He Knows Where He's Been

Image credit: David James

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Michelle's character Velma tries to seduce Wilbur Turnblad, Edna's husband. Which gives us a great musical comedy scene between Chris Walken and Michelle. That plot point is not in any previous version, is it?
ADAM SHANKMAN: The scene existed in [our] script, but not as a musical scene. And Michelle had been asking for another number. To be perfectly honest, Michelle wanted something of her own. On the way back from that meeting with her, I was wringing my hands. God, what could it be? There's no place, there's no place. So I said, Why don't we just musicalize the [seduction] scene, and repeat [the song] ''Big Blonde and Beautiful''?

Which is initially Queen Latifah's song, as Motormouth Maybelle.
That reprise was my idea. It involved a lot of collaboration between me and [composer/co-lyricist] Marc [Shaiman] and [co-lyricist] Scott [Wittman]. It was Marc's idea to bring Edna into it too, and to go back and forth between Edna and Velma. That made it even more visual.

And Michelle gets a great chance to dance as Velma in the song ''Miss Baltimore Crabs,'' where in flashback she looks eerily young.
Velma never dances in the play. She doesn't dance that much in the ''Blonde'' reprise. But I've made her very dance-y in ''Baltimore Crabs.'' It's a musicalization of the entire Corny Collins Show audition scene, so it doesn't cut back and forth, it's all part of the same thing. She looks fabulous.

Now about that fat suit on Travolta. Why so extreme with the jowls and the flabby arms and legs? Does Edna really need to be so elephantine?
If you're going to celebrate size, you show it. You should see Edna's big heavy arms and her big, dimpled knees. John's commitment is incredible. Four hours minimum in makeup, and then to get out there in a dress that weighs another 30 pounds?

But he doesn't move like it weighs on him.
Edna's big, but she's very dainty. Light on her feet.

What if John Travolta had gone all method, and said, I'm gonna do this like Robert De Niro in Raging Bull. I'm going to actually gain a whole bunch of weight.
I would have said, I'd like to know how you're going to gain the breasts. There's a limit to what you can actually grow. And lose. Although actually, with modern medicine, you never know.

Was Billy Crystal ever an active prospect to play Edna before Travolta, when you came aboard?
He was just a discussion. He was somebody who I'd met with and talked to and he was into it. And then for a variety of reasons, mostly having to do with being tired from doing his one-man show [700 Sundays], it just didn't work out.

Did John Travolta worry about taking on a role that was already so closely identified with two other performers?
Divine did a magnificent job. Harvey got in there and created a fabulous performance with a voice that's like a foghorn...[but] for this to work in our movie, it can't be drag. And you can't be thinking it's John, either. It needs to be a woman. John is a walking target on this one. I said to him, If you agree to do this, I look forward to being your touchstone. You're playing a woman in close-up. You don't have to play to the third balcony. I demanded a sense of intimacy from him. That's what pulls the audience in.

So how did you make sure it wasn't drag-ish?
We went through probably seven months figuring out the shape of John Travolta's face as Edna. We did a cast of John's entire body, because we had to build the [fat] suit. I spent days with 12 John heads in front of me, with different size faces. A lot of them had too much double chin. It got grotesque.

And I've heard on the set the bangs were a big deal?
John has an iconic face in close-up, and it was so important that you just lose John and see Edna. You have to completely think it's not John. If we took the bangs up, you could see, It's John. But make the bangs long, and it was Edna. When you take away his forehead, you take away John. John also wanted Edna to have a waist. That was a big deal for him, and very important to him. Like if Sophia Loren packed on 300 pounds.

What about his actual performance under all that makeup?
John's playing Edna as very fragile and phobic, but also funny. She's a shut-in. Self-conscious. Hasn't been out of the house in 11 years. She goes through moments of massive, horrible insecurity, and there had to be real fear on her face at times. I have her clutching things as Tracy tries to pull her out of the house. And I tried to make that both funny and true.