?

“In my head, we lost Stephen Chow in April, so it’s something I’ve had a lot of time to wrap my head around.” They’re currently meeting with “many, many people from all over the globe” to find a replacement Kato.

As you can see they’re attempting to make this film work, regardless of the roadblocks put in it’s way. Rogen is excited to be working with director Michel Gondry, who is mostly known for his visually awkward, but still innovative filmmaking.

“We’re encouraging him to make it as visually exciting and inventive as anything anyone has ever seen. We’re fans of these types of movies when they’re done well. We think that we can handle the story and the script and the dialogue, but we know nothing about cameras and lights and fancy ways of making things look amazing. And that’s what he’s better at than anyone in the world pretty much. So we’re encouraging him to really go for it.”

So what do you people think? Should they keep going with this thing or what? This isn’t the first time a movie production has lost cast members and directors. Both happened during the filming of The Wizard of Oz, but then again…..that was the Wizard of Oz, this is Green Hornet.

What do you think about Green Hornet still moving forward? Should everyone just stop while they’re ahead?

Stephen Chow Exits Green Hornet

Anet Hovhanesian — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 21:01:36 +0000

Not only was Stephen Chow set to direct the movie The Green Hornet but he was going to play the character Kato in the film as well. The film is about a newspaper publisher who turns into a masked superhero (Green Hornet) and fights crime at nights. Chow would have play edthe martial arts expert by the superhero’s side. Kato. First Chow backed out of directing the film, and now he has dropped out of the project all together. According to Superherohype.com, Chow has exited the film due to scheduling conflicts.

Here is what the studio had to say about Chow’s exit:

“There was a mutual and amicable decision by both sides to move on…We are out now to cast a new Kato and remain fully committed to Michel Gondry’s exciting vision for the film, which will begin production this September.”

The movie which stars Seth Rogen is set to be released on July 9th of 2010.

Who do you think will play Kato now?

Stephen Chow Drops Out of Green Hornet Movie

Krystal Clark — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 00:30:23 +0000

If you’re surprised by this latest casting update, you must not have been following the Green Hornet adaptation that closely. The film originally had Chinese star Stephen Chow set to direct and co-star as the title character’s famous sidekick, Kato. He then decided to opt out of the directors chair due to “creative differences,” and the position was passed on to Michel Gondry. At this point he was still loosely attached to star as Kato, but over at First Showing, they’re confirming that Chow has officially dropped out of the film all together.

Sources are reporting that Chow decided to leave the Green Hornet project due to scheduling conflicts. This past year has been a bumpy ride for the film that initially began as a pet project for screenwriters Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg. It’s release has been shuffled several times, and there’s not a set date for when production will actually begin. The actor could no longer wait for Hornet to get it’s act together so he decided to move on.

I’m not surprised that Chow opted to leave the film. He didn’t sound like he was 100 percent invested in the first place. Sure he would have been a great Kato, but obviously it wasn’t meant to be. There’s nothing wrong with casting an unknown actor in a major film. It’s less expensive, and it gives audiences exposure to someone new. Chow isn’t the only Asian actor in the world, perhaps producers need to expand their options. When was the last time a completely unknown Asian actor got a big break in an American film? Was it Jet Li in Lethal Weapon 4? That was 11 years ago, give someone else a chance!

What do you think about Stephen Chow leaving the Green Hornet adaptation? Who could replace him as Kato?

Michel Gondry to Direct Green Hornet

Krystal Clark — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 19:30:35 +0000

Oh, the drama that surrounds a comedy. The big screen adaptation of The Green Hornet was beginning to become one of those avid “in development” projects we constantly hear about. It’s production has been plagued with issues, most notably the rocky involvement of Stephen Chow. Chow was set to direct and star as Kato alongside Seth Rogen for the film, but he soon dropped out as director due to the usual “creative differences.” Now another unconventional director is attached to helm the action comedy, and according to Variety it’s Michel Gondry.

The Green Hornet will be a definite change of pace for Gondry who typically directs more off beat pieces than anything. He’s the man behind Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Science of Sleep, and Human Nature. I’m interested to see what will happen when he steps onto that set. There are a lot of different personalities involved with making this film. Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg wrote the script. Stephen Chow, an established actor and director in his own right will costar, and now Gondry. Very interesting indeed.

The Green Hornet is set for release on June 25, 2010.

What do you think about this latest development in The Green Hornet Saga? How do you feel about Michel Gondry directing the film?

Round Up: Charlie’s Angels 3, Green Hornet, Next Batman Sequel

Krystal Clark — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 16:00:27 +0000

Here are some of the top stories that you may have missed over the weekend……

Charlie’s Angel’s 3 is on it’s way! Co-star and producer Drew Barrymore is trying to get a third installment of the Charlie’s Angel’s franchise off the ground. Barrymore stated,”I’m so into it, they’re hard movies to make, but they’re fun.”[E! Online]
Dakota Fanning has confirmed her interest in the Twilight sequel New Moon. We reported earlier that there were rumors that the actress auditioned for the part of a vampire named Jane. Fanning herself has stated that she hopes the role works out, because she’s a huge fan. [Shocktillyoudrop]
The Green Hornet may be dead in the water. According to close sources, ever since the departure of Stephen Chow as director, the Hornet project has been on shaky ground. It’s said to be “highly unlikely” that the film will even shoot this year. [ComingSoon]

Batman 3 in 2011? Executive producer Michael Uslan expect’s the Caped Crusader to make another appearance on the big screen in two years. As usual, he won’t reveal any details regarding the plot, or possible villains. [Superherohype]
See an exclusive clip from the upcoming sci-fi film Push. The film co-stars Chris Evans, Dakota Fanning, and Djimon Hounsou as reluctant superheroes. Think NBC’s Heroes, but on the big screen.[FilmSchoolRejects]

Chow Not Directing ‘Green Hornet’

Krystal Clark — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 16:12:42 +0000

In a typical Hollywood move, Stephen Chow has opted not to direct the big screen movie version of the classic TV series The Green Hornet. According to Variety, Chow exited the position over “creative differences.” I wonder what those differences were? Did he want to make the movie good, and take it beyond its campy roots? We may never know.

More on The Green Hornet after the jump.

Chow, who directed and starred in “Kung Fu Hustle” and “Shaolin Soccer,” signed in September to direct the film and play the role originated in the TV series by Bruce Lee.

The film was scripted by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, and Rogen is starring as the masked crime fighter.

I hope they don’t mess this one up for Bruce’s sake. He’s probably doing aerial kicks in his grave over all this.

Interview: Seth Rogen for “Zach and Miri Make a Porno”

Artie — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 01:39:35 +0000

To say that Seth Rogen had a very good ‘07-‘08 run would be a gross understatement. No other actor under thirty, save for Michael Cera, has crashed the spotlight so readily. Knocked Up literally put his face all over town, but then he unleashed the perverse, endearing Superbad (as brilliant as Cera’s work is, the point still goes to Rogen), and built a cache of action cred in Pineapple Express.

Now Hollywood has been desperately trying to categorize him. But they’re wrong. He’s not the new Will Ferrell. He sure as hell isn’t the new Chevy Chase, and if his ballsy upcoming slate says anything, it’s that the studios are slowly but surely figuring that out.

Rogen talks with Screencrave about his personal stake in Zack and Miri Make a Porno, why audiences should look past the title, and why they should be ready to see a whole lot more of him. Figuratively speaking.

The first thing to notice is that the Seth Rogen doing interviews looks nothing like Zack (probably on your TV right now thanks to the marketing blitz). The beard and gut are gone, and don’t think he hasn’t noticed other people pointing it out.

“Yeah, yeah, I know the implication,” Rogen shoots back to a remark on his newly-svelte appearance.

“I’ve been eating well and dieting. It’s such a lame answer, No one wants to hear that. Yeah, I’ve been exercising. I hate it. I hate what I’ve become.” And Rogen signals it’s okay to laugh with his own guttural heh-heh-heh.

The subject turned to the marketing of the movie, a small bit of controversy involving the MPAA, and the stick figures that are the sole portion of the American print campaign. Rogen doesn’t share all of the frustrations of director Kevin Smith.

“It’s good! I like it, I think it’s a funny ad. It looks startlingly like me.”

Better than the head shots?

“Yeah, I don’t feel the urge to get my face up there, no way,” Rogen shuddered, assuming the question referred to the campaign for Knocked Up, rather than the blatant oral implications of the international poster.

“Oh, no, that one is waaaay better. Canada got it right, yet again guys. Take your cues.”

Co-star Elizabeth Banks mentioned earlier that she was prepared to go fully nude because she knew Rogen would be on top of her.

“Yeah I cover a lot,” he laughed and continued, “ It wasn’t my decision [to go naked] but yeah, I was ready. I don’t know what his plan was. I was prepared to show up and ask ‘what are we doing today’ and [Smith responding] ‘today you’re pulling your dick out’ but he didn’t say that. He said, ‘hey, we’re going to shoot it like this.’ I said okay. I’m up for anything, I’m a team player.”

Was Smith as comfortable with onset lovemaking?

“He was a little awkward about it. Not bad. There wasn’t a ton of direction that day. It was very professional.” Rogen observed. He was also candid about the differences between working with Smith and longtime collaborator Judd Apatow.

“Well the movies are similar, in how they mix raunch with sweetness, but their styles onset are very different. It’s as simple as Judd not knowing what he wants, but he knows what he wants the scenes to be about. How the information comes out, what the jokes are, he discovers that while we’re shooting and Kevin is very specific. He knows what the shots are, he literally edits the movie, so that’s the fundamental difference. But [Kevin] is totally open to changing lines and changing jokes. There was a fair bit of improv there.

“They’re both great. They both have the things that make them more fun and more relaxing and things that make them a little more difficult. But I wouldn’t want to do only one [style of comedy] either way.”

Comparisons aside, being in a Kevin Smith movie was on Rogen’s to-do list long before he started picking up momentum.

“Yeah, that was always a goal of mine and it’s thrilling that it finally happened. I was very flattered, It was shocking he even knew who I was. We’d met very briefly before, but when someone who inspired you really wants to work with you, and have you do what you do in the first place is thrilling.”

As if he couldn’t have gotten any luckier, Rogen also starred alongside Elizabeth Banks. The rapport they started with The 40 Year Old Virgin grew into a rare onscreen chemistry at the heart of the buzz around Zack and Miri.

“She’s great! We’re friends, I think that helps. You can tell we really know each other. She also has a really dirty sensibility which is one of the reasons I thought she’d be good for Miri in the first place. And she wouldn’t sue me. I give her all the credit.

For women [sex] is a more emotionally driven act and for men it’s a more physically driven act and I think it’s as simple as that. [ZacK and Miri’s love scene] gets into that. They think one thing is going to happen and then emotions develop. It’s the unspoken love. I think a lot of people are friends and in love and it takes an event to bring that to the surface. In this movie that event is making a porno. It’s a very relatable premise, just brought to an [R-rated] place.

Good friends make better lovers?”

“That’s what I think. Absolutely. That’s why Superbad works.” Rogen quipped. He’s also been hearing himself cast as a “Romantic Nerd,” at the forefront of a cinematic trend in less-typically dashing male stars.

“I just try to do the movies I would like to go see, and romantic comedies if handled right can be a very great genre. That’s all the thought I put into it.”

Chances are that label will get crushed beneath the wave of fascinating (if not slightly risky) projects he has on the way, one of the most anticipated being Judd Apatow’s Funny People.

“We just started shooting, we’re three weeks in and it’s great. It’s me and Adam Sandler and Jonah Hill, Jason Scwartzman, Eric Bana, Leslie Mann, and a slew of stand-up comics and it’s been a lot of fun. I play a stand-up comic and Sandler plays a comic as well and it’s a really interesting movie.”

In what way?

“It’s a little heavier. Definitely in its subject matter. It deals with death in a lot of ways, an interesting mixture of penis jokes and death jokes. That’s new for us. And it’s a beauty! Janusz Kaminski is shooting it which is incredible to watch.” For those who don’t watch credits, Kaminski is currently Steven Spielberg’s cinematographer of choice.

“It’s great to see Janusz because people always say our movies don’t look good so now they can fucking shut up about it. Judd was like ‘how can we get people to shut about this?’ and he hired Janusz. He’s found ways of shooting our improv, he shoots with three cameras at once and it still looks beautiful. That’s really fun to watch.”

If that won’t alter moviegoers’ perceptions of Rogen then Observe and Report will. Director Jody Hill earned the admiration of Will Ferrell and Adam McKay with his twisted debut The Foot Fist Way.

“I think it’s amazing, I’m unbelievably proud about it. It’s a very dark dark comedy, like a comedic ‘Taxi Driver.’ That’s what we’re going for and they somehow let us do that. It’s a very edgy, dark, hilarious movie and probably one of my favorite if not the favorite movie I’ve ever been in. I can’t believe how balls-to-wall it is.”

And in March shooting begins on Rogen’s biggest gamble, a big screen take on tv superhero The Green Hornet.

“Stephen Chow is directing! He was always our first choice, and we like to consolidate our team so having a guy direct and play Kato is really nice. We love his movies, we’re huge fans and we think he’s hilarious and we got him!”

It’s true, they are excited, but with Chow on board what kind of movie are they making?

“We actually don’t know. Originally we were going for kind of a serious action movie, but we feel no obligation to live up to anything we’ve told any of you in the past.” Rogen deadpanned. The rumor was that Chow was in the Four Seasons hotel that day wrestling with that issue. The future Hornet welcomes the challenge.

“We’re really right now in the process of discovering what the tone is exactly. We know the story we want to tell, that’s going to be the same, but you don’t bring a guy like Stephen on and say ‘No! What are you doing? We don’t want your ideas!’ He is a genius, obviously, so it’d be stupid not to let him inject some of his own sensibilities.”

His zen attitude is a healthy approach considering that isn’t the only vague hurdle the project has to clear.

“The Green Hornet always just fought criminals. There were never any villainous characters, it was always men in suits. We’re taking that as our cue.”

At that point Rogen was informed that the press kit for Zack and Miri mentioned that Jason Mewes was in The Green Hornet. This was news to Rogen.

“It Does?? Uh, maybe, I dunno. We’ll let him go for it. But… no. That is not official.”

Regarding the release of the much-delayed Fanboys, Rogen’s take is, “I’ll believe it when I see it.”

Not that he needs the exposure. Currently demand is high, and Rogen admits he has been fortunate to avoid financial situations as dire as his onscreen counterpart.

“[Early on] No, it was never that bad. I did have to punch up a Hilary Duff movie, once.”

And if he did make a post-Jade Caruso-like dive into obscurity, Rogen wouldn’t rule out making a porno to make ends meet, being a fan of the “down and dirty stuff.”

“I honestly don’t know who would see it, but…maybe, yeah! I’ve thought about it, yeah. I’ve worked with porn stars in literally every single movie I’ve been in, so it was not weird to work with them [in Zach and Miri], it was par for the course. To me you need a porn star on set, just to make the film.”

So who would be the co-star of the Rogen sex tape?

“I would choose Jonah Hill.”

And the porno moniker would be? Pet’s name first, street name last?

“Alowishus St. James.”

Sure to get a boost in promotional sales from Zack and Miri is a male masturbation aid called the Fleshlight, an item Zach mistakenly spends his last few dollars on. One would assume they’d come knocking for an endorsement.

“No! I don’t think they are. I don’t think they exist.”

They exist, alright.

“They do? Really? They didn’t even send me a free one. What ya gotta do?”

So which legendary Hollywood director, in the fictional porn auteur’s mind, would make the best porno flick?

“I’d like to see a Cassavetes porno. It’d be really real, really raw porno.” Rogen laughs.

“And he’d put his whole family in it.”

Zack and Miri Make a Porno glides into theatres October 31st

ScreenCrave.com » Stephen Chow

Does Green Hornet Have a New Kato?

Related Posts

Seth Rogen Speaks out About Green Hornet

Related Posts

Stephen Chow Exits Green Hornet

Related Posts

Stephen Chow Drops Out of Green Hornet Movie

Related Posts

Michel Gondry to Direct Green Hornet

Related Posts

Round Up: Charlie’s Angels 3, Green Hornet, Next Batman Sequel

Related Posts

Chow Not Directing ‘Green Hornet’

Related Posts

Interview: Seth Rogen for “Zach and Miri Make a Porno”

Related Posts