Special Note to Journalists: THE PRESTIGE is a

Special Note to Journalists:
THE PRESTIGE is a mystery structured as a cinematic magic trick.
In order to allow audiences to fully enjoy the unfolding of the story, the filmmakers
respectfully ask that you not reveal too much about the deceptions at the heart of the film.
THE PRESTIGE
ABOUT THE PRODUCTION
“We were two young men at the start of a great career.
Two young men devoted to an illusion.
Two young men who never intended to hurt anyone.”
—Alfred Borden, THE PRESTIGE
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ABOUT THE PRODUCTION
From acclaimed filmmaker
Christopher Nolan (“Memento,”
“Batman Begins”) comes an
innovative thriller woven out of the
stuff of illusions. In this twisting,
turning tale of urgent mystery, two
Victorian-era magicians spark a
powerful rivalry that builds into an
escalating battle of tricks and an
unquenchable thirst to uncover the
other’s trade secrets. As these two remarkable men pit daring against desire, showmanship against science
and ambition against friendship, the results are dangerous, deadly and definitely deceptive.
Their rivalry is brought to life by two of today’s most compelling screen stars: Tony Award winner
Hugh Jackman, beloved on screen for his portrayal of the feral Wolverine in “X-Men” and its sequels, and
Christian Bale, acclaimed for his intense performances including his recent turn as the Caped Crusader in
“Batman Begins.” Joining them is an exceptional cast of diverse characters portrayed by two-time Oscar®
winner Michael Caine, Golden Globe® nominee Scarlett Johansson, newcomer Rebecca Hall, rising
actress Piper Perabo, fantasy-film cult hero Andy Serkis and rock star David Bowie as the groundbreaking
electrical genius Nikola Tesla.
It all begins in rapidly changing, turn-ofthe-century London. At a time when
magicians are idols and celebrities of the
highest order, two young magicians set out to
carve their own paths to fame. The flashy,
sophisticated Robert Angier (HUGH
JACKMAN) is a consummate entertainer,
while the rough-edged purist Alfred Borden
(CHRISTIAN BALE) is a creative genius
who lacks the panache to showcase his
magical ideas. They start out as admiring
friends and partners. But when their biggest trick goes terribly awry, they become enemies for life—each
intent on outdoing and upending the other. Trick by trick, show by show, their ferocious competition
builds until it knows no bounds, even utilizing the fantastical new powers of electricity and the scientific
brilliance of Nikola Tesla—while the lives of everyone around them hang in the balance. Rife with sleightof-hand shocks and revelations, the film delves into a riveting world where the farthest, darkest edges of
faith, trust and the possible are probed.
THE PRESTIGE is directed by Christopher Nolan from a screenplay by Jonathan Nolan and
Christopher Nolan, based on the novel by Christopher Priest. The film is produced by Aaron Ryder, Emma
Thomas and Christopher Nolan. The executive producers are Charles J.D. Schlissel, Chris J. Ball, William
Tyrer, and Valerie Dean.
Creating a mysterious, yet vividly contemporary, portrait of the torch-lit heyday of London’s magic
scene is an accomplished behind-the-camera team that includes Oscar®-nominated cinematographer Wally
Pfister ASC, production designer Nathan Crowley and editor Lee Smith, A.C.E., all of whom also
collaborated with Nolan on “Batman Begins.” Joan Bergin, an Emmy® Award nominee for television’s
“David Copperfield,” designed the costumes.
THE PLEDGE, THE TURN, THE PRESTIGE
THE PLEDGE, THE TURN, THE PRESTIGE:
TURNING A MOVIE INTO A MAGIC TRICK AND VICE VERSA
According to Cutter, the magician’s ingeneur (one who designs illusions behind the scenes) played by
Michael Caine: “Every great magic trick consists of three acts. The first act is called The Pledge: the
magician shows you something ordinary, but of course, it probably isn’t. The second act is called The Turn.
The magician makes his ordinary something do something extraordinary. Now, if you’re looking for the
secret…you won’t find it. That’s why there’s a third act, called The Prestige. This is the part with the twists
and turns, where lives hang in the balance, and you see something shocking you’ve never seen before.”
Director Christopher Nolan uses these
same principles of carefully constructed
secrets and shocking moments of revelation
to unfold the winding, surprise-filled story of
dueling magicians Robert Angier and Alfred
Borden in THE PRESTIGE—an intricate
thriller in which mysteries abound, illusions
permeate every action, and nothing is quite
what it seems, except the primal human
emotions that drive an epic feud between two
ambitious men.
Nolan has already, with just a handful of
films, established himself as one of filmmaking’s most creative minds, and one with a striking ability to
evoke the mysterious and disorienting, whether in independent classics or major action blockbusters. He
first came to prominence after his promising debut, “Following,” with “Memento,” the ingenious,
backwards-moving thriller about a desperate man trying to avenge his wife’s murder while suffering from
the loss of all short-term memory. Lauded as a cinematic masterpiece that played with notions of time,
space and subjective reality, “Memento” continues to confound audiences and is now studied by film
students. Nolan went on to cut his teeth on a bigger thriller, a remake of the Norwegian noir film
“Insomnia,” in a fresh version starring Al Pacino, Robin Williams and Hilary Swank, which once again
took the audience on a dizzying journey into crime and fear. He then made another leap, this time into
superhero territory, tackling “Batman Begins,” which unveiled the untold origins of the Dark Knight’s
emergence as the savior of Gotham City. The film was hailed as one of the most original and engaging of
all superhero movies and went on to worldwide acclaim, the rare summer box-office blockbuster that met
with equal critical success.
Now, it seemed that Nolan was the perfect person to tackle material as intricate and unconventionally
entertaining as THE PRESTIGE.
Says producer Emma Thomas: “Traditionally, I think filmmakers have avoided the subject of magic
because there is this feeling that if you’re not seeing it live that it’s too easy to get the wool pulled over your
eyes. But Chris started with the idea that movies are already a kind of magic trick—and instead of
concentrating on the magic shows themselves, the story is all about what happens behind the scenes in the
lives of two driven magicians who are devoted to and obsessed with creating the most baffling illusions.”
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THE PLEDGE, THE TURN, THE PRESTIGE
The film’s genesis began just after Nolan directed “Memento.” Around that same time, executive
producer Valerie Dean read and fell madly in love with Christopher Priest’s acclaimed novel The
Prestige—and immediately knew that amidst its complex blend of history and science fiction, its tale of
an out-of-control magical rivalry would make for an original film.
Dean gave the book to Nolan, who was equally intrigued. “The book created a terrific relationship
between the narrative form of the novel and the techniques and ideas used by magicians to fool you and
engage you in deception—and I felt the exciting thing about making a film of The Prestige would be to
find the cinematic equivalent,” Nolan says. “There’s quite a strong relationship between what magicians
do and what filmmakers do. The filmmaker is very similar to a magician in the way we release
information—what we tell the audience and when—and how we draw the audience in through certain
points of view. We use our own techniques, blind alleys and red herrings, to fool the audience and,
hopefully, to create a satisfying payoff. With THE PRESTIGE, there was an opportunity to really play with
these concepts right before the audience’s eyes.”
Nolan in turn asked producer Aaron Ryder of Newmarket Films to obtain the rights. After his
experience on “Memento,” Ryder trusted that Nolan would create something distinctive with THE
PRESTIGE. “He’s a truly gifted storyteller,” says the producer. “Chris was born to direct movies. I feel
his films are some of the best films being made today and I just loved the idea that he wanted to make
this film to be a magic trick in and of itself.”
Meanwhile, the director approached his brother Jonathan about joining him in tackling the massive
task of adapting Priest’s intricate novel, composed in part of confessional diaries, into a suspenseful
screenplay. Having previously worked together on “Memento”—which Christopher Nolan adapted from
Jonathan Nolan’s time-shifting short story—Jonathan was intrigued by the prospect of doing something
equally challenging, yet entirely different.
This time around, the fun would be in trying to write a movie as an illusion—one that would dazzle,
deceive and ultimately surprise the audience. “The movie definitely had to function as a magic trick,”
Jonathan says. But that concept left him in entirely unexplored territory. He continues: “When I started
writing, I had a bunch of different classic movies in mind that I thought I might pay homage to, but after
I was done, I realized that I’d never seen anything quite like this one before.”
He began by paring through the onion-like layers of Priest’s novel. “The book is a very complicated,
very ambitious, sweeping epic with tons of ideas—and it took me about 18 months to figure out how to
cut it down into something that resembles a film,” Jonathan comments. “I had to find the structure, which
was tricky, because the story is so complexly interwoven. What we came up with is a three-part flashback
structure based on this idea of the three-part
structure of a magic trick.”
Utilizing that three-part structure—
comprised of The Pledge, The Turn and The
Prestige—helped the Nolans cut to the core
of why people have always been so fascinated
by magic. “A lot of it turns on this idea that
Chris and I were fascinated by: that the
audience for a magic show knows that what
they’re about to see is a trick,” Jonathan
explains. “If they actually thought a woman
was going to be sawn in half, they would be
very upset, and definitely not amused. So they know it’s a trick but they also want to feel fooled, so that’s
why that third act, or The Prestige, is so important. The real world is rigid, there’s not a lot of mystery to
it, but people don’t want that to be the case—and that’s where magic comes in. If we’ve got all the rules
figured out and this is the way the world works, where you get a job, save your money and then die—well,
who wants to live in that world? I think we all would prefer that the universe have some surprises, some
tricks up its sleeve.”
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Along the way, Jonathan Nolan delved into researching the secretive world of gifted magicians. This
became especially revealing when he met with some of the most shadowy figures in that already shadowy
realm—the ingeneurs who come up with wild ideas for never-before-seen tricks behind the scenes.
“They’re fascinating figures who eschew the limelight, and for a screenwriter, there’s something very
familiar about that,” he laughs. “The attraction is that they get to pull all the strings.”
In researching magic’s illustrious past, Nolan also gained insight into why that grand legacy has faded
into today’s Vegas acts. “I think part of it is that now there are hundreds of different versions of magic out
there but we don’t call them magic. We have television, video games, movies—they’re all spectacles that
you can disappear into just as one used to do at a Victorian magic show,” he says.
THE PRESTIGE heads into many unexpected directions, including having its two main stars—Hugh
Jackman and Christian Bale—morph from heroes to anti-heroes and back again. Jonathan always intended
for the audience to choose sides. “I think you can’t really watch the movie without choosing an allegiance.
But whoever you’re rooting for, the idea is that you’re likely to start questioning it by the film’s end,”
explains the writer. Yet Jonathan himself doesn’t hold a special loyalty to one character or the other. “I like
both Angier and Borden,” he says. “To me, they’re flip sides of the same coin, two complementary halves
of one person.”
As he wrote, Nolan never shied away from letting the audience draw their own conclusions about all
that is going on in the raging battle between Angier and Borden. “I love contentious stuff,” he admits.
“Chris and I still argue about aspects of ‘Memento’ and we’ve had arguments about THE PRESTIGE as
well. I think if you get to the point where people are sitting around a table arguing about what your movie
means, then you’ve done your job as a writer.”
After Jonathan wrote an initial draft of the screenplay with Christopher’s creative involvement,
Christopher then jumped in with his own draft. The unique working relationship between the brothers has
always involved one sparking the creativity of the other. Jonathan has his own theory for why they
complement each other so well. “I’ve always suspected that it has something to do with the fact that he’s
left-handed and I’m right-handed,” he remarks, “because he’s somehow able to look at my ideas and flip
them around in a way that’s just a little bit more twisted and interesting. It’s great to be able to work with
him like that.”
Emma Thomas was dazzled by the
completed screenplay. “When I read the
book, I knew it was going to make a great
movie—I just didn’t quite know how!” she
laughs. “There were so many different
elements to the story, but Jonathan and Chris
were able to distill it all while keeping the fun
of magic and the excitement of this unusual
world alive and keeping the focus on all these
fascinating characters. Every role had
something juicy about it.”
Aaron Ryder was equally impressed. “The
story plays with deception, identity and obsession,” he says. “In much the same way that ‘Memento’
pushed the envelope, I believe on a grander scale, the same could be said for THE PRESTIGE. I truly
think that it’s innovative in that same way. Jonathan and Chris adapted a very complicated book into a
tension-filled thriller. It’s rare to see a film deviate so far from the source material yet still remain true to
the story and the theme.”
BACK TO THE 20TH CENTURY’S FUTURE:
NOLAN TAKES A FRESH LOOK AT THE GREAT VICTORIAN AGE OF MAGIC
THE PRESTIGE emerges amidst an intriguing period rarely explored on film—the Golden Age of
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magic at the turn of the century. It was the ultimate era for magicians as they pioneered the nascent
beginnings of mass entertainment. On the cusp of a new industrial society, the public was obsessed with
the very concept of magical occurrences—whether on the stage or in the life-changing technological
advances and scientific secrets of the universe unfolding before them. In this atmosphere, the best and
boldest of magicians became huge, headline acts across Europe and the U.S. While few other than Harry
Houdini, who began performing in 1899, are remembered today, back then numerous talented magicians
had the chance to become household names and international idols.
“Magicians were essentially the rock stars
of their day,” observes Hugh Jackman, who
plays Angier, the charismatic front man who
will stop at nothing to attain superstar status.
“It was very different from today in that a lot
of the magic back then seemed truly deathdefying to audiences and it seemed there was
a lot of danger because something could go
wrong at any moment. It was a fantastic time
for that new kind of shocking theater which
preceded modern entertainment.”
Indeed, the times seemed to be magical
themselves, especially with the coming of one of the biggest revolutionary changes in human history:
electricity. “Electricity must have really felt like magic to those who didn’t understand it yet,” observes
producer Emma Thomas. With mechanical objects suddenly able to come to life, the public became
fascinated with such mystical subjects as the afterlife, spiritualism and anything that seemed to defy the
rational imagination.
But while the Victorian era is yet another layer in the unfolding of THE PRESTIGE, the last thing
Christopher Nolan wanted to do was make a typically constrained, demure period movie. “The Victorian
Era is often mischaracterized as stuffy and repressive—when it was actually an incredibly exciting time
in human development,” he explains. “You had the second Industrial Revolution, the birth of electricity,
the birth of cinema, the start of widespread
international travel and science being turned
on its head by new theories. You also had the
beginnings of mass advertising with
billboards and posters. It was a period of
great adventurousness with changes that are
still being felt today.”
To capture this literally electrifying,
alternate vision of Victorian times, Nolan
wanted to depict the era in a way that would
come off to audiences as dynamic, immediate
and new. “Every creative choice is opposed to
the way period movies are usually done,” explains Thomas. “Wally Pfister shot the film with mostly
handheld cameras with enormous energy, and the characters are brought to life by the actors with a very
contemporary feeling. The background details are all fairly realistic, but Chris has made it so that period
doesn’t really matter anywhere near as much as the story.”
Christopher Nolan continues: “I wanted to be accurate to the feeling rather than the details of the period.
I think it was one of the first times in which the world felt overwhelmed with visual information. Posters
were everywhere, text was everywhere, and there was a lot of imagery assaulting people as they walked
down the streets, exceeding even what we have today. So that’s the view we give of Victorian London—one
that feels very contemporary and immediate, and I think one that lends a more authentic feeling to what it
would be like to be living then. There’s something about a lot of period films that allows the audience to sit
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at a remove from the characters. But we wanted to dive into this world in a direct way so it was very
important to use the camerawork and production design to bring the audience deeper inside.”
Above all, Nolan wanted the film’s multiple layers to be accessible to the audience, inviting them not
only into the two main characters’ stunning fall from grace but into the very workings of the narrative.
“We wanted the audience to be aware of the effect the film is having on them as it is unfolding before their
eyes,” he summarizes.
Despite the design complexities, from the beginning the idea was also to shoot the film in as pareddown and fast-paced a manner as possible. “Coming off of the hugeness of ‘Batman Begins,’ we thought
it would be great to be light on our feet and as stripped-down as we possibly could be,” says Emma
Thomas. “It gave us a tremendous amount of energy.” That energy was parlayed into creativity once
production moved into full swing. Notes Christian Bale of Nolan: “Chris really understands movie visuals.
He has an iron trap of a mind and knows exactly what he wants to see on the screen. Then, because of
that, he’s able to let others really fly and be very spontaneous.”
Nolan collaborated closely on the visual front with cinematographer Wally Pfister, who first worked
with Nolan on “Memento,” went on to shoot “Insomnia” and garnered an Academy Award® nomination
for his work on “Batman Begins.” “Chris and I have a great collaborative relationship with each other and
a great friendship as well,” says Pfister. “There is not another director I could name that I have the same
level of respect for. He’s not only on top of every element of the film, from the photography to the set
dressing, he’s just a great storyteller and, for me, that’s where it begins.”
Nolan came to Pfister with a precise vision. “There’s a distinct relationship between the style of the
film and the style of the narrative, and that was something I was quite specific about,” says the director.
“We did most of the photography with a handheld camera so that it’s always at eye level, engaged directly
with the characters, while the narrative itself is quite clearly above the characters.”
Nolan continues: “Through framing devices and so forth, we allow the audience to shift between
multiple points of view. So the audience is sort of seeing a lot of things that the characters themselves
aren’t necessarily seeing. They’re getting the complete picture. And I thought that would create a very
interesting tension between the more subjective sort of storytelling that I’ve done in the past and the
traditional omniscient position that audiences are used to in action thrillers.”
Pfister’s lighting schemes helped to lend the film the dynamic, modern edge that Nolan was seeking.
“We use a lot of natural light to really give a sense of immediacy and a tactile quality to each scene and
location,” explains Nolan. Pfister and Nolan also wanted to use the anamorphic lenses that have lent their
previous films together a distinctive style—but this came with a price. “This is the fourth film we’ve shot
together with Panavision Anamorphic lenses. It’s a beautiful, crisp, grain-free image and there’s nothing
else that really looks that way on the screen,” notes Pfister. “But the cameras weigh about 60 pounds, so
my shoulders really took a pounding!”
Throughout, Nolan and Pfister went after a more handmade, old-school aesthetic—emphasizing
organic camera movements and minimalist opticals over elaborate effects. Explains Pfister: “Chris and I
wanted to really minimize the technical and equipment idea of this picture. We followed as much as
possible the sort of notion that you just put the camera on your shoulder and run in there and capture the
scene. It was a very exciting way to shoot for all of us—for me, for Chris and for the actors, who were
freed of the usual technical restrictions. It actually put me much more in the storytelling process than if I
had been sitting back by a monitor with someone else operating the camera and was much more efficient
and spontaneous. It’s a liberating, unconventional way to shoot and it gives the film a naturalistic style
that makes it very different from how any other period film has been captured in our current era.”
This “old school” approach extended even further in that Nolan and Pfister eschewed the now-standard
Digital Intermediate, the phase in which a motion picture is scanned into a computer so that the
filmmakers can use digital tools to manipulate colors and other image characteristics. Instead, THE
PRESTIGE utilized traditional photochemical printing in which color grading is achieved simply by
exposing the film to varying degrees of light. “We wanted to make the film in the most organic way,”
continues Pfister. “For what we were looking for, the photochemical process gave us the perfect amount
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of control and also preserved the integrity of the anamorphic negative.”
Pfister felt that the ultimate goal was to produce an unprocessed facsimile of the darkly imaginative
images that swirl around in Nolan’s brain. Observes the cinematographer: “Chris had his eye on every
element that went into this film, from the first words on the page to the final color timing that we did
together—and all along, he’s trying to get the movie out there as he saw it in his head long before pen even
went to paper.”
When it came to palette, Pfister also allowed his color and texture decisions to develop organically,
emerging from the radical changes of the times. “A lot of the palette is dictated by the fact that the film’s
timeline is riding the cusp of the beginning of electricity, which obviously becomes part of the story as
well. So in a lot of the earlier scenes, we’re using candlelight and oil light, and then later on, we introduce
electricity in a grand way, and then we introduce electrical lights in some of the locations as well. So you
have lot of orange and yellow in the candle-lit and oil-lit scenes and kind of a green moonlight effect
mixed with the orange gas lamps for the night scenes. Throughout, I tried to move towards a different look
and mood than I’d seen in period pieces before.”
The night scenes were especially vital to the film’s mysterious moods. “What I hope we’ve done with
the night lighting is to create a dark, dingy and grungy London, where there’s smoke and soot and the
buildings are dirty. Chris and I have shied away from smoke on previous films, but it’s another visual tool
we’re using to make this picture different in
tone and atmosphere,” he says.
For Nolan, this grungy look was essential.
“I think there’s often too great a tendency in
films to try to clean up the past, to make it
look neater and tidier that it was, so I felt it
was appropriate to really mess up that kind of
world, to shake it up and have it really coming
apart at the seams.”
This same philosophy was woven into the
production design as well. “We wanted to get
massive amounts of texture into each setting
so it had the same kind of density as the real world we live in today,” says Nolan.
The task fell to Nathan Crowley, who worked with Nolan previously on “Batman Begins” and
“Insomnia.” Crowley created some 68 diverse sets for THE PRESTIGE, helping to forge the anythingcan-happen atmosphere of the Victorian theaters where Angier and Borden launch their epic feud. From
the first time he read the script, Crowley’s head was spinning with ideas. “THE PRESTIGE is a great
mixture of drama with sci-fi, history, horror and more—it crosses all the boundaries,” he says. “We
weren’t setting out to make a strict period film, so we forged a sort of ‘Victorian Modernism’ that has a
real edge to it.”
Crowley began with research, poring in libraries over photographic reference books of 1890s London
to get a sense of the mood and feel. Like Nolan, Crowley was taken aback by the sheer visual
bombardment of a city that, despite lacking radio, film and television, was lined with all manner of visual
advertising. “The streets were littered with advertising, and that was something surprising to me,” says
Crowley. “It really was the start of mass media in a way, so we wanted to capture that sense of chaos and
speed. Another thing I wanted to emphasize was the coming of automation. There is always something
mechanized in the images of the film, giving that sense of constant momentum.”
Crowley and Nolan next began tinkering around with models, a method of working out creative ideas
they had developed earlier. “On ‘Batman Begins,’ we had started building models in Chris Nolan’s garage,
and it was really successful, so we decided to do that again. It was just me and him alone in the garage,
trying to find the feel of the film,” recalls Crowley.
One of Crowley’s favorite touches in the bustling metropolis of a newly modern London is the horsedrawn double-decker buses bearing Vaudeville show posters on their side panels. Bringing them to life,
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however, required ingenuity. “We had to build this stuff from scratch without a lot of resources, so we used
old Western wagons and basically turned them into buses! I think they really define the streets of London
in that era, so I was very happy with the way they came out,” he says.
Crowley found an ally in his search for turn-of-the-century magic posters: magic consultant, Ricky Jay,
had an astonishing collection. He also visited David Copperfield’s museum in Las Vegas and surveyed
book after book of 19th-century posters. “In those days, magicians always had a poster for their new acts
so we created print lithographs for each of Angier’s and Borden’s shows,” he notes. “A lot of the posters
of that time were comical, with devils behind the shoulder of the illusionist. Our earlier posters do have a
more lighthearted feel, but as they get deeper
in their battle, the posters take on a more
intense, Black Magic feeling.”
When it came to recreating the Victorian
Age theatres, Crowley veered away from the
de-saturated, shades of grey he used for the
external city and dove into brilliant colors—
reflecting the idea that life seemed to take on
a vibrancy like nowhere else inside these
spaces. The multilevel theater designs, which
feature attics, staircases and basements—
where steam-powered hydraulics help to pull
off some of the large-scale mechanical magic tricks—were also influenced by the mathematical art of
M.C. Escher, who often uses visual illusions to profound effect in his drawings.
Another favorite set, especially for Christopher Nolan, was Borden’s workshop, where the obsessive
magician tests his illusions. To get a better sense of what a magician’s shop looks like, Crowley
investigated the workshop of Houdini, among others. “They are sort of like furniture workshops except
that they are filled with magic props and all kinds of mechanical machines,” observes Crowley. He forged
a warm, sprawling space filled to the brim with all kinds of unusual and unexpected objects.
Crowley also created dozens of turn-of-the-century urban locales—from dark bars and dank prisons to
the stark courtroom where Borden stands trial. But the pièce de résistance for Crowley was the futuristic
machine Tesla builds for Angier, which Angier in turn hopes will create the most incredible magic trick
ever witnessed. Crowley wanted the machine to give a sense of scientific mastery, mechanism and
industrialization all at once—so for inspiration, he turned to issues of 1890s-era Scientific American to
see what kinds of unusual inventions were being proposed at the time.
When it came to recreating Tesla’s Colorado Springs laboratory, Crowley stayed close to the ample
historical record, including building a life-sized
version of the famous Tesla Coil. “Tesla is the
only real historical figure in the film, even
though he brings in a science-fiction element,
so we wanted to stay true to that,” says Crowley.
“At the same time, Tesla pushes the film out of
Victoriana and the Industrial Revolution and
takes it into science-fiction realms, which
made it all very interesting for me.”
Working closely with Crowley was
Special Effects Coordinator David Blitstein,
who helped create some of the film’s inventive mechanical gadgetry. This included the folding birdcages
that become a mirror of the film’s multidimensional structure and view of reality. “Dave created the most
amazing harness that fires and splits birdcages in half and pulls them up your arms so quickly that the eye
can’t see it,” says Crowley. “The interesting challenge was that we had all these sliding trick panels and
pistons that shoot things upwards—all the things that magicians secretly use—but the camera is always
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right on them, getting a level of detail the
audience wouldn’t usually see.”
Unlike on most films, Crowley continued
his work into post-production, consulting with
the visual effects team to make sure all their
fantastical additions would work seamlessly
with his designs. Yet, despite all the difficult
tasks he had to tackle, Crowley was grateful.
“Chris pushes me harder than any other
director I’ve worked with. He challenges me
constantly, which I really like,” he says.
The cast and crew were equally
appreciative of how Crowley’s sets helped to pull them deeper into the film’s realms of science, magic and
human ambition. “Nathan’s sets really bring you into this world that Angier and Borden live in. Walking
onto the sets was like being transported back to turn-of-the-century London,” says Aaron Ryder. “I really
can’t think of another film that looks like this one. It’s very unique in design and vision.”
The costumes of THE PRESTIGE, which also involve elements of illusion and deception, became
another vital element of the film’s intricate design. Here, Nolan collaborated with Ireland’s leading
costume designer, Joan Bergin, who has previously worked on such films as “Veronica Guerin,” “Laws of
Attraction” and “My Left Foot,” as well as garnering an Emmy® nomination for the television adaptation
of Charles Dickens’ “David Copperfield.”
Bergin had a vision right from the beginning for what she wanted. “It’s a look I would call
‘deconstructed Victorian,’” she says. “We took these images of Victorian clothing and then broke them
down into something more modern and simplified. In this film, it’s not about every detail of the clothes
being correct but trying to be very character-driven and really reveal the characters’ journeys through their
clothing. This is a sort of a Gothic thriller
with layer upon layer upon layer and I hope
the clothes help the audience follow the
characters through all the twists and turns of
the story.”
In choosing the look for each wholly
unique character, Bergin wound up on a
massive search that took her from collections
of 200-year-old dresses to more modern
designer interpretations of Victoriana. She
spent days roaming the endless racks of a
large costume house, searching for
inspiration among the hats, capes and extensive assemblage of vintage fabrics. As for palette, she shifted
away from the expected. “I’ve kept the palette quite simple, but it’s unusually dark, with lots of aubergine,
Chinese yellows and black and white—and sometimes looking through a mirror, you’ll see these very rich
colors with a kind of sheen to them that adds another layer to the mystery.”
The core of her work was dressing Angier and Borden—in all their varying and surprising
incarnations. To begin with, she wanted to break through the stereotype of the cheesy, overdressed
magician. “We have this image of Victorian magicians wearing big cloaks with stars on them, but if you
do the research, you find that, actually, they presented themselves as gentlemen, in a white bow tie and
jacket,” she explains. “They really were the rock stars of their day, so I took that a bit further with some
splashes of color and lovely fabrics for their waistcoats, especially as they get more and more famous.”
There was also a focus on contrasting the characters. She continues: “It was fun to work with Angier,
who is someone who is always very beautifully dressed, because Hugh just wears clothes so superbly well.
There’s such elegance to him and, as the film goes on, he just gets grander and grander. Then with
THE SHOWMAN
Christian Bale’s Borden, who is from the rough end of town and is sort of a self-made man, we use a more
kind of modern, grungier look, not at all old-fashioned.”
On the women’s side, Bergin was equally driven by character. “I wanted there to be sympathy for Sarah
Borden, and Rebecca Hall, who plays her, looks absolutely glorious in period clothes, so I really went out
of my way to show her as someone who has a very simple but wonderful fashion sense. We wanted to
emphasize the feeling that she might have become someone else except for her circumstances,” she
explains. “What’s interesting is that some of her skirts could easily be from Marc Jacobs or others putting
out collections now—you can see how they take inspiration from that era.”
As for Scarlett Johansson’s Olivia, Bergin took a lot of pleasure in working with the actress. “It takes
a very particular figure to wear Victorian clothes, and Scarlett has the perfect form. Hers are some of my
favorite costumes because I tried to design a kind of modern, sexy, foxy interpretation of what a woman
in the theater would wear at that time. It allowed me to be quite inventive.”
The actors were further inspired by Bergin’s work. “Her clothes
completely change your whole demeanor,” muses Rebecca Hall. “I’m
normally a sort of slouchy person, but when I put on these outfits, I
felt like the most prim and proper lady.” Scarlett Johansson, on the
other hand, was thrilled to play a different sort of Victorian lady. “My
character is a bohemian, so I didn’t have to wear those tight, lacy
collars and bustles. Olivia has a more unconventional wardrobe,
which was very exciting to me.”
In dressing David Bowie as Nikola Tesla, Bergin took to heart
what she had seen said of the maverick scientist—that he always
looked like he was going to the opera. “He was impeccably turned
out, so we gave Bowie a cashmere coat with a lamb’s-wool collar that
really suggests this very elegant, brilliant man who was beaten down
by minds who could never aspire to his heights,” she explains.
For Christopher Nolan, the hope was that all the elements of THE
PRESTIGE would come together like the pieces of a provocative
puzzle. “I like films that continue to spin your head in all sorts of different directions after you’ve seen
them,” the director concludes. “I hope people walk away from this story feeling very entertained but also
with all kinds of resonances and interesting thoughts banging around in their brains.”
THE SHOWMAN:
HUGH JACKMAN IS ROBERT ANGIER
In this time when magicians were the
great entertainers of their age, no one else can
rivet an audience with the charm and pizzazz
of the consummate showman Robert Angier.
But when a stage tragedy strikes close to
Angier’s heart, it pushes him to invent his
greatest trick ever, one that will take him into
realms of scientific discovery and magical
deception no one could have imagined. To
play Angier, Christopher Nolan immediately
thought of Hugh Jackman, the multitalented
Australian who has become a major star of
both stage and screen. Jackman is known to millions of young fans for his screen portrayal of the hugely
popular superhero Wolverine—an angst-filled mutant with animal-keen senses—but he is also a Tony
Award winner for his showstopping performance as songwriter Peter Allen in “The Boy From Oz” and an
16
THE RIVAL:
CHRISTIAN BALE IS ALFRED BORDEN
Christian Bale first heard about THE PRESTIGE while he was playing a very different character—the
dark, crime-fighting superhero Batman in Christopher Nolan’s “Batman Begins.” But it wasn’t until much
17
THE RIVAL
Emmy® Award winner for his hosting of the televised Tony Awards show.
It was Jackman’s unique mix of innate cool along with his sophisticated showmanship that convinced
Nolan he was the only person who could bring out both the theatrical brilliance and the thirst for
vengeance at the heart of Angier. He also seemed like the perfect persona to create a chain reaction of
fierce competition and rivalry with Christian Bale.
Says Nolan: “When Hugh gets on stage, he truly comes to life. He’s extraordinarily comfortable being
up there and so knowledgeable about his relationship with the audience. That’s exactly what this character
needed—and Hugh presents Angier with a sincerity that’s extremely winning.”
Upon reading the script, Jackman was hooked. He was drawn to Angier’s journey—which takes him
from the bright lights of success to the darkest shadows of the human soul. “At the beginning of the story,
Angier is very optimistic, hopeful and energetic,” he observes. “His main strength as a magician is as a
performer. He simply loves being in front of a crowd. He has an ease and a panache and a great sort of
way with the audience. In fact, to be somewhat critical of him, you could say that his style is sometimes
far greater than his content.”
But then Angier meets Alfred Borden and
everything in his life changes. “It irks me to
even say this, but Borden is technically a
much
better
magician,”
Jackman
begrudgingly admits. “My character can sell
a trick to an audience with far more skill, but
Borden is a kind of inventive genius. When
things go wrong between them, Angier has
two conflicting responses. On the one hand,
he begins to loathe Borden, to hate him, to
want vengeance for what he has done, but on
the other, he is driven by a competitive obsession to be better than Borden. So all of Angier’s anger and
hate, all his darkness and sadness become focused on one thing—finding out Borden’s secrets.”
To prepare to play Angier, Jackman conducted his own research into the colorful history of magic,
from its creative heyday in the early 1900s till now. “I found it to be an incredibly mysterious and
interesting world,” he says. “There is something about magicians that makes them different from nonmagicians. They do everything alone, because they don’t want to share their secrets, and they are intensely
competitive. They’re fascinating people, which makes them great characters.”
The more he learned, the more Jackman began to see that magicians share elements in common with
both conmen and scientists, two mainstays of contemporary society. “Great magic is all about misdirection
and illusion, the same skills a conman needs,” he says. “But just as scientists are obsessed with the things
humans can’t yet understand, magicians tap into that. What’s great about THE PRESTIGE is that it melds
the mystical, the magical and the idea of the impossible with elements of science and reality.”
As for Angier, Jackman believes he is addicted to the audience’s stunned reactions. “He loves seeing
that look in their faces of being fooled. For him, it taps into that human quality of hope and faith, that
feeling that the impossible can actually happen. He is driven by that power,” the actor says.
Watching Jackman bring Angier, and his many different sides, to life was a revelation for Nolan, one
that would be echoed again with Christian Bale’s performance. “It was really interesting to see how both
Hugh and Christian took the ideas behind the way magicians really think and work, and each made these
their own, reconciling them with their own way of looking at the world,” he summarizes.
THE RIVAL
later, when he read an early version of Jonathan Nolan’s screenplay, that he knew without a doubt that he
wanted to be a part of the film.
Bale has already established a reputation as an iconoclast when it comes to the roles he has chosen on
his way to becoming one of the most respected actors of his generation. The Welsh-born British actor got
an auspicious start from Steven Spielberg at the age of 13,
playing the lost boy who finds himself in a Japanese internment
camp in “The Empire of the Sun.” More recently, his uncommon
diversity and intensity has come to the fore. He chilled the blood
embodying every frightening inch of a yuppie psychopath in
“American Psycho,” lost a startling 60 pounds to descend into
the psychological anguish of the thriller “The Machinist” and
voiced the title character of Hayao Miyazaki’s acclaimed
animated film “Howl’s Moving Castle.” Then, just before
portraying Pocahontas’ husband, John Rolfe, in Terence Malick’s
“The New World,” he went into deep training and put on pounds
of muscle to create the most nuanced portrait of the superhero
Batman yet seen in the blockbuster “Batman Begins.” Shortly
after, Bale encountered THE PRESTIGE.
“After ‘Batman Begins,’ I had really hoped to find some very
high-quality scripts, some really good movies, but I was not
finding myself surrounded by them. Then, I read THE
PRESTIGE,” Bale recalls. “I thought it was a very original,
unique piece about a rivalry that knows no limits—and because magicians are involved, you never know
what’s real and what isn’t, which makes for a fantastic thriller. It’s so layered, you have to peel it apart. I
already knew that Chris is one of the smartest directors around and that working with him is like having
a very solid foundation on which to build a beautiful house—and I really fancied doing a movie with him
that would be so different from ‘Batman.’”
He continues: “So I called Chris and said, ‘Whatever you’re thinking, and you can tell me where to go,
but I’m just going to lay it on the line. This is the one of the best bloody scripts I’ve ever read and I want
to do it.’ I think my passion for it bowled him over.”
When Bale entered into a deeper conversation with Christopher Nolan about his vision for THE
PRESTIGE, his passion only increased. “I’ve
always admired actors who are like shape
shifters, and Chris is that way as a director,”
he observes. “I loved the idea that he wanted
to radically change styles with this film. I
liked the spirit behind it. Whereas ‘Batman’
was a juggernaut, this huge beast of a ship
that was hard to maneuver, THE PRESTIGE
was like riding horseback—there was a
feeling right from the start of being light on
our feet and very free.”
Once Nolan had cast him as Borden, Bale
dove into the part. He began by reading not only Christopher Priest’s novel but also numerous books about
the lives of magicians. “You realize that their stature at the time was so different from what it is
nowadays,” he says. Then, he began studying with contemporary magicians and the film’s consultants,
Ricky Jay and Michael Weber, to hone his own fledgling skills of prestidigitation. “Actually, my
grandfather was a magician but I never saw him perform,” notes Bale. “So it was wonderful to work with
Ricky and Michael, who are terrific magicians. Still, they really annoyed me because I can’t stand when
someone can do something I can’t do!”
18
19
THE RIVAL
Spending time with authentic magicians was quite revealing to Bale. “It was really good to see up close
the kind of competitiveness that happens between magicians, because that’s such a strong point in the
story,” he says. “It’s really about how far these two men will go to be the winner and you can see that this
really goes on in magic circles. It’s a very closed profession, and when someone does a trick that no one
else has thought of, you watch as their eyes boil over. Of course, because they’re so mysterious, they don’t
give a lot. So we only learned what was necessary. If you asked too good of a question, they’d find some
clever way to distract you away from it!”
With the tricks he did learn, Bale was constantly surprised. “Some of them just flabbergasted me,” he
says, “while others were almost disappointing because, when you see how it’s done, it’s entirely too
simple. But of course our movie really isn’t about the tricks so much as it is about the psyches of the
people who perform and create them.”
Borden might be sought after as an engineer but he hungers for much more than that. Though he comes
from a tough, lonely background as an orphan, his ambition is nothing less than to be the greatest magical
star of his time—in spite of his inability to connect with audiences. “The thing I love about Borden,”
comments Bale, “is that he’s all about the
purity of the magic, about the nature of an
ingenious idea. He doesn’t care about the
showmanship, he doesn’t care about selling
the trick, he simply cares about creating the
most perfect illusion. He’s totally obsessed
with that one thing. Like so many truly
brilliant artists, Borden has no concept of
how to market himself.”
Yet his obsession soon also becomes
about Angier, who possesses qualities Borden
both covets and reviles. “Angier is merely a
decent magician, but he is a great showman, an entire marketing operation unto himself,” Bale observes.
“Borden sees Angier as a conman, whereas he’s the real deal. He just doesn’t understand why the public
can’t see that.” As for creating such vengeful feelings towards Hugh Jackman, Bale states: “We both had
completely different approaches to our characters and we both really believed in our characters, so that
made the rivalry truly come alive on screen.”
Borden’s life is complicated not only by Angier’s success but by his relationships with two different
women—his long-suffering wife, Sarah, and Angier’s assistant, Olivia. “Borden’s first and greatest love
will always be magic,” says Bale. “Any relationship will always have to take second place for him, and
that’s a hard thing for his wife to stomach. He
adores his family, but magic is the only thing
he’s always had that gives him value. He’s an
orphan and he’s been on the streets his whole
life. He really has nothing else, except this
one extraordinary talent. I think he really
believes that if you let people in on the secret
of who you are, they’ll think nothing of you.
It’s only by building a mystery around
himself that he can gain any power.”
Like Christopher Nolan, Bale was
completely committed to avoiding period
trappings in his portrayal of Borden. “I think it can be quite funny to watch actors in period movies,
because they act just like other actors in period movies! We just take it for granted that people had this
very formal way of being in the past—but it isn’t true. Both Chris and I felt that we really had to kick that
and get away from it. So the idea was to focus on the characters—who have the same needs and wants and
desires as anyone in today’s world. Also, usually period movies are all about the privileged. THE
PRESTIGE is much more gritty and hands-on dirty and you get to see the darker side.”
Ultimately, Bale hopes that audiences will be as surprised by THE PRESTIGE as he was upon first
reading the script. “It really is a movie that I can’t compare to anything else. It’s a movie where you’ve
really got to pay attention. And that’s just what life is like, too—you’ve got to pay attention.”
THE MAGICIANS’ SIDEKICKS
THE MAGICIANS’ SIDEKICKS:
MICHAEL CAINE IS CUTTER AND SCARLETT JOHANSSON IS OLIVIA
Magicians have long had need for close
assistance. Whether behind the scenes—
where brilliant imaginations think up the
tricks in the first place—or on the stage—
where sexy, charming women have always
served as a delightful means to distract the
audience—magicians must rely, however
begrudgingly, on the talents of others. In THE
PRESTIGE, the assistants of Angier and
Borden only serve to further thicken the plot
with their own agendas and deceptions.
Some of the most vital behind-the-scenes
players in the magic world are the people known as ingeneurs—the dark, secretive figures of technical
prowess who actually create the tricks. Angier’s ingeneur is the retired conjurer Cutter, portrayed with wit
and verve by one of cinema’s most lauded
stars, Sir Michael Caine. Though Caine has
played an extraordinary range of characters in
a vast array of film stories, he had yet to
encounter a world quite like that of THE
PRESTIGE. Add to that the chance to reunite
with Christopher Nolan, with whom he had
worked so successfully on “Batman Begins,”
and Caine was immediately interested. He
says that Nolan brings to mind another
director from the past. “He reminds me of
Alfred Hitchcock, the way that everything is
about creating the best moments of suspense,” says Caine. “He is tremendous with suspense.”
As for his character, Caine describes him as “a teacher, a father and a guide to Angier.” He continues:
“He finds Angier, helps him to create his best tricks, and then watches as it all goes terribly wrong.” In
creating his nuanced portrait, Caine even altered his highly recognizable voice. “Cutter is an older man,
and in those days, they smoked like chimneys and drank like fish, so I brought his voice down into the
throat with a kind of cough in it,” he explains. “And his accent is very thick and rather menacing.” Body
posture was also key to Caine’s reading of Cutter. “He’s a powerful man, but also very relaxed,” he
observes. “One thing about him is that he often has his hands in his pockets—but when they come out,
you better worry!”
The filmmakers knew that Caine would make the role entirely his own. Says Nolan: “Michael Caine’s
character really becomes something of the heart of the movie. He has a wonderful warmth and emotion
to him that draws you into the story and allows you to have a point of view on these characters without
judging them too harshly.”
Meanwhile, when Angier hires an alluring stage assistant—Olivia Wenscombe—she becomes both a
pawn and a player in the rivalry between Angier and Borden. Olivia is played by Golden Globe® nominee
20
Scarlett Johansson, who says she was immediately attracted by the
screenplay. “It was one of the best scripts I’d ever read and I thought it
would be great fun to play this vivacious, bohemian character,” she says.
“There’s a spiciness to Olivia that I think Chris really honed in on and I
felt there was a part of me that I could bring to her.”
It was easy for Johansson to understand Olivia’s strong attraction to
Angier. “She’s very taken with his passion for what he does. He’s one of
those sorts of men who seems very untouchable, as well, and I think that’s
quite attractive to a young girl—that brooding, selfish behavior. But
when he betrays her, it really hurts her.” As for Borden, she says: “She’s
asked to live amongst the enemy with Borden, and I think Olivia and
Borden come to a kind of understanding but she really will always be in
love with Angier.”
The chance to work with Christopher Nolan was also a draw for
Johansson. “He
has that rare kind of Old Hollywood quality. I
don’t know exactly how to describe it, but you
never want to disappoint Chris because you know
he will always hold up his end of the bargain,” she
observes.
Johansson especially enjoyed her up-close
introduction to the world of magic—finding it not
so dissimilar from the world she knows best. “It’s
very secretive and competitive,” she observes. “It’s
all about the commitment to the illusion, which
isn’t that different from any form of entertainer.”
THE SCIENTIST:
DAVID BOWIE IS NIKOLA TESLA AND ANDY SERKIS IS TESLA’S ASSISTANT, ALLEY
21
THE SCIENTIST
Amidst all the beguiling fictional characters of THE PRESTIGE lies a historic figure who has long
been shrouded in mystery and intrigue: Nikola Tesla (1856-1943), radical inventor, engineer and scientist.
A Serbian immigrant to America, Tesla was a modern-day Da Vinci who dreamed up ideas about robots,
computers, microwave ovens, radar and fax machines long before anyone else could imagine such
“magical” technologies. He received more
than 700 patents in his lifetime and helped to
forge our modern high-tech society. He
discovered the rotating magnetic field, which
became the basis for all machinery using
alternating current, and also invented the
Tesla Coil, an induction device widely used in
radio technology. Indeed, it was Tesla’s
technology that helped to change the world
from an endless chain of disconnected
communities to one partly united by
information and communication.
Yet so eccentric was Tesla that he was said to be the inspiration for the mad scientist in Max Fleischer’s
original “Superman” cartoons. He pushed at the very frontiers of science—going where no one else dared.
At his Colorado Springs laboratory, depicted in the film, Tesla conducted all kinds of wild experiments,
including forging man-made lightning bolts, and was said to be examining such far-out notions as time
THE SCIENTIST
travel, death rays and interstellar communication.
But, as with most visionaries, Tesla was also surrounded by controversy and hounded by injustices. He
had an infamous rivalry with another genius
inventor: Thomas Edison. Tesla had originally
worked for Edison when he first came to
America, but when the two parted ways over
a payment disagreement, an obsessive feud
ensued—one reminiscent perhaps of Angier
and Borden. Mystery would follow Tesla
even into death. After his passing, most of his
scientific papers disappeared without a trace,
never to be found, leading many to wonder
what fantastic or dangerous ideas were
among them.
In THE PRESTIGE, the character of Tesla blurs the lines between magic and science when he agrees
to invent a machine that will allow Angier to out-do Alfred Borden’s most stunningly implausible stage
trick. To play Tesla, the filmmakers knew they would need someone entirely out of the ordinary—a
magnetic figure so used to operating outside
of the lines, he would be instantly believable
as a mad genius. Given this description, the
obvious choice was David Bowie, the risktaking rock performer who has also taken a
wide range of acclaimed acting roles, from
“Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence” to “The
Elephant Man.” But first, the filmmakers
would have to convince him to take the role.
“Chris has always been a fan of Bowie,”
explains Aaron Ryder, “and we felt we needed
the kind of persona and weight that Bowie
carries as a superstar for Tesla.” Adds Emma Thomas: “He was just so perfect for the role that we couldn’t
imagine anyone else who could pull it off—and then, Chris managed to wrangle a meeting with him in New
York, which we were all very nervous about.”
Nolan recalls: “I simply went and explained to him why he was the only person in the world who could
play this part—and luckily, he agreed to do it.”
Playing Tesla’s fictional assistant—and the man who serves
as liaison between the great scientist and Angier—is Andy
Serkis, who became a cult hero among fantasy-film lovers for
his extraordinary embodiment of Gollum in the blockbuster
“Lord of the Rings” trilogy and for his work as the famous beast
in Peter Jackson’s “King Kong.” Here, he plays the American
Roger Alley. “Andy makes for a wonderfully memorable
character as the sort of front man for Tesla,” Nolan comments.
“It was also really fun to see him in the flesh and to see his real
face on screen!”
Says Serkis of the character: “Alley is Tesla’s gatekeeper,
manager, minder, bookkeeper and closest associate, all at once.
He’s there to pull switches, to get his hands dirty and basically
enable things to happen. He’s a mirror in a way of Michael
Caine’s Cutter. He’s basically Tesla’s ‘engineer.’” Although Alley never existed in real life, Serkis sees him
as “representing the few disciples who saw that Tesla’s work was visionary and decided to go out on a limb
22
THE MAGICIANS’ WIVES:
PIPER PERABO IS JULIA MCCULLOUGH AND REBECCA HALL IS SARAH BORDEN
Magicians may be able to pull off incredible illusions, but even they are not immune to the complex
realities of love and relationships. And indeed, it is a dazzling but disastrous trick involving Angier’s wife,
Julia, that sets in motion his increasingly treacherous magical feud with Alfred Borden.
Playing Julia McCullough is Piper Perabo, the rising American star who has come to the fore in a
number of lighthearted contemporary comedies but here takes on a much darker role—as the woman
willing to go the dangerous extremes for the cause of a great magic trick. Perabo was fascinated by the
chance to explore through Julia the inner world of the magician’s assistant. “Julia is the kind of girl who
is willing to be sawed in half and have knives thrown at her and that sort of thing,” explains Perabo. “She’s
very young and I think she’s just happy to feel like she belongs in this world of magicians—to actually
have that sense of power of being a woman with a job, where men respect her and take her seriously, which
was quite rare in that time. Magicians were really glamorous and glitzy at that point. The vibe was more
like a rock concert and it would have been very exciting for Julia.”
Perabo not only had to take on an English accent for the role—something she had honed for the recent
British comedy “Imagine Me and You”—she also had to learn to perform the adventurous “water tank”
trick, in which she is bound by a rope and dropped from a considerable height into a tank of water, only
to be sealed within. “I got pretty good at it by the end,” Perabo laughs.
But while Angier’s wife is a part of the magic show, Borden’s wife, Sarah, sees it as her competition.
Convinced that her husband will always love magic more than he loves her, she is flummoxed and hurt by
his constant changes of heart. Starring as Sarah is British newcomer Rebecca Hall, a young actress best
known so far for her work on the London stage, who was cast after the filmmakers saw her reading on
tape. “We knew right away we were seeing something special,” says Thomas. “This is one of her first film
roles but there will be many more.”
Hall was fascinated by the film’s magical nature. “It creates a nice tension between what’s fun and
entertaining about magic and what’s potentially scary and dangerous about it,” she comments. She also
felt a lot of empathy for her character’s romantic trials. “Sarah’s got a difficult job of it because she’s very
much in love with a man who on some days is 100% obsessed with his work and yet, on others, seems
completely in love and committed to her,” she explains. “At first, she accepts that the work side of him is
going to be secret, but she becomes increasingly frustrated by the feeling that she doesn’t know the real
intricacies of what he is doing or who he really is.”
Since THE PRESTIGE is only Hall’s second feature film, the chance to work one-on-one with an actor
23
THE MAGICIANS’ WIVES
for him.”
In preparing for the role, Serkis read up on the period and became even more fascinated. “It was an
amazing time when you had people like
Edison, Tesla, Darwin and Muybridge who
were changing our fundamental views of time
and space. The railroads were being laid, the
telephone was being invented—and because
of all this, I think there was a great enjoyment
of the mysterious and a crossover where
science could help magic. So it’s great
because it’s a very potent era to examine.”
Yet, like the Nolans, Serkis also sees the
story of THE PRESTIGE as transcending its
era. “I think anyone who has ever obsessed
about their work or their family or anything at all will really key into the emotions of this story,” he
summarizes.
of the caliber of Christian Bale seemed almost like a surreal dream to her. “When I met him, I was pretty
intimidated because he’s such a huge star,” she says, “but I have so much respect for everyone in this film
and I learned so much that it was an incredible experience.”
ABOUT THE CAST
THE PRESTIGE’S CONSULTANTS:
RICKY JAY AND MICHAEL WEBER TEACH THE CAST MAGIC
With the cast in place, the filmmakers brought in magicians Ricky Jay and Michael Weber to train
them in the classic magician’s skills of prestidigitation and misdirection. However, because the magic
tricks in THE PRESTIGE simply provide the backdrop for the story of Angier and Borden’s hazardous
rivalry—and are not intended to fool the film’s audience—Jay and Weber’s main task was to give the cast
a deeper sense of how magicians think, move and perform.
Jay heads the company Deceptive Practices, which provides expertise in magic, con games and card
tricks for films involving everything from illusions to gambling. On THE PRESTIGE, he was thrilled to
find himself with such devoted and curious students. “One of the greatest pleasures for us was working
with Christian and Hugh, who both had remarkable energy and an amazing willingness to practice and
rehearse. These guys were terrific in terms of the attention they paid to detail,” says Jay.
As for the story, Jay thinks that, for all its fantastical twists and turns, it rings quite true to a magician.
“Those kinds of competitions between magicians really did exist,” he remarks. “That was a time in
London when five or six magicians would be playing at theaters right next to each other on the same night,
a time that has never been duplicated in the history of magic. It’s also interesting because that was a time
when there was a strong relationship between early cinema and magic. A lot of the people who worked on
the development of the motion picture camera were also magicians. Since then, people have become
suspicious of any magic done on film, but one of the things we’ve tried to do with this film is bring out
the idea that there was a lot of integrity to magic in those days, so it kind of brings everything back
full circle.”
Says Aaron Ryder of Jay and Weber’s contributions: “We felt very lucky to have these two on board.
They worked with Hugh and Christian extensively, bringing them a little bit more into what is normally
an incredibly secretive brotherhood. Still, they basically agreed that they would teach only the tricks that
were necessary for the script—and they wouldn’t give away too many secrets!”
ABOUT THE CAST
HUGH JACKMAN (Robert Angier) most recently reprised his role
as Logan/Wolverine in “X-Men: The Last Stand,” the third installment of
the “X-Men” franchise. He made his first major U.S. film appearance in
the first “X-Men” movie—and this stellar debut led to leading roles in
“Someone Like You,” “Swordfish” and “Kate and Leopold,” for which he
received a 2002 Golden Globe® nomination. Jackman reprised his role as
Logan/Wolverine in “X2” and went on to star in the blockbuster “Van
Helsing.” In addition to THE PRESTIGE, he stars this year in Woody
Allen’s “Scoop” and Darren Aronofsky’s “The Fountain.”
On stage, for his portrayal of the 1970s singer-songwriter Peter Allen
in “The Boy From Oz,” Jackman received the 2004 Tony Award for Best
Actor in a musical as well as Drama Desk, Drama League, Outer Critics
Circle and Theatre World awards. His previous theater credits include: “Carousel” at Carnegie Hall,
“Oklahoma!” at the National Theater in London (Olivier Award nomination), “Sunset Boulevard” (MO
Award—Australia’s Tony Award) and Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” (MO Award nomination).
Jackman’s career began in Australia in the independent films “Paperback Hero” and “Erskineville
Kings” (Australian Film Critics’ Circle Best Actor award and The Australian Film Institute Best Actor
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nomination). In 1999, he was named “Australian Star of the Year” at the Australian Movie Convention.
Born in Wales, CHRISTIAN BALE (Alfred Borden) grew up in
England and the USA. He made his film debut in Steven Spielberg’s
World War II epic “Empire of the Sun.” Bale’s work to date includes
“Henry V,” “The Portrait of a Lady,” “The Secret Agent,” “Metroland,”
“Velvet Goldmine,” “All the Little Animals,” “American Psycho,”
“Shaft,” “Captain Corelli’s Mandolin,” “Reign of Fire,” “Laurel Canyon,”
“The Machinist,” “Batman Begins” and “The New World.”
He will next star in the independent films “Harsh Times” for
writer/director David Ayer and “Rescue Dawn” for director Werner
Herzog. This fall, Bale will film “I’m Not There” and “3:10 to Yuma,”
followed next year by “Dark Knight.”
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ABOUT THE CAST
MICHAEL CAINE (Cutter) has been in over 90 motion pictures and
has been nominated for six Academy Awards® including “Alfie,”
“Sleuth,” “Educating Rita” and “The Quiet American.” The highly lauded
thespian won Best Supporting Actor Oscars® for his performances in
“Hannah and Her Sisters” and “The Cider House Rules.” Caine’s other
honors include the New York Critics’ Best Actor Award for “Alfie,” a
Golden Globe® Best Actor Award and a BAFTA Award (the British
equivalent of an Oscar®) for “Educating Rita,” a Golden Globe® for
“Dirty Rotten Scoundrels” and a Golden Globe® for “Little Voice.”
Caine was born in South London and had a childhood fascination with
cinema. Leaving school at sixteen, he worked in numerous menial jobs
until National Service with the Royal Fusiliers took him to Korea. Upon
his discharge, his first job in the theater was as assistant stage manager in Horsham, Sussex. When he
returned to London, he acted with Joan Littlewood’s Theater Workshop and played a minor role in the film
“A Hill in Korea” while obtaining bit parts in other movies and walk-on roles in a couple of West End plays.
Eventually touring Britain with one repertory company after another, he developed a relaxed stage
presence and perfected a vast range of accents. Starting out as an understudy in the role of Private
Bamforth in the London stage hit “The Long and the Short and the Tall,” Caine ended up taking over the
part when O’Toole dropped out and toured the provinces for six months. Following this stint, his television
and film parts grew more substantial. The turning point in his film career came in 1963, when he landed
the part of aristocratic Lieutenant Gonville Bromhead in “Zulu.” Passing forever out of the ranks of
anonymity, he next played Harry Palmer in the espionage thriller “The Ipcress File,” which exceeded all
expectations at the box office.
In 1966, “Alfie” catapulted Caine to superstardom. In the annual British film critics’ poll, it was voted
Best Picture of the Year. It also gave him his first Academy Award® nomination. In the late sixties, he
appeared in “Gambit,” “Funeral in Berlin,” “Billion Dollar Brain,” “Hurry Sundown,” “Woman Times
Seven,” “Deadfall,” “The Italian Job,” “The Battle of Britain,” “Too Late the Hero” and “The Last Valley.”
During the seventies, he starred in “X, Y and Zee,” “Pulp,” “Sleuth,” “The Wilby Conspiracy,” “The
Romantic Englishwoman,” “The Man Who Would Be King,” “Harry & Walter Go to New York,”
“California Suite” and “The Swarm.” In the eighties, Caine starred in “Dressed to Kill,” “Victory,” “The
Hand,” “Death Trap,” “Educating Rita,” “Blame It on Rio,” “The Holcroft Covenant,” “Hannah and Her
Sisters,” “Sweet Liberty” and “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.”
In 1992, he and American producer Martin Bregman formed M & M Productions to make films in
Britain for Caine to star in or direct. Their first production was “Blue Ice,” costarring Sean Young and
directed by Russell Mulcahy. Caine is also an author. He wrote an autobiography, What’s It All About?, as
ABOUT THE CAST
well as Acting on Film, a book based on a highly successful series of lectures he gave on BBC Television.
Caine most recently appeared in “Batman Begins,” “Bewitched” and Gore Verbinski’s “The Weather
Man” with Nicolas Cage. In 2000, Queen Elizabeth II honored Michael Caine with knighthood. Born
Maurice Micklewhite, he is now officially known as Sir Michael Caine.
With more than a decade of work under her belt, four-time Golden
Globe® nominee and BAFTA winner SCARLETT JOHANSSON
(Olivia) has proven to be one of Hollywood’s most talented young
actresses. Johansson received rave reviews and a Best Actress Award at
the Venice Film Festival for her starring role opposite Bill Murray in
“Lost in Translation,” the critically acclaimed second film by director
Sofia Coppola. Johansson also portrayed the title character in the muchadmired “Girl With a Pearl Earring,” a film adapted from the novel of the
same name about the painter Johannes Vermeer (Colin Firth).
Earlier this year, Johansson was seen in Woody Allen’s “Scoop,”
opposite Hugh Jackman, and the Brian DePalma film “The Black
Dahlia.” She also recently finished shooting the lead role in “The Nanny
Diaries,” based on the highly successful book of the same name.
At the age of 14, Johansson attained worldwide recognition for her performance as Grace Maclean, the
teen traumatized by a riding accident in Robert Redford’s “The Horse Whisperer.” She went on to star in
Terry Zwigoff’s “Ghost World,” garnering a Best Supporting Actress award from the Toronto Film Critics
Circle. Johansson was also featured in the Coen Brothers’ dark drama “The Man Who Wasn’t There,”
opposite Billy Bob Thornton and Frances McDormand. Her other film credits include the critically
acclaimed Weitz brothers’ film “In Good Company” as well as “A Love Song for Bobby Long,” opposite
John Travolta, which garnered her a Golden Globe® nomination (her third in two years). Recently she was
seen in Woody Allen’s “Match Point,” which garnered her a fourth consecutive Golden Globe® nomination
in three years, and in “The Island” opposite Ewan McGregor for director Michael Bay.
Her additional credits include Rob Reiner’s comedy “North”; the thriller “Just Cause,” with Sean
Connery and Laurence Fishburne; and a breakthrough role in the critically praised “Manny & Lo,” which
earned her an Independent Spirit Award nomination. A New York native, Johansson made her professional
acting debut at the age of eight in the off-Broadway production of “Sophistry,” with Ethan Hawke, at New
York’s Playwright’s Horizons.
PIPER PERABO (Julia McCullough) has been working nonstop
since her big-screen splash in Jerry Bruckheimer’s “Coyote Ugly.” She
was recently seen in Adam Shankman’s “Cheaper by the Dozen 2,” in
which she reprised her role as the eldest daughter to Steve Martin and
Bonnie Hunt’s characters; in the romantic comedy “Imagine Me & You”
with Lena Heady and Matthew Goode; and in the crime drama “10th &
Wolf ” with an ensemble cast that includes James Marsden and Dennis
Hopper. She next stars in “Because I Said So” with Diane Keaton, Mandy
Moore and Lauren Graham. Also in the wings is “First Snow,” a film
directed by Mark Fergus, costarring Guy Pearce and Adam Scott. Perabo
is currently filming an untitled Pastor Brothers project for Paramount
Vantage in New Mexico. She will play the female lead opposite Chris
Pine and Lou Taylor Pucci in the post-apocalyptic thriller about four friends trying to escape a viral
pandemic. The film is set to release in 2007.
Perabo’s feature film debut was in the comedy “White Boyz,” written by Danny Hoch. She also starred
in the comedy caper “The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle” opposite Robert De Niro and Renee
Russo, “George and the Dragon” with Michael Clarke Duncan and James Purefoy, the cult favorite “Lost
26
and Delirious” directed by Lea Pool, and the sci-fi thriller “The Cave” opposite Cole Hauser, Morris
Chestnut and Lena Headey.
DAVID BOWIE (Tesla) was born in 1947. Between the late ’60s and
the mid-’70s, he experimented with multimedia, also recording the
albums “The Man Who Sold the World,” “Space Oddity,” “The Rise and
Fall of Ziggy Stardust,” “Aladdin Sane,” “Diamond Dogs,” “Station to
Station” and “Young Americans.” The track “Fame” taken from this
album was to be his first U.S. No. 1.
In 1976, he relocated to Berlin, recording “Low” and “Heroes” with
Eno and Tony Visconti. In 1979, he made his Broadway debut in “The
Elephant Man” and released the Visconti co-production “Scary Monsters
and Super Creeps,” followed by the Nile Rogers-produced “Let’s Dance.”
Between the mid-’80s and the present, he has worked with his band Tin
Machine, collaborated with the dance company La La La Human Steps,
and written music for Hanif Kureishi’s “Buddha of Suburbia.” The year 1992 brought one of rock’s first
CD-ROMs, “Jump.”
In 1994, reunited once again with Eno, he produced the experimental “Outside” album, followed in
1997 with “Earthling” and, in 1999, “hours…,” his twenty-third studio album. In 1999, he became a
Commandeur dans L’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. And in 2000, Bowie was voted the #1 Most Influential
Artist of All Time by the U.K.’s tastemaking tome, the NME. Bowie’s next project, in 2002, was a further
recorded collaboration with Tony Visconti, entitled “Heathen.” The accompanying live dates in Europe
and America saw full performances of both “Heathen” and the seminal “Low.” A year later, the “Reality”
album was launched with the world’s largest interactive, live-by-satellite event and was followed by the
rapturously received and critically acclaimed “A Reality Tour” of the world.
27
ABOUT THE CAST
REBECCA HALL (Sarah Borden) comes to the big screen after
making her feature film debut earlier this year in Tom Vaughn’s “Starter
for Ten.”
Last year, Hall received wide acclaim for her performance as
Rosalind, Shakespeare’s love-conflicted heroine in Peter Hall’s
production of “As You Like It,” which began at The Theatre Royal Bath
in 2003 and was followed by an international tour. It was revived in 2005
at the Rose Theatre in Kingston and subsequently ran at the Brooklyn
Academy of Music, Los Angeles’ Ahmanson Theater and the Curran
Theater in San Francisco. In summer 2004, she starred in three
productions at the Theatre Royal Bath: in the title role in Timberlake
Wertenbaker’s “Galileo’s Daughter,” (directed by Peter Hall), Elvira in
Simon Nye’s version of the Moliere comedy “Don Juan” (directed by Thea Sharrock) and as Ann
Whitfield in Shaw’s epic “Man and Superman” (directed by Peter Hall). In summer 2003, she starred as
Barbara in D.H. Lawrence’s “Fight for Barbara” (directed by Thea Sharrock) at the Theatre Royal Bath.
For her West End debut as Vivie, the tough-minded daughter in “Mrs. Warren’s Profession” (Strand
Theatre, premiered October 2002), Hall garnered the Ian Charleson Award. In 2003, she was again
nominated for the Ian Charleson Award for “As You Like It.”
While reading English at Cambridge, she played Miranda in “The Tempest” and Martha in Edward
Albee’s “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf?” and directed productions of “Cuckoo” by Guiseppe Manfredi
and Tom Stoppard’s “The Real Inspector Hound.”
Hall’s television credits include Brendan Maher’s forthcoming “Wide Sargasso Sea” for BBC 4, Peter
Hall’s acclaimed adaptation of Mary Wesley’s novel “The Camomile Lawn” for Channel 4 and “Don’t
Leave Me This Way,” directed by Stuart Orme.
ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS
The year 2006 has seen Bowie return to acting, with THE PRESTIGE adding to such cinematic
highlights as Nic Roeg’s “The Man Who Fell to Earth,” Martin Scorcese’s “The Last Temptation of
Christ,” Tony Scott’s “The Hunger” and Nagisa Oshima’s “Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence.” In spring of
2007, Bowie will be the inaugural curator of the “Highline” arts and music festival in New York.
ANDY SERKIS’ (Alley) most memorable and critically acclaimed
roles were as Gollum in all three of “The Lord of the Rings” films and in
the Peter Jackson epic “King Kong” playing two roles, King Kong and a
cook. He will next be in the HBO film “Longford,” in the animated
DreamWorks film “Flushed Away” and in the family action-adventure
“Stormbreaker.”
Recently, he also played opposite Jennifer Garner and Mark Ruffalo
in “13 Going on 30,” directed by Gary Winick. Other film credits include
Quinn in the World War I horror feature “Deathwatch,” the Factory
Records producer Martin Hannett in “24 Hour Party People,” the
eccentric choreographer in “Topsy Turvy” and the coked-up yuppie in
“Career Girls.” He played leading roles in “Shiner” with Michael Caine,
“Mojo,” “Among Giants,” “Loop,” “Sweety Barrett,” “The Jolly Boys Last Stand,” as well as “Stella Does
Tricks,” “Five Seconds to Spare,” “The Near Room” and “Pandemonium.” He also wrote and directed a
short film called “Snake,” starring his wife, Lorraine Ashbourne, and Rupert Grave.
His extensive television works include a highly acclaimed performance in a recent adaptation of
“Oliver Twist” and lead roles in “The Jump” and the series “Finney,” along with many guest appearances
including “Shooting the Past” and “Touching Evil.” Notably, his voice was heard on the Fox television
show “The Simpsons.”
Serkis has played a huge range of parts in theater in London and across the United Kingdom. His
recent critically acclaimed roles include Iago in “Othello” (Royal Exchange Theatre), Potts in the original
cast of “Mojo” by Jez Butterworth, “King Lear” and “Hush” all for the Royal Court Theatre, “Hurlyburly”
at the Old Vic and Queen Theatres, “Decadence” at the Bolton Octagon, and “Cabaret” at the Crucible
Theatre, Sheffield. In 2003, he made his directorial debut with the play “The Double Bass” at the
Southwark Playhouse in London.
ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS
THE PRESTIGE marks the fifth film for CHRISTOPHER NOLAN (Director/Screenwriter). Cowritten with his brother and frequent collaborator Jonathan Nolan, and starring Hugh Jackman, Christian
Bale, Scarlett Johansson and Michael Caine, the film depicts an intense rivalry between two magicians
who become obsessed with outdoing one another, leading to self-destruction and murder. The Touchstone
Pictures release is due in theaters October 20, 2006.
Filmmaking has been a lifelong pursuit for Nolan, who began making movies at an early age with his
father’s Super 8mm camera. While studying English Literature at University College of London, Nolan
shot 16mm films at UCL’s film society, learning the guerrilla film techniques he would later use to make
his first feature, “Following.” The no-budget noir, which The New Yorker’s Bruce Diones hailed as “leaner
and meaner than the thrillers of Hitchcock,” enjoyed great success at international film festivals, including
Toronto, Rotterdam, Slamdance, and Hong Kong, prior to being released theatrically in the U.S.
(Zeitgeist), U.K. (Alliance), France (CCI) and various other territories.
Nolan’s second feature, “Memento,” was named film of the year by the Broadcast Film Critics.
Starring Guy Pearce, Carrie-Ann Moss and Joe Pantoliano, the small-budget independent garnered a
DGA Award nomination. In addition, Nolan’s screenplay, based on a short story by Jonathan Nolan,
received an Academy Award® nomination for best screenplay and a Golden Globe® nomination and was
honored by the Los Angeles Film Critics and Broadcast Film Critics, as well as won the Waldo Salt
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Screenwriting Award at the 2001 Sundance Film Festival.
Nolan followed “Memento” with the critically acclaimed psychological thriller “Insomnia” for Warner
Bros. Pictures, Section 8 and Witt-Thomas Films. Starring Academy Award® winners Al Pacino, Hilary
Swank, and Robin Williams, the film earned Nolan the Best Director of the Year award from the London
Critics Circle. In 2005, Nolan co-wrote and directed “Batman Begins,” starring Christian Bale, Liam
Neeson, and Michael Caine. The blockbuster pleased critics and fans alike, reinvigorating the franchise
and paving the way for the recently announced sequel, “The Dark Knight.”
JONATHAN NOLAN (Screenwriter) was born in London and grew up in the Chicago area. His short
story “Memento Mori” became the basis for the acclaimed noir classic “Memento,” directed by his brother
Christopher Nolan. In addition to THE PRESTIGE, Nolan also wrote the screenplay for the forthcoming
Batman adventure, “The Dark Knight,” based on a story by Christopher Nolan and David Goyer.
Producing challenging and thought-provoking fare has become a trademark for EMMA THOMAS
(Producer). Thomas most recently produced the blockbuster hit “Batman Begins” and will next produce the
sequel, “The Dark Knight.” She previously was an associate producer on the internationally acclaimed
independent hit “Memento,” which went on to win numerous awards, establishing Thomas as a bona fide
success. This was reinforced with her next feature, “Insomnia,” starring Al Pacino, Robin Williams and
Hilary Swank. Earlier, her first feature film, “Following,” was a major turning point in her career. Shot on
weekends over the course of a year, “Following” was guerrilla filmmaking at its finest and gained
recognition at film festivals around the world. Having studied at the prestigious University College in
London, Thomas began her career at Working Title Films in London, where she worked in physical
production for 5 years. While at Working Title, she gained the grassroots knowledge of film production that
she would later employ so successfully in her career. Her approach is marked by intense collaboration,
having worked with many of the same crew throughout all of her films, both independent and studio. Thomas
and Christopher Nolan are also developing a motion picture version of “The Prisoner,” based on the
groundbreaking 1960s television show. She resides in Los Angeles with Christopher Nolan and their family.
CHRIS J. BALL and WILLIAM TYRER (Executive Producers) founded Newmarket Entertainment
Group (“Newmarket”) in 1994. Over the past twelve years, Newmarket has grown from its roots as a
film finance company into one of the leading producers and distributors operating in the world of
independent film.
In its early years, Newmarket financed more than 75 independent feature films such as “The Usual
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ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS
AARON RYDER (Producer), in a relatively short period of time, has established himself as one of the
brightest and most prolific young producers working today. In 1999, he teamed with Newmarket to serve
as the company’s president of production and in-house producer. During his tenure, he developed,
produced and executive produced such films as “The Mexican,” starring Brad Pitt and Julia Roberts,
Christopher Nolan’s independent hit “Memento,” as well as the cult hit “Donnie Darko,” with Drew
Barrymore and Jake Gyllenhaal. Other credits include “Start Raving Mad” and “Wrong Turn.”
In 2003, Ryder shifted gears to help Newmarket build their fledgling distribution company. Ryder was
intimately involved in acquiring standout films for domestic distribution including “Whale Rider,”
“Monster” and “The Woodsman.”
In 2004, Ryder and Newmarket formed Raygun Productions—a non-exclusive production entity for
Ryder to produce up to two films a year for the Newmarket pipeline, while at the same time affording him
the ability to produce films outside of the parent company.
Recent projects outside of his deal with Newmarket include: “The Amateurs,” starring Jeff Bridges,
scheduled to be released in January 2007; “The Return,” a supernatural thriller for Universal’s Rogue
Pictures, starring Sarah Michelle Gellar; and “The TV Set,” which he produced with writer/director Jake
Kasdan, starring David Duchovny and Sigourney Weaver and set to come out in theaters April 2007.
Suspects,” Jim Jarmusch’s “Dead Man,” and the Wachowskis’ debut, “Bound.” In the late ’90s, Tyrer and
Ball built an exceptional creative team and guided the company into film production and distribution.
Newmarket’s first production was “Memento,” directed by Christopher Nolan, and this film was followed
up by such productions as “The Mexican” and such co-productions as “Cruel Intentions” and “The Skulls.”
Newmarket’s distribution arm, Newmarket Films, was formed to theatrically release “Memento” in the
U.S. The film was a resounding critical and box-office success. Newmarket Films followed this with a
string of further successes that sound like a roll call of great indie cinema: “Donnie Darko,” “Whale
Rider,” “Monster,” “The Passion of the Christ,” and “Downfall.”
In 2006, Newmarket produced Chris Nolan’s return to independent film, THE PRESTIGE, and will
distribute the award-winning films “God Grew Tired of Us” and “Death of a President.” Future plans
include a slate of films from Newmarket’s production arm, Raygun Productions, and the continuing
expansion of its substantial library of more than 250 titles through both acquisition and production.
ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS
VALERIE DEAN (Executive Producer) is currently working as an independent producer on several
projects. Her previous film credits include serving as associate producer on Bill Condon’s “Kinsey,”
starring Liam Neeson in the title role. Dean was formerly Senior Vice President of Production at Pretty
Pictures, overseeing feature film, television and theater development for writer and director Neil LaBute
and producer Gail Mutrux. She began working with Mutrux in 1996 on projects ranging from Mike
Newell’s “Donnie Brasco” to LaBute’s “Nurse Betty” after serving as a story editor for Barry Levinson’s
Baltimore Pictures.
CHARLES J.D. SCHLISSEL (Executive Producer) most recently served as an executive producer on the
thriller “Flightplan” starring Jodie Foster. He was also executive producer on Christopher Nolan’s “Insomnia”
and “Red Planet” and co-producer on “Matchstick Men,” starring Nicolas Cage and Sam Rockwell.
Schlissel studied film and media at the University of Washington and San Francisco State University
before moving to Los Angeles to complete his education at UCLA. To pay his way through school, he
worked on independent films, music videos and commercials and did legal research for an entertainment
law firm whose clients included Marlon Brando and Orson Welles. The son of an aerospace engineer and
performance artist, Schlissel grew up around the country. He graduated summa cum laude from UCLA
with a degree in Economics/International Finance and Arbitrage; he was accepted into the AFI’s
producing program and, two months later, became Mel Brooks’ assistant on the comedy “Spaceballs.” He
went on to work as a production assistant on various projects before commencing a long-term association
with producer Stuart Cornfeld as a development executive.
Through an introduction from Cornfeld, he next moved to Barry Levinson and Mark Johnson’s newly
formed Baltimore Pictures as Director of Development. Two years later, he was promoted to Head of
Production, where he undertook the post-production work on Levinson’s Academy Award®-nominated
“Avalon.” During his tenure at Baltimore, Schlissel oversaw production on numerous high-profile features
including “Bugsy,” “Toys,” “Wilder Napalm” and Steve Soderbergh’s “Kafka.” He produced his first
feature, “Sniper,” just as the company was concluding its deal with TriStar Pictures.
Upon leaving Baltimore Pictures, Schlissel became an independent producer, with credits that include
“Heavyweights,” “While You Were Sleeping” and “Celtic Pride.”
A long-time collaborator with director Christopher Nolan, WALLY PFISTER (Director of
Photography) previously shot “Batman Begins,” for which he garnered an Academy Award® nomination,
as well as “Insomnia” and “Memento,” for which he was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for
Best Cinematography.
Pfister’s most recent film credits as cinematographer include Wayne Beach’s “Slow Burn,” F. Gary
Gray’s “The Italian Job” and Lisa Cholodenko’s “Laurel Canyon.” Other cinematography film credits
include Bill Morrissette’s “Scotland, Pa.”; Ron Judkin’s “The Hi-Line,” for which he won the Moxie
Award for Best Cinematographer at the Santa Monica Film Festival; Robert L. Levy’s “A Kid in Aladdin’s
30
Palace”; and Craig M. Saavedra’s “Rhapsody in Bloom.” His television credits include “Sanctuary,”
“Sharing the Secret,” “Breakfast With Einstein” and “Sketch Artist,” for which he was nominated for a
CableACE Award. Pfister has also lent his cinematography talents to numerous commercials.
NATHAN CROWLEY (Production Designer) previously collaborated with director Christopher
Nolan on “Batman Begins” and “Insomnia.” He also recently designed the fantasy romance “The Lake
House,” starring Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock. Crowley’s other recent film credits include Joel
Schumacher’s “Veronica Guerin,” John Moore’s “Behind Enemy Lines” and Barry Levinson’s “An
Everlasting Piece.” For the small screen, he designed the BBC series “The Ambassador.” As an art
director, Crowley’s credits include John Woo’s “Mission: Impossible 2,” Richard Donner’s “Assassins,” the
Dublin section of Alan J. Pakula’s “The Devil’s Own” and Mel Gibson’s “Braveheart.” Crowley also setdesigned Kinka Usher’s “Mystery Men” and John Carpenter’s “Escape from L.A.”
JOAN BERGIN (Costume Designer) is one of Ireland’s best-known film costume designers and her
credits have included Peter Howitt’s “Laws of Attraction,” Joel Schumacher’s “Veronica Guerin,” Bruce
Beresford’s “Evelyn,” Barry Levinson’s “An Everlasting Piece,” Alan J. Pakula’s “The Devil’s Own,” John
Schlesinger’s “The Tale of Sweeney Todd,” Pat O’Connor’s “Dancing at Lughnasa” and four films for Jim
Sheridan: “In the Name of the Father,” “My Left Foot,” “The Field” and “The Boxer.” She most recently
designed the costumes for “The Honeymooners,” starring Cedric the Entertainer, Mike Epps, Gabrielle
Union and Regina Hall.
On stage, Bergin designed Brian Friel’s “Translations,” starring Brian Dennehy, on Broadway and
returned to Lincoln Center in 1999 for their Friel season. Her work has also been seen on television in
“David Copperfield,” for which she received an Emmy® nomination.
Information contained within as of October 3, 2006.
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ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS
An editor and sound designer, LEE SMITH’s (Editor) most recent film editing credits include
“Batman Begins” for Christopher Nolan, Peter Weir’s “Master and Commander: The Far Side of the
World,” Gregor Jordan’s “Buffalo Soldiers,” Tony McNamara’s “The Rage in Placid Lake,” Craig Lahiff’s
“Black and White” and Alan White’s “Risk.” A long-time collaborator with Weir, Smith edited and sounddesigned “The Truman Show,” “Fearless” and “Green Card.” He was also an additional editor on “Dead
Poets Society” and an associate editor and sound designer on “The Year of Living Dangerously.”
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