Lauren Ambrose prepares to do wild things with her voice.
The Hollywood Reporter is saying that Michelle Williams has been taken off the Spike Jonze production of Maurice Sendak’s classic children’s book, Where the Wild Things Are. She is being replaced with Lauren Ambrose.
The film is a mix of live action, puppets, and computer animation. Williams had been doing the voice for KW, one of the giant Wild Things. Regarding her departure, a production source says:
“The filmmakers enjoyed working with Williams, but her voice didn’t match their original vision of how the Wild Thing should sound.”
This begs three questions:
- Didn’t they know how Michelle Williams sounded before they cast her? If so, has she changed?
- How does Michelle Williams sound, anyway? I, for one, couldn’t identify her voice if she was announcing, “Hi, I’m Michelle Williams.”
- What does a Wild Thing sound like. Okay, I guess the answer is Lauren Ambrose.
Ambrose is very much around these days. She’s in the just released Frank Langella pic, Starting Out in the Evening; she’s taping the Fox show The Return of Jezebel James, along with Parker Posey (wow…does this show really belong on Fox?); she played Juliet last summer in Shakespeare in the Park’s production of Romeo and Juliet. Williams has a small part in the just-released I’m Not There (which I saw…still can’t think of her voice).
Wild Things has a Dave Eggers screenplay and stars, amongst others, Forest Whitaker, James Gandolfini, Catherine Keener, Catherine O’Hara and the suddenly in everything Paul Dano. What’s the over/under on how many of them will say they’re doing this movie to be in something their kids can watch? Anyway, Wild Things is set for a fall 2008 release.
Of course they knew how Michelle sounded, that’s why they cast her. I just think that they didn’t like her as a person because from what I’ve heard she can be very rude and has a bad attitude.
Jane, I wonder if you’re the person who I think.
These filmmakers are Not fools. It’s money.
Because she was rude(like you imagine), they fire her after they worked together with her the whole process??! It’s a funny idea!
Maybe you just saw or only found the bad comments about her on the net in your spare time, but I just wonder why I found many nice comments about the encounters with her from other people before. It’s kind of weird.