Newsgroup: it.arti.cinema
Titolo: Intervista a Gene Wilder

Ciao! Qualcuno č in grado di tradurre la seguente intervista a Gene Wilder, almeno
nella parte che riguarda il remake di Willy Wonka? Grazie!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2005/06/01/ftwilder01.xml
'Why would they remake Willy Wonka?'
First Hollywood and then cancer almost destroyed Gene Wilder. But, as Michael Shelden
discovers, he's tougher than he looks
For the past three decades, you could show almost any child a picture of Gene
Wilder's cherubic face and know it would be instantly identified as Willy Wonka's.
But childhood is never going to be the same after this summer, when Johnny Depp takes
on the role of the confectionery genius in the big-screen remake of Roald Dahl's
classic story. For many of Wilder's diehard fans, the existence of a rival Wonka is
sacrilege.
While Depp and his director, Tim Burton, wait to see whether the high-tech magic of
their version can top the primitive charm of the old film, the original star has been
politely evasive about this challenge to his long-standing position as a childhood
icon.
But the gloves came off last week when I sat down with Wilder at his home in
Connecticut and asked him directly whether he likes the idea of Depp taking his
crown.
His usual sunny expression clouds over and he throws his hands up. "It's all about
money," he says. "It's just some people sitting around thinking: 'How can we make
some more money?' Why else would you remake Willy Wonka? I don't see the point of
going back and doing it all over again.
"I like Johnny Depp, and I appreciate that he has said on the record that my shoes
would be hard to fill. But I don't know how it will all turn out. Right now, the only
thing that does take some of the edge off this for me is that Willy Wonka's name
isn't in the title."
It takes some doing to get Wilder riled in this fashion. But you can't blame him for
wanting to defend his own legacy. In any case, the mad pursuit of big profits in
Hollywood has been a sore point with him for years. It's one of the reasons he moved
away from California long ago.
"I like shows," he says, "but I don't like showbusiness."
In the Seventies, he was one of the hottest stars in the film industry, with one big
hit following another - Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein, Silver Streak, Stir
Crazy, The Woman in Red. He was in the rare position of being able to write his own
scripts and play romantic leads as well as comic figures. But he was never
comfortable as a Hollywood star.
"I was on Broadway first, then I was in Los Angeles for nine years. That was enough.
I still get nervous when I have to go out there. I don't like crowds, and everyone
always expects you to say something funny. I don't want that pressure."
If he had stayed in California, would his star have continued to rise?
He smiles. "It would have ruined me personally. It would have taken my soul. But,
yes, it would have helped me professionally. No doubt about that."
If you think Wilder seems more than a little neurotic, you're right. He has been in
therapy for years and still frets over problems and mistakes that go back to his
childhood, when he lived in Milwaukee and was the son of a Russian immigrant father
and a chronically ill mother, who suffered from heart disease.
He was in awe of his mother's beauty, but was always worried that he would say or do
something to aggravate her condition. And he worried that he didn't show his father
enough respect.
"I said something really stupid once. I told a friend that my mother was so
beautiful, but my dad was ugly. My dad heard it and just laughed it off, but I felt
guilty. It haunted me for years. I should never have said that."
As it happens, the smiling face of film star Gene Wilder became a convenient mask for
a far more troubled guy - Jerry Silberman, the actor's real name.
He likes to joke that he changed his name at the outset of his career because he
didn't think "Jerry Silberman in Macbeth" had the right ring to it. But there were
deeper reasons to stop being Jerry.
"I was a milksop as a kid. I had no confidence, no guts. I felt I was going to be
someone else someday - someone who didn't have my weaknesses. The name Gene appealed
to me partly because I liked the character of Eugene Gant in Look Homeward, Angel.
But I also had a distant relative named Gene who was a navigator in a bomber during
the war. He was handsome and looked great in his leather flight jacket, and I liked
that."
Does he ever miss Jerry?
"No, I'm Gene now. For a while, my sister would call me 'Jer', but that stopped 20
years ago."
He took his last name from the playwright Thornton Wilder. The transformation from
"milksop" Jerry to dazzling Gene was speedy and effective. Within a few years he had
won substantial parts in big Broadway shows - including One Flew Over the Cuckoo's
Nest, with Kirk Douglas - and was featured as the reluctant swindler in the legendary
1968 film production of Mel Brooks's, The Producers.
      With his wife Karen
His collaboration with Brooks turned out to be the best thing that happened to his
career, as he is quick to agree. He says that their work together on Young
Frankenstein was magical. But, given his objections to the new version of Charlie and
the Chocolate Factory, wasn't he angry when Brooks revived The Producers and adapted
it as a musical?
"Not at all. That's an entirely different case. The music is wonderful, the whole
experience on stage is great. It's not the same as the film. I guess you could call
it 'The Son of the Producers'. I love it."
For Wilder, success in showbusiness almost seemed to guarantee trouble in his
personal life. He has been married four times, with the first two relationships
ending in divorce. He has an adopted daughter - Katie - from his second marriage, but
for reasons he can't explain, the two have drifted apart and no longer speak to each
other. He has no other children.
His third marriage ended with the heart-rending death of Gilda Radner, a fellow comic
actor who was only 42 when she succumbed to ovarian cancer in 1989.
To nurse her through the long last stages of her disease, Wilder put his waning
career on hold. When he returned to it, he found there were few parts he wanted.
Gilda left him her big house in the Connecticut countryside, and he was reluctant to
move away. Sitting on a shaded bench outside the house, he waves his hand across the
wide lawn and says that he feels this is his permanent home.
"After Gilda died, I came out and sat on this bench and felt the roots growing from
my feet. I knew I was meant to stay here."
But the house itself held painful memories that he first had to confront and
overcome. "I took care of her when she was dying here. It was hard for both of us.
She loved this house and is buried three miles from here. I knew I couldn't live here
until I dealt first with some emotions that were weighing me down.
"I went through the house one night, talking to Gilda, yelling about some things that
angered me, getting rid of ghosts. I opened doors and closets and looked at the
clothes she left behind and came to terms with her death. I didn't want to be afraid
of living here. I had to make some peace with myself and with her spirit."
Two years later, he married his fourth wife, Karen Webb, a hearing specialist from
New York. After 14 years together, they are so happy in each other's company that
they still act like newlyweds.
But Wilder's contentment has not come easily for him. Mel Brooks used to joke that
his friend made the perfect victim on screen. "The wolves are waiting to devour this
sheep," he once said of him.
Indeed, in real life as well, Wilder seems to have had more than his share of misery.
Less than 10 years after Gilda died of cancer, he was diagnosed with non-Hodgkins
lymphoma.
Like Gilda, he went through a painful round of chemotherapy, which played havoc with
the unruly curls on his head. He says that he emerged from all his hospital
treatments - which included a stem-cell transplant - so wasted that he looked
"Auschwitzian".
For the past five years, his disease has been in remission. But age and illness have
taken a heavy toll. At 71, he has lost the bright blue spark in his eyes, and his
hair is a fascinating tangle of wispy strands that stick out in all directions and
seem to carry a permanent electrical charge.
He appears not to care in the least. He is happy just to be alive. These days, he
keeps busy painting and writing - unlike most stars, he wrote his own autobiography -
and takes the odd acting job when he feels like it, appearing most recently in the
television series Will & Grace.
His troubles have done more to strengthen his character than any of his successes.
The milksop is now a tough guy. Which is why he finally set to work in the past few
years and wrote his life story. He found that he could not only face the old demons,
but explain them to himself. If it all ends tomorrow, he says he isn't worried.
"I've become pretty philosophical about a lot of things, including death. It doesn't
get to me. I'm married to the woman I love, and I've done a lot of the things I
wanted to do. At this point, the way I feel, if it's over, it's over."
-- 
Solfamě
www.cartonianimati.3go.it
"Troppo biasimo chi richiede in altri quello che in sč stessi recusa."  (Leon 
Battista Alberti) 

 
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2005/06/01/ftwilder01.xml
Perche' rifare Willy Wonka?
Prima hollywood e poi il cancro hanno quasi distrutto Gene Wilder, ma, come
Michael Shelden scopre, e' piu' duro di quel che sembra.
Per gli ultii 3 decenni, tu potevi mostrare a praticamente qualunque
bambino una foto della faccia da cherubino di Gene Wilder e sapere che
l'avrebbe istantaneamente identificato per Willy Wonka.
Ma l'infanzia non sara' piu' la stessa dopo questa estate, quando Johnny
Depp prende per se il ruolo del produttore geniale nel remake per il grande
schermo della famosa stroai di Roald Dahl.
Per molti dei piu' testardi fan di G.W. l'esistenza di un altro Wonka e' un
sacrilegio.
Mentre Depp e il suo direttore, Tim Burton, aspettano di vedere se la loro
tecnologica versione possa superare il fascino primitivo del vecchio film,
la vecchia star e' stata educatamente evasiva riguardo a questa sfida alla
propria posizione come icona della infanzia di lunga durata.
Ma i guanti sono venuti via settimana scorsa quando mi sono senduto con
Wilder nella sua casa nel connecticut e gli ho chiesto direttamente se gli
piace l'idea di un Depp che si prende la sua corona.
La sua usuale espressione solare si rabbuia e lancia le mani in aria. E'
tutto per colpa dei soldi, dice. E' solo qualcuno da qualche parte che sta
pensando a come fare altri soldi. Perche' quale altra ragione bisognerebbe
rifare Willi Wonka? Non vedo le ragioni di tornare indietro e rifarlo tutto
da capo.
"mi piace Johnny Depp, e apprezzo che abbia detto alla stampa che non e'
sara' facile di prendere il mio posto. Ma non so cosa questo diventera'. Al
momento l'unica cosa che non mi fa saltare i nervi e' vedere che il nome di
Willy Wonka non e' nel titolo."
Ci vuole parecchio per far arrabbiare Wilder fino a questo punto. Ma non
puoi fargli una colpa del voler difendere il proprio testamento. In ogni
caso la folle rincorsa di ogni profitto in hollywood e' stata la amara
ragione per la quale se ne e' andato dalla california anni fa.
"mi piace lo spettacolo, ha detto, ma non mi piace tutto lo sfruttamente
che c'e' intorno"
Negli anni settanta e' stato uno delle star "piu' calde" nell'industria del
cinema, con un grande successo dopo l'altro: Blazing Saddles, Young
Frankenstein, Silver Streak, Stir  Crazy, The Woman in Red. Era nella rara
posizione di essere in grado di scrivere le proprie sceneggiatura e
recitare in ruoli romantici cosi' come in quelli comici. Non e' mai stato a
suo agio con le stelle di Hollywood.
"Sono stato prima a Browadwy, poi in Los Angeles per nove anni. E' stato
abbastanza. Divento ancora nervoso quando devo tornare la'. Non mi piace la
folla, e tutti si aspettano che tu dica qualche cosa di divertente. Non mi
piace quel tipo di pressione".
< il resto un altra volta >

 < il resto un altra volta >
Grazie mille!!!


AP :

Ok, mi esercito un po' in  traduzione, e continuo.
- Ma se fosse rimasto in California, la sua fama avrebbe continuato a
crescere?
Gene sorride. "Mi sarei rovinato, il mio spirito si sarebbe perduto. Ma sě,
professionalmente mi avrebbe aiutato, non ho dubbi su ciň."
Se pensate che Wilder sia un poco nevrotico, avete ragione. E' stato in
terapia per anni,  e ancora gira intorno a pronblemi ed errori che
riportano alla sua infanzia, quando viveva a Milwakee coi suoi genitori, il
padre immigrato russo e la madre era malata cronica di cuore.
Era affascinato della bellezza di sua madre, ma anche terribilmente
preoccupato di poter dire o fare qualcosa che ne peggiorasse le condizioni
fisiche. Nel contempo si preoccupava di non essere abbastanza legato a suo
padre.
"Una volta feci una cosa veramente stupida. Dissi ad un amico che mia madre
era molto bella, ma mio padre era orrendo. Mio padre mi udě e ci rise
sopra, ma io mi sentii in colpa. Per anni. non avrei mai dovuto dirlo.
In quel momento la faccia sorridente della sta Gene Wilder divenne quella
piu' adatta ad una persona piu' problematica - Jerry Silberman, il vero
nome dell'attore.
Wilder ama dire che cambiň il suo nome all'esordio di carriera perche' non
pensava che "Jerry Silberman in Macbeth" non avesse il suono giusto. Ma ci
furono ragioni piů profonde per smettere di essere Jerry.
"Ero un bambino pauroso, non mi fidavo, non avevo coraggio. Sentivo che un
giorno sarei diventato qualcun altro, qualcuno che non avesse le mie
debolezze. Il nome Gene mi piacque parzialmente per il personaggio
interpretato da Eugene Gant in Look Homeward, Angel.  
Ma avevo anche un lontano parente con quel nome che fu navigatore su un
bombardiere durante la guerra. Era un bell'uomo e appariva splendido col
giubbotto di pelle dell'aviazione.
- Non ti manca mai Jerry?
"No, sono Gene ora. Per un periodo mia sorella mi chiamo 'Jer', ma ha
smesso venti anni fa.
*****
Chi finisce?
P.
-- 
When you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you
want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.

 da capo.
Ma non siera ricreduto all'uscita della sala?
-- 
Gwilbor
gwilbor(at)
email.it
http://xoomer.virgilio.it/magaz/
"Strano gioco. L'unica mossa vincente è non giocare"

 Ma non siera ricreduto all'uscita della sala?
Boh, l'intervista e' vecchia, di sicuro dopo aver visto il film si e'
tranquillizzato. nessuno puo' conforntare questa boiata con l'immortale del
'71
-- 
- Come si definisce una donna che sa dove e' suo marito la sera?
Vedova.