What's it like to bring dragons to life?
Puppeteer and Tom Wilton "creature actor" Tom Wilton on creating How to Train Your Dragon
Universal Studios
- Laura Rutkowski
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The giraffe in Wonka, a velociraptor in the Jurassic World franchise, John Cena’s mermaid tail for Barbie — in his career as a puppeteer and “creature actor” Tom Wilton has brought many weird and wonderful creations to our screens.
His latest is Toothless the Night Fury in the live-action film How to Train Your Dragon, a remake of the animated version (based on the Cressida Cowell book). As creature puppetry supervisor, Wilton and his team brought the winged animals to life on the island of Berk, where Vikings have spent centuries fighting dragons until the chief’s teenage son Hiccup (Mason Thames) befriends one. Here’s how Wilton’s performances, combined with the technical wizardry of visual effects company Framestore, make for movie magic…
A STABLE JOB I was working in regional theatre and was given a tiny part in War Horse. Then I asked to be one of the horse puppeteers and had a two-week puppetry crash course. The first film I worked on was Star Wars Episode VII: the Force Awakens, which renewed interest in practical creature effects. They wanted War Horse puppeteers on the movie — the Luggabeast was directly inspired by Joey the horse.
NO BALLS, PLEASE Everyone’s heard the cliché of using a tennis ball on the end of a stick for an eyeline for an actor to act opposite. With a puppet, we’re there to provide actors with a scene partner. The more they believe the creature is real, the easier it is, and the quality of their performance is better.
FROM PROPS TO PUPPETS Typically, the prop modelling department would make something to represent a creature, but it was a prop that didn’t move. So we’d try to breathe life into this thing. The tipping point was [Harry Potter spin-off] Fantastic Beasts, when I got puppet and creature makers Stitches and Glue involved, who also designed all the puppets for How to Train Your Dragon.
Mason Thames filmed his flying scenes with Toothless on a robotic gimbal. Universal Studios
THE SCALES FALL We introduced Mason and Nico [Parker, who plays teen Viking warrior Astrid] to the methodology behind working with puppets. I asked three of the puppeteers from the stage production of Life of Pi to bring along the tiger puppet, as one of the references for Toothless was a panther. The original How to Train Your Dragon is Mason’s favourite film, so when we showed Toothless to him, he was in awe.
MASTER OF PUPPETS We had four Toothless heads — one for stunts; two lightweight heads that could be mounted to have different heights; and then the main, “hero”, puppeteer head. We had heads to represent all the other big main dragons, the Hideous Zippleback, Deadly Nadder and a hand puppet to represent the Terrible Terror.
EYE SEE YOU We originally had a fixed eye shape for the puppet head, but it made Toothless look startled all the time, so we put in different eyelid shapes so he could look angry, scared or sad. I could move the eyes so the iris would track where the actor was. I also moved his mouth, and he had four “ear plates” that could be pressed back against his head or flared out, indicating he’s inquisitive, startled or scared.
THE WHOLE TOOTH The body of the Toothless puppet is about the length of one and a half buses and was a 1:1 scale with the animated dragon in the movie. We had the head, a neck section, shoulders, front legs, a body section, back hips, back legs, the tail and a section of his wings. Everything came apart, so we were able to use as much or as little of Toothless as was required. We had up to five puppeteers on him and I was in the head. It’s made of foam, so it was relatively light. The heaviest pieces were the head and the tail. At least three people were needed to operate the latter.
Mason Thames as Hiccup riding on Toothless. Universal Studios
TAKING FLIGHT We also had a section of Toothless’s body that Mason and Nico could climb on and off. We created movement to make it feel like they were sitting on a living creature. For the flying sequences, there were also robotic gimbals for every dragon that the actors rode.
IN PUPPETEERS WE TRUST It’s taken a while to get the special effects community, and also producers and directors, to trust puppeteers. There’s a fear that the problems it will cause in post-production outweigh the benefits and that it binds them to a certain kind of performance, but we shoot takes with and without the puppet. Even with the best actors, something feels lacking without the puppets. It’s alive, it’s there, it’s real for the actor. In the final film, it’s lovely knowing there’s a trace of my performance.
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Authors
Laura Rutkowski
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