The
Chronicles Of Narnia return, berthed at a new studio (20th Century Fox) as The
Voyage Of The Dawn Treader sets sail on December 10 with Eddie Izzard joining
Ben Barnes and Georgie Henley on an epic journey aboard The Dawn Treader ship
in this Michael Apted directed family blockbuster.
Eddie appears in the beginning and around
18:55 (thanks Annette)
'Narnia' star a humble prince By JIM
SLOTEK -- Sun Media (excerpt)
Barnes' only real regret is he never got to
meet Eddie Izzard, the British comedian who voices the Narnian character of Reepicheep,
a warrior-mouse who joins Caspian in the war against the Telmarines.
"Eddie
Izzard is one of my comedic heroes, I've seen him, like, three times onstage and
obviously I didn't meet him when we were shooting. It would have been great. It
was obviously exciting to see me in the movie having conversations with one of
my heroes when I'd been talking to a piece of wire. He was definitely better than
the wire.
"I still haven't talked to Eddie, but I just did a film called
Easy Virtue, which is kind of a Noel Coward thing, and Eddie does a sketch in
one of his videos about the British film industry and how nothing ever happens.
People walk into a room, 'What are you doing?' 'Well, I'm just moving books to
the left.' 'I didn't realize you'd be in here.' 'Well, I am.' 'Well, I think you'd
better go.' 'Yes, I think you'd better had.'
"And I was doing a scene with
Colin Firth in the film in which we realized we'd said nothing to each other.
And we said, 'Instead of doing this scene, why don't we do (Eddie's)? We'll go
in and do this little skit in the first take.' And that's what we did.
"So
I'm hoping it makes the DVD extras. I'll send a copy to Eddie Izzard and hope
he think's it's funny."
Eddie Izzard
lends voice to The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian By
Anita Singh, Showbusiness Editor
Izzard will voice the
diminutive Reepicheep in The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, the sequel
to CS Lewis classic The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe.
This is the first
image of Reepicheep from the Disney movie, which is a mix of live action and computer-generated
animation.
Izzard
said of the role: "I didn't see myself as Reepicheep but then I thought that it
may be fun.
"And looking again at Reepicheep I realised that he has always
been recorded in a high, slightly camp voice because of the overt language that
he uses and his chivalrous nature, but actually he is a murderous little so-and-so
of a mouse. I see him as the Mad Max of mice."
The Narnia books have sold
90 million copies since their publication in the 1950s.
Prince Caspian
is the second in a series of seven.
Disney turned The Lion, The Witch and
The Wardrobe into a hit film in 2005 and this is the eagerly-awaited follow-up.
Izzard,
46, fell in love with the Narnia books as a child.
"I read them all and
I didn't really read many things as a kid. The Narnia ones I really got into and
I read every single one of them," he said.
"I think it was the wish fulfilment
- you go off and become adults, get swords and horses and fight battles.
"Kids
want to get these powers and you are hungry for it when you are 10 or 11 or 12.
"You feel you can go out and do all this stuff. So it was that and the
imagination - that in The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe, in the back of a wardrobe,
there is a door to another world - that is just amazing!
"I liked The
Magician's Nephew as well - you put on a ring and you go to another place. A magic
ring - wow! Then there's the one with a secret door in a wall. It was those things
in which they took you to a place where the wish fulfilment and the adventure
were huge. They just really grabbed me."
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince
Caspian is released in the US on May 16 and in the UK on June 26.
Movie
tie-in editions of the books will be published by HarperCollins on May 5
FRIDAY, MAY 16 (release date)
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian — Director Andrew Adamson follows up
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe with Stage 2 in this cycle of C.S. Lewis
adaptations. This time, those intrepid Pevensie kids return to Narnia and help
its rightful heir reclaim the throne from his wicked Uncle Miraz. You know what's
cool? Eddie Izzard playing the voice of Reepicheep.
Eddie
Izzard (Voice of Reepicheep) - "He's like Mad Max crossed with a guy like
William the Conqueror. He just goes around slashing and killing. His sole interest
in life is to pile up dead bodies. Mad Max's wife and child were killed in the
first film and I can only assume that's what happened to Reepicheep, because he's
so driven by rage and revenge. But he also has the code of honour which limits
him. In previous versions he's played in a camp way - everyone does him in a high-pitched
squeaky voice. I wanted to dump that. He's basically Mad Max as a mouse."
(FROM
AIN'T IT COOL NEWS) Adamson and I talked about Reepicheep and how much
I'm looking forward to seeing what Eddie Izzard brings to the fan-favorite violent
sword-swinging mouse. Adamson said that he didn't really find the character of
Reepicheep until Izzard came in to record his dialogue. He had an idea, he said,
but he came to find that he had subconsciously lifted a lot of his character for
Puss N' Boots when doing SHREK 2. So, he couldn't lock down a character that was
different from Puss until he heard Izzard give his voice. Then things began clicking.
EDDIE CAST AS REEPICHEEP IN NEW NARNIA MOVIE Another report
from BNAT 9 has revealed the voice of Reepicheep: Eddie Izzard (stand-up comic,
voice of Bee Army General in Bee Movie) will be the voice of Reepicheep in the
Prince Caspian movie.