Just looking at Wes Anderson, with his clear-rimmed glasses, mussed hair, a velvet suit and New Balance sneakers, it's easy to figure out where he got the inspiration for Rushmore's Max Fisher. Like Max, Anderson was that guy who, in school, would write plays and have his buddies star in them. In The Royal Tenenbaums, the dry, hilarious, subtle humor that he and actor Owen Wilson have created (Wilson also co-wrote Bottle Rocket and Rushmore and stars in this film) comes onto the screen with precision, thanks to Anderson's meticulous direction. If he's deliberate and somewhat of a perfectionist, it's only because he wants to get his vision for each scene and the movie as a whole onto the screen.
"Wes has just kind of a specific way that he does things," comments Luke Wilson who plays the agreeable Tenenbaum brother and appeared in Anderson's three films. "I've worked with a few different directors, and they could care less what kind of chair you're sitting in, or how the table's arranged or even what you have on in the scene.... Wes focuses on every single aspect down to your watch and what kind of glasses you have on."
For The Royal Tenenbaums, Anderson and Owen started writing the script because, as Owen says, "It was Wes wanting to do a movie about a family of geniuses set in New York.... Things kind of spun out from there." Apparently, Anderson always had a fascination with people who were prodigies. "When I was a kid," Anderson admits, "I was really impressed by... this one kid who skipped a couple of grades. And he couldn't even do math in the school. He had to go someplace else to do math because he was past our whole school and he was like a kid who couldn't really, you know, get his lunch unwrapped. He couldn't deal with his normal life at all."
From that, we get the three Tenenbaum children: Ben Stiller's Chas is the business genius and the angry older brother; Gwyneth Paltrow is the adopted daughter Margot, the requisite brilliant playwright; and Luke Wilson is Richie, the tennis champion. Sadly for them, they don't last long as whiz kids. They grow up as strange failed has-beens, forgotten by the public. Anderson elaborates: "They all peaked early.... Something Owen and I were very interested in was, what happens afterwards? How do people deal? Often having some special skill or knack for something makes you different from everybody else. And it makes you not fit in in some ways, and less able to cope with some of the normal things, and then to have the thing that you're focused on so much sort of disintegrate.... It leaves people in a strange position."
The strange limbo in which the three Tenenbaum geniuses float around also revolves around Royal, their estranged smart-talking, insensitive patriarch (wonderfully portrayed by Gene Hackman) who, at the start of the film, separates from his wife, sweet Etheline, played by the venerable Angelica Huston. With a stellar ensemble cast, which also includes Danny Glover , Bill Murray and brings back the Anderson staple, the droll Kumar Pallana, for a third time, The Royal Tenenbaums stays true to the unique wit of Anderson's previous films. But there's a definite growth since Rushmore. The more serious Tenenbaums tackles heavier issues of finding love and family.
Set in a strange New York, the film flows like a book, strewn with various literary references from Fitzgerald to Sacks. The story, narrated by Alec Baldwin, literally unravels in chapters as it explores the impossibility of love that all characters face in their own personal and family lives when Royal comes crawling back after two decades at a hotel. In typical Anderson style, every exquisitely-composed frame is like a cool photograph, scenes interspersed with an impeccable musical selection ranging from The Beatles' "Hey Jude" to the Charlie Brown "Christmas Time is Here" theme song to Mark Mothersbaugh's signature melodies. The sharp language of Anderson and Owen Wilson again provides dry lines that are as funny as ever.
But whether or not it's really hilarious to the general public is of some concern. As Huston says of Anderson, "I think that he makes very serious movies under the guise of comedy," which separates viewers into those who get his wittiness or at least find it funny and those who don't. That may be why Bottle Rocket, as Luke Wilson says, had people walking out of screenings. Rushmore was better received, but each film created somewhat of a cult following.
When asked if it's difficult to make movies for smart people (those being the ones who enjoy his humor), Anderson says, "It's nice to be thought of making movies for smart people. I like that, but if that's part of people not getting it? Then yes."
And along the same lines as the Tenenbaum children, does Wes Anderson worry about turning from a sort of film "genius" into a has-been?
"I don't worry about it, but it does happen to everybody," he says. "Right now, one thing I feel like is that I have been able to make movies I want, that I'm, like, dying to make. I'm dying to make these three movies that I've done. But at a certain point, there won't be a movie that you're dying to make, and you make the next movie you're dying to make and it doesn't really gel, you know? And that usually seems to happen, it starts happening, but it's not something I'm really that concerned about because what are you going to do? You just try to make the best thing you can do."
So does Wes Anderson think people are finally getting his humor?
He answers tentatively: "More... people are. Now, yeah, I think so. This movie might have a bigger audience, possibly? Because of all the movie stars? Which is like a bigger chance for more people to not get it.
"So we'll have to see how that plays out."
Buena Vista Pictures Marketing sent Janet Kim on this all-expenses-paid trip to L.A. for the advance screening and interviews. On her trip, Janet claims, she became best friends with Penelope Cruz after a chance encounter on Rodeo Drive.
