In ‘Wonka,’ Timothée Chalamet Finds a World of Pure Imagination

Hugh Grant learned some years ago that if a filmmaker doesn’t make something from the heart, it shows. The films that work best, and are most loved, he's found, are the ones that the directors really meant.

It applied to his romantic comedies with Richard Curtis as well as "Paddington 2." And he’s pretty sure it’s true of "Wonka." The lavish big screen musical about a young Willy Wonka — before Charlie, before the chocolate factory — is dancing into theaters this month with its heart on its velvet sleeve.

Like the "Paddington" movies, "Wonka" was dreamt up by Paul King, a lifetime Roald Dahl fan and a writer and director whom his collaborators somewhat universally agree may actually be Paddington in a human costume. With a beloved troupe of actors, including Grant, Timothée Chalamet, Olivia Colman, Sally Hawkins as well as newcomer Calah Lane, its vibrant costumes and sets and a contagious "let’s put on a show" energy, "Wonka" feels like a modern homage to classic MGM productions of the 1940s.

But King wasn’t so sure about "Wonka" at first. He worried that like so many other "brands," a young Willy Wonka movie was something devised in a boardroom with visions of "12,000 movies and a TV show."

Then he went back to the book, which he’d read so many times as a child that the pages fell out of the spine. This time he found not just a great character in Willy Wonka, an unapologetically flamboyant dreamer whom Dahl also seemed a bit obsessed with, but also a breakthrough about his work.

"I realized how informative Dahl had been to everything that I love about family movies. They’ve got these great heightened characters, but there’s a real beating heart to them," King said. "It was like, oh this is the mothership."

And, with his "Paddington 2" co-writer Simon Farnaby (of "stop that stunning sister" fame), he would spend years toiling over what they’re calling a companion piece to the Gene Wilder "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory."

Chalamet, the wildly popular Oscar-nominated actor of "Call Me By Your Name" and "Dune," wasn’t technically a song and dance man (though his digital footprint from his teen years contains some evidence to the contrary) when he signed on to play Wonka. But King was convinced that he was the perfect person to balance "sincere" and "ridiculous" thanks in part to his memorable (and "hella-tight") performance in Greta Gerwig’s "Lady Bird."

This was a little baffling to Chalamet, who only learned this at the premiere in London. But for him, "Wonka" was a chance to do something a bit different, on a grand scale. He also understands audiences being a little skeptical of any spin-off of a beloved character, but he takes comfort in something Gerwig said while they were making "Little Women."

He recalled her telling him "something like, 'For anybody that’s saying that a lot of versions of this have been made, you know, when it’s done well, no one complains’. I think Paul really did that here."

In addition to "Pure Imagination" and the Oompa Loompa song from the 1971 film, Neil Hannon, frontman of The Divine Comedy, wrote six original songs, while Christopher Gatelli ("Hail, Caesar!") oversaw the choreography.

Though Chalamet grew up surrounded by dancers (his sister, mother and grandmother included), and had done musicals at his performing arts high school, he didn’t fully appreciate the exhaustive rigor of it. He’d trained for "Wonka" for months, but he was still not fully prepared for how taxing "take 13" of a large-scale dance number would be.

"He’s very modest and I think that’s one of the nice things about him," said King, who has compared Chalamet’s singing voice to Bing Crosby.

The sets, overseen by production designer Nathan Crowley ("Interstellar") were also something grand to behold. King wanted the city to look like "the best of Europe." In total, they built more than 50 set across three soundstages, a backlot and an aircraft hanger around Warner Bros. Studios Leavesden, in addition to several on-site locations in the UK to give the film its whimsical, but grounded feel. Lindy Hemming ("Paddington") designed the vibrant costumes.

Perhaps the most inspired twist of "Wonka" is Grant, an actor made world famous for his good looks and charm and romantic leads, who is playing an Oompa-Loompa.

King had already introduced Grant to a new generation of youngsters having him as the washed-up actor Phoenix Buchanan in "Paddington 2." When he was re-rereading "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" he found "Hugh’s voice" coming into his head for the devious little workers.

"They’re so biting and satirical and funny, but they’ve got a real kind of edge to them ... and they take an enormous delight in these children’s demise," King said. "I had this vision of Hugh Grant, you know, this high with orange skin and green hair. And once you have that picture come into your mind, you have to try and get it out there."

Grant is also a self-proclaimed miserable curmudgeon, which he’ll say with a straight face right before saying something completely contradictory. In his interviews, which often go viral, he’s witty and wry and reliably unreliable.

Yet when he talks about King, and "Wonka," and it all being from the heart, something melts away.

"One of the things that made those romantic comedies that I made with Richard Curtis work, apart from the fact that he’s very good at writing comedy was that he meant it. He really cared about love and he was always falling in love, falling out of love and being traumatized by it. But he meant it," Grant said.

"Paul King means all this. The message of Paddington and the message of this one, you know, family matters, the people you share your chocolate with. It’s not a trite, tacked on motto. It comes from his heart."

And it’s easy to believe that Grant, miserable though he may be, actually means it too.

But "Shogun", based on the 1975 novel by Australian-British writer James Clavell, broke the mould when the period drama series -- mostly in Japanese and hailed for its authenticity -- won 18 Emmy awards in September.
Other recent Japanese works have also become worldwide hits.
Franco-US-Japanese show "Drops of God", based on a manga of the same name, won best drama series at the International Emmy Awards in November.
Netflix's 2023 adaptation of the manga superhit "One Piece" -- starring Mexican actor Inaki Godoy as the lead -- was hailed by viewers and critics alike and will return for a second season.
More adaptations of major manga and anime hits are in the works, including the superhero adventures of "My Hero Academia" and the ninja escapades of "Naruto".
"Demand from Western markets is clearly increasing," said Kaori Ikeda, managing director at TIFFCOM, the content trade fair affiliated with the Tokyo International Film Festival.
But Japanese companies lack "know-how" when it comes to things like negotiating rights, she told AFP.
So TIFFCOM has organized Tokyo Story Market, a space to facilitate networking and meetings between international producers and Japanese publishers.
'Whitewashing'
Foreign studios are also getting better at avoiding some of the pitfalls of the past, such as the 2017 film version of the manga "Ghost in the Shell" starring Scarlett Johansson.
Critics accused the movie, whose main actors except Takeshi Kitano were all non-Japanese, of "whitewashing".
Similarly, the 2017 supernatural thriller "Death Note" was panned for veering too far from the original manga.
"Manga authors are highly respected and fan communities are very vigilant," said Klaus Zimmermann, producer of "Drops of God".
His adaptation takes some liberties, such as starring a French actor as one of the main characters, but Zimmermann insists it was developed in collaboration with the authors of the original manga.
"It was about finding the spirit of the manga so as not to distort it," he told AFP.
Yuki Takamatsu, a rights negotiator at the manga's publishing house Kodansha, said the process of adapting "Drops of God" was "amazing".
"Everyone was open to tackling those challenges together... At every step, everyone was understanding about how we should do it," he said.
Past failures were in part down to publishers struggling to communicate their wishes to foreign producers, who in turn lacked a proper understanding of manga and anime, Takamatsu said.
"Back just 15, 20 years ago, most of the enquiries we received from those big studios were like, hey, I know 'Dragon Ball', do you have 'Dragon Ball' IP?" Takamatsu told AFP.
"But nowadays, especially since Covid, the producers in their 30s, 40s, they watch anime together with their kids on Netflix or Amazon" and then reach out, he said.
Japanese TV goes global
Japanese broadcasters have also become "better and better (at) presenting and marketing their content" abroad, said Makito Sugiyama, executive director at the Broadcast Program Export Association of Japan (BEAJ).
This includes their participation at global events such as MIPCOM in Cannes, an annual trade show for the television industry, Sugiyama said.
Japanese broadcasters have long had success selling show concepts abroad, like the one for "America's Funniest Home Videos", known in Britain as "You've Been Framed".
Now, some Japanese dramas are also finding a wider echo abroad.
Nippon TV's original drama "Mother" became a hit thanks in part to its Turkish remake, and has been broadcast in around 50 countries.
Western viewers have overcome their initial reluctance to watch series with Asian actors, believes Masaru Akiyama, chief executive of the BEAJ.
"They have got used to it, they don't care anymore. They want to see, they want to feel the stories."
"Shogun" was "a game changer for Japan," he added, and Ikeda agrees.
"That a samurai story with such attention to historical detail can become mainstream entertainment is proof of the potential" of Japanese content, she said.

In ‘Wonka,’ Timothée Chalamet Finds a World of Pure Imagination