Producer Charles Roven explains why Superman is still relevant after 75 years, how the Man of Steel project came together and a producer’s daily tasks.
Charles Roven: I think it’s pretty amazing. Just the symbol alone in all of its incarnation is in the top 3-5 most recognizable along with the cross. It’s an incredible thing. I think the idea of somebody who looks like us who has extraordinary powers, there’s a certain level of wish fulfillment to it. As the years go by and our attitudes changes, the character has to metamorphosize into someone more [contemporary].
Do you think he’s like human beings and we can relate to him that way?
Charles Roven: He’s not us – he has these special powers. The thing about him where in certain kinds of ways, he has lost his relatability. In a more simpler time, he was a more simpler character. It was easier for him to make black-and-white choices. He’s never had to debate his decisions. We felt in this movie that we had to create a character more complex.
Did this come through in the earliest draft of the screenplay?
Charles Roven: In the draft of the screenplay that David [Goyer] wrote, that was based on the story of David and Chris. It was massaged in an inspired way by Zack. That’s what happens when you are dealing with really great talents. You have an idea for a story, but ultimately the vision for the execution of that story has got to be with the director. When you are dealing with a director who can do so many things directorially like Zack can. The guy who is guiding the way the actors are interpreting is the director [with] the visual style that the director is bringing.
Can you elaborate on what Zack added to the project in terms of story?
Charles Roven: For example, Zack read the script and felt that what was great character-wise about Clark or Kal-El was that he had actual things that made him relatable to us, particularly when he is growing up. As he’s getting older he has a certain level of desire. He’s on a quest to find out who he really is. We are on a quest in our own lives. In order to make it feel real, Zack decided that he would shoot the movie hand-held that would make it feel that it was much more of today. Spontaneous is more immediate. Those kinds of things are the interpretation of the director. The way that he flies that give you a thrill like you were flying yourself, that is a directorial interpretation. How did you get involved in the production?
Charles Roven: I became involved through Chris [Nolan]. When he started in the early stages of pre-production on Batman Begins, because of the size of the movie he was looking for a producer that he could work with who could produce a movie of size. That was in 2003. We had the unbelievable great fortune to be working on Dark Knight Rises and Man of Steel at the same time. They overlapped shooting. It was impossible for Chris to be on the Man of Steel physically. In the early stages of pre-production, we talked. I knew when I saw Memento that he was a guy to watch. He was always doing his own thing.
What were your primary duties on Man of Steel?
Charles Roven: Together with [producer] Deb Snyder, we work with Zack on all of the above-the-line creative areas. The one thing that Chris kept in touch with was the script. We did revisions to the script. As we got closer and closer, the script became very very tight except for modifications to the action sequences. I worked very closely in the casting of the movie with Zack and Debbie and making those deals, even if we creatively decided jointly who we wanted to go to for the various parts. To pick the two fathers of Superman or the two mothers or Michael Shannon as General Zod, we would negotiate the deals . That’s a producer’s function, to work those deals out. The shooting schedules of those films are sometimes 2-3 times that of a regular film. We shot 125 days. Our global footprint was extreme over very large areas.
What was the location schedule like for the film?
Charles Roven: We shot in Plano Illinois and Chicago. Then we shot in Vancouver. We went to Vancouver Island and went up to the glaciers. Then we dropped down and shot in Mojave Edwards Air Force Base and went over to Bakersfield. When you have a wide global footprint and great well-known actors, it’s important to schedule their time as efficiently as possible. Because the schedule is so long, if they need to be there the entire time, it’s more expensive. It’s better to compress their time in that period.
How would you describe your daily tasks during production?
Charles Roven: The most important thing is making sure that Zack has all of the tools that he needs; making sure that all of the actors are comfortable so that there is no reason that they can’t do their work as quickly as possible. Looking at the dailies to make sure we don’t have to go back there or reconstruct it. When we picked Plano Illinois as Smallville, one of the things that struck us was as the result of an unfortunate train accident, one side [of the town] was taken out. We knew that we would have a big action set-piece in the town and destroy some of the buildings in the town. We constructed building that from a façade. Making those kinds of logistical decisions. Constantly being ahead of the production, thinking ahead. We had to build the Kent Farm to make it look like it was sitting in the middle of this farm field.
What about a film such as Man of Steel draws you in as a producer?
Charles Roven: Making the big movie is addictive. It’s so complicated and such a challenge. If somebody said to me you could only only big movies, I wouldn’t be happy. I really enjoy making both kinds of films. When you are doing a smaller movie, there are still moments in time when you need to open up the film, you need to give it some bigness in some areas.
How do you work with Snyder in the post-production phase of the film?
Charles Roven: Zack is an extremely collaborative director. We don’t want to interfere with his cut until he’s ready to show it. By the same token, we had a huge number of visual effects. Debbie and I looked at all of the visual effects. We looked at all of those shots as they were completed. We are not just releasing the movie in 2D. We are releasing in 3D and in IMAX. We are also involved in the marketing. You are not just doing the studio marketing. You have a tremendous number of promotional partners. It indicates to your audience that this is a big tentpole property. You want to make sure that they are going to use it in a way that is flattering to the film. You have to monitor those things.
With Man of Steel or the Batman films, are you working for the film or the studio?
Charles Roven: Every movie is different. My ultimate employer is really Warner Bros and Legendary. WB is the lead on Man of Steel – it’s their franchise. They are the ones who are hiring me. My job is to make the best movie possible. I owe my biggest allegiance to the film from an emotional standpoint and an execution standpoint. They want me to be as pure in that resolve as I can possibly be. When I have a great director to work with, and I’ve bought into his vision and he’s executing it, that makes my job fun and very rewarding. It allows me to do the best job I can and what the studio wants. I have to keep the movie in the forefront. It’s all about the film. The purer that I can keep that in general, the better experiences by and large I’ve had. By the same token, to me, and quite frankly to guys who I love to work with I want to make the best movie I can make but make it within the budgetary constraints that I can do it in. Notwithstanding the size of this picture, when we finished principal photography, we were done with the movie. We did the same thing on the Dark Knight. We all really understood the movie that we set out to make. There was a vision, everybody embraced the vision, we followed him, and everybody knew the movie we were making and how we were going to make it.
What in the end do you want the audience to take from Man of Steel?
Charles Roven: As much as Superman is an icon that in many ways because of his extraordinary powers is aspirational, one of our biggest goals was to make him relatable. We knew we had to make it exciting and make it a lot of fun, but we did that because we made the characters and particularly Superman so relatable.
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