Luc Besson and Caleb Landry Jones discuss working with dogs and singing Edith Piaf, for 'DogMan'

(31 Aug 2023)

ASSOCIATED PRESS
Venice, Italy - 31 August 2023
1. Wide shot Luc Besson joins cast and producers for "DogMan" press conference, push to medium Caleb Landry Jones and Besson
2. SOUNDBITE (English) Luc Besson, writer/director:
"I'm writing since I'm 16 years old every morning at 5:00 a.m., and it's my way to escape this world. And when I read this article, I just figure what kind of life this boy can have after that, when you cut your roots like this and your parents throw you in a cage, what do you became? You became a terrorist or Mother Teresa or what can you became? And I just tried to imagine his life, in fact. And that's it."
3. Wide shot press conference
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Caleb Landry Jones, actor
(Luc Besson - off camera) " He's working on the on a character in Scotland, so it's not his normal voice, but he needs to stay in character. And so if you don't understand so much the accent, you know, it's brilliant accent, but..." (comes into shot as hugs Caleb Landry Jones)
Caleb Landry Jones: "It will be better in the film. But I was very lucky that Luc gave me so many different things to take when I first got there. I'm staying with some wolves for a few days, for instance. I was also got a lot of help from another actor, Tonio. How do you say pronounce the last name? Descanvelle. And he was helping me phonetically learn the Edith Piaf song because otherwise I would not have been able to do that. Wearing a corset. A lot of limping around."
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Luc Besson, writer/director - on helping the dogs get comfortable with them
"We have a ritual every morning because there's basically 100 dogs, and every morning they go in the park. They have a big park. And we were in the park every morning. You lay on the floor, they kill you in 10 minutes. You're like full of mud. But I think it helps us like on the set after the dogs knew him and knew me, and that helps a lot."
6. Wide shot press conference
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Luc Besson, writer/director - on the dogs:
"And we have one French star. His name is Dorman the Doberman, the one who's like this. He is never with the other. And he comes specifically, you know, he has one day of shooting for him. But he was very cute. My favorite is one, like, 80 kilos. It's just like, come over you and Iick you everywhere and you're destroyed for the day. But that's okay."
8. Close-up Caleb Landry Jones
9. SOUNDBITE (English/French) Luc Besson, writer/director - on the dogs:
"One thing that I didn't expect is there's 25 trainers and they have two dogs each. So during the take, the dogs just react with the voice of their master. So when you say 'action,' there's 25 people screaming at the same time. (French) 'Lie down! Lie down! That's it! Lie down.' 'Go! Over there! Lie down!' (English) "25 at the same time. And Caleb is reading Shakespeare."
10. SOUNDBITE (English) Luc Besson, writer/director
"And the trainers have to hide everywhere. So every time you see an armchair or a table, there's a trainer under it. They were on the roof, on a ladder. So you just get used to it. That's it. But it takes it takes a week."
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Caleb Landry Jones, actor - on sharing scenes with the dogs:
"When you turn around and there's 35 dogs looking at you, you know, it's quite something. Maybe baking that cake was quite surreal just to turn around and they're all, you know, looking at you, quite amazing and silent too."
(Host: "And what about your performance as Edith Piaf?")
"There was a lot of folks in the crew that were crying. So something must have happened that day."
9. Wide shot press conference






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