THE ADVENTURES
OF CAPTAIN ZOOM
IN OUTER SPACE
|
This
black & white SF hero rockets from '50s television across the
universe & into real misadventure.
|
By
Kim Howard Johnson
Captain Zoom
is transported 400 light years away to lead a planet to freedom. The
only problem is that Captain Zoom doesn't really exist - he's
only an actor playing the part on a cheesy '50s SF-TV show.
Will he pass up the role of his life? Or despite his small screen
talent, can he actually thwart an evil tyrant, and free a planet?
The Adventures of
Captain Zoom in Outer Space, a $4-million two-hour movie airing
as an MCA-TV "Action Pack" feature, combines the fun of a '50s kids'
TV show with the adventure of a Flash Gordon serial, all draped
in '90s sensibilities.
Creator and executive
producer Brian (The Flintstones) Levant says they're walking
a semi-jagged line between comedy and adventure. "If I have any marketable
skill, it is to sustain a reality where both humor and danger can
co-exist and become credible, but at the same time, it has a different
sense to it," says Levant. "That's what I bring to Captain Zoom,
creating and sustaining that balance so that one doesn't overpower
the other, and they work together rather than in opposition.
Levant says the basic
concept came to him suddenly while he was driving. I had this image
of a Captain Video-like character transported to another planet, where
they believe him to be the person he portrays," says Levant. "I gnawed
on it for about six years before we shot it. I had never pitched it
anywhere, but when I signed with Universal Television, I insisted
that Captain Zoom be part of the deal, and they agreed!"
"The Monday after we
finished The Flintstones [screenwriters] Rick Copp and David
Goodman and I sat down for a week and hammered this out. Then we got
money for a design phase, so we would have a full script and a booklet
showing our weapons, ships and costumes."
Captain Zoom combines
many science fiction elements. "We tried to puree every SF epic that
we had ever encountered: a touch of Star Wars, a dash of Forbidden
Planet, a cup full of Flash Gordon, and a stick of Buck
Rogers, and put it on mix," jokes Levant. "The situations that
Captain Zoom finds himself in were familiar not only to us
as viewers and to him as participant, but on a different level. His
life has truly become a series of life-and-death struggles."
SF
Inspirations
The executive producer
admits that SF books and comic strips were important when he was growing
up. "They were a huge, huge influence." Levant says. "When talking
about Captain Zoom, I always hark back to being eight years
old and getting up on Sunday mornings to watch Flash Gordon,
and being overpowered by the visuals and the imagination. I didn't
know that Ming's great court was nothing but a soundstage floor
with I8-foot curtains! It took me to somewhere that I had never been.
It always stuck with me, and Captain Zoom is my attempt to
create the feeling that it brought to me, and add the dimension that
is my life's work - which is comedy - to combine those elements. I
tried to create a world where comedy and danger are credible, to try
and turn Captain Zoom from someone who plays a hero into the
genuine article.''
While developing the
movie's look, the Zoom universe went through some drastic reshaping.
"At first we tried to make everything come from insects and nature,
starting very naturally with ships that looked like giant beetles
and things," says Levant. "It was interesting, but it was at war with
the material. Then I was out with my son and we came upon a book called
Cars Detroit Never Built, a compilation of concept cars of
the '50s and '60s. I stared and picture after picture of great fins
and unnecessary chrome, and I said, 'This is what our ships
should look like!' From the back, the mother ship has the fins of
a '62 Chevy, and the doors of a '51 Studebaker! We even painted the
models with old automotive paint."
The filmmakers had to
use their ingenuity to achieve some FX, as when the interior of the
fighter ship was mounted on a computer controlled set to simulate
a ship's pitch and roll. 'We built a whole gimbal set with hydraulic
lifts," says Levant. "I'm not happy with building the whole inside
of the set and putting it on tires, and having grips shake it. When
they banked, I wanted the ship to bank. When they went into a nose-dive,
I wanted it to dive! We didn't lose any actors. but we threw
them around pretty good! You can't fake that. I didn't want to do
Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea where everyone puts their arms
out and goes side to side!"
The quality was there
down to the props, maintains Levant, who notes that their weapons
were not mass-produced cheaply. "We didn't have propmakers making
the weapons - we had artisans," he clarifies. "It wasn't just plastic
casts of guns. They lathed the aluminum, and made them with weight
and body. They weren't mass-produced, they had a personal touch. I
was just at a Planet Hollywood looking at Star Wars guns, and
I said, 'That's a Star Wars gun?! Ours really look like
death rays! They don't look like they belong to Hopalong Cassidy!"
Television
Families
The
cast features veterans and newcomers, including Daniel (Ed Wood)
Riordan as Captain Zoom, Liz (ER) Vassey as rebel leader
Tyra, Gia (Strictly Ballroom) Carides as the high priestess
Vesper, Ron (Beauty and the Beast) Perlman as the evil
Lord Vox, and Nichelle Nichols as the rebel seer Sagan.
"I can't say enough
about the cast," Levant raves. Nichelle's presence made us feel we
were in space! The first time she read, she did it with kind of an
English. high-tone accent. I said. ' You don't have to do that! Your
somebody who already commands the respect of millions! Try it again,
and be more like you!' So, she did, and brought it dignity and grace
and power."
The screenwriters were
equally delighted with the actress. "We were thrilled to get Nichelle."
says Copp. "She has been very choosy about what SF projects she does,
and we were very pleased when she came in and wanted to do this part.
"I'm a huge Star
Trek fan," Goodman admits. "The great thing about Nichelle, aside
from the fact that she's a terrific actress, is that you don't see
much of her. You see more of other Cast members. like Leonard Nimoy
and Walter Koenig, doing other SF things. but Nichelle has turned
down 25 SF projects since Star Trek. She brought real class
to this movie."
As for the other female
stars, "Liz Vassey, who I first hired when she was 14 for The New
Leave it to Beave, was the only person who ever read for Tyra,"
says Levant. "She came in to see us and she had grown up a lot - a
six-foot tall Amazon! Many times, you look at girls in these parts
and they're beating up guys, and you think, 'Oh, right! Liz
is a big, strong woman, and you believe she really could be leveling
these guys!"
'We also felt lucky
to get Gia Carides of Strictly Ballroom, because she doesn't
really do much television,' adds Copp. 'This appealed to her, and
it was a fun part.
Goodman notes that Perlman
is perfect in his role as the evil Lord Vox. "Ron really walked
that line between menace and comedy," he says. "Lord Vox is
a real villain and you believe this guy is evil. Our casting director
put Ron on a list, and when he read the script he came to us. He gave
a great reading, and we never saw anyone else after that."
The lead had to be a
relative unknown due to budgetary consideration, but it was a lengthy
casting process. Goodman explains: "We saw about 100 guys, and we
started to question the material, because many of those reading didn't
quite get it. Then Dan Riordan came in. He did his '50s Captain
Zoom voice…"
"…And he did it better
than anybody we had ever seen!" Copp interjects. "It was like you
would hear in those 1950s shows!"
"We saw him a second
time and he blew us away," says Goodman. "He hit every note, made
lines into jokes that we never even intended that way. He was just
perfect. He is Captain Zoom!"
"He's Dudley Do-Right!"
says Copp.
Heroic
Schticks
Copp and Goodman, whose
credits include Golden Girls and Wings, were brought
into the project by Levant. "Rick, Brian and I worked together to
flesh out the story and the planet's history," says Goodman. "We each
brought many different things to the table. When Brian brought us
the idea, we got very excited, I'm a big SF fan, and Rick's and my
background is in sitcoms."
"I'm more of a student
of science fiction," Copp says. "My earliest SF influence was when
Josie & the Pussycats went to outer space! I'm learning a lot
about SF."
"When we sat down to
do this, it was like someone was handing me my fantasy," says Goodman.
"We took a page from literary science fiction, and started looking
at Isaac Asimov's Foundation trilogy and Frank Herbert's Dune.
These men drew on the fall of the Roman Empire and the life of Mohammed,
so we tried to decide on a backdrop that would give this a similar
richness and texture and a multitude of stories. We chose the Middle
East and Israel, the Holy Land for many different religions, which
is surrounded by enemies. That's the basis of the Captain Zoom
mythology. Pangea is the Holy Land of the galaxy, and all of these
different races and religions consider Pangea their Holy Land, and
will fight to conquer it, while the Pangeans themselves fight to keep
their homeland."
Part of their research
involved watching Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers serials,
to which they paid tribute in Captain Zoom. "I was a huge fan
of those, and I think you can see that in the show," says Goodman.
"The arena fight is right out of Flash Gordon, but we have
our own little twist on it. Flash Gordon had to fight Prince
Barin. his best friend: Zoom has a real comic spin in that
scene. Zoom says 'I'm your friend, I won't be repulsed by your
face,' and when Simulus lifts his mask, our guy can't control
himself!"
According to the writers,
Captain Zoom is an antidote to today's violent, cynical heroes.
"That's the fun of it," Goodman notes. "He was never meant to be a
hero, and he's thrown into this situation and forced to deal with
it for his own survival. But he's an actor - and not a very good one!
He does find the hero within himself, so there is that serious aspect
to what's generally a comedy. In order to survive, this guy has to
find that deep down, he can be a hero."
"When we were researching
this, I wanted to lap up as much SF TV and literature as I could before
we started writing." says Copp. "The best part was finding these classic
'50s TV shows, like Space Patrol and Tom Corbett. We
watched some kinescopes and used what we saw for the scenes when he's
still doing his TV Show in the 1950s. Those shows were hugely comic-they
had a lot of unintentionally funny moments, which we were able to
mine for our scenes. We wanted a direct contrast to the '50s television
with the real adventure."
The writers say that
overall, they tried to maintain a balance between the comedy and the
adventure. "We tried to walk a line by making Zoom very fun,
very comic, but keeping the situations and adventures real, so that
we wouldn't turn away the SF audience." says Copp.
"This is not
a spoof." Goodman declares. "We want the adventure to be real and
exciting. The comedy really comes from the characters and their interactions."
Kids today may not be
familiar with the '50s SF shows, but the writers believe they don't
need to be in order to enjoy Captain Zoom. "Our intention was
for those '50s scenes to stand on their own," says Copp. "You see
a lot of bad television, and it may no longer be live, but it's still
out there everywhere, I think people can relate to bad acting, bad
scripts and cheesy effects. It also gave me a chance to write a part
for myself!"
Copp is on screen briefly
as Happy, Zoom's TV sidekick who is left in the '50s when
Zoom is transported to Pangea. "In retrospect we would have loved
to have had Happy beamed up there with him," laughs Copp, "but
cooler heads prevailed.
Goodman reveals, only
partially joking, that the predecessor of Captain Zoom was
actually inspired by STARLOG. This is a childhood fantasy of mine
to be interviewed by STARLOG," he confesses. I remember when I was
in junior high school, there was an article in issue #10 or so on
how to do homemade special FX. I got a camera from my uncle Marvin
and filmed a little space movie with my best friend, my cousin and
my sister. With inflation, I think it cost as much as CaptainZoom!"
There is a possibility
of a sequel or even an ongoing Captain Zoom series. We're talking
about both right now," says Goodman. "The last democracy in America
is syndicated television, so now we're waiting for the audience to
decide whether this is something they want to see. We're working on
a sequel script now, because the studio had enough faith to commission
it, so we're just waiting to see how the audience responds. Either
way, we had fun!"
The writers have considered
ideas if Captain Zoom returns. "Flash Gordon is the
template." Goodman notes. "Alex Raymond's strip was about Flash
Gordon coming to Mongo and uniting the people against Ming,
and I think if we were going to do Captain Zoom as a series,
we would do that with a comic spin. One thing that SF on television
doesn't do well is create whole worlds - you go to a planet and meet
five people, and they define the planet. Here we have the planet Pangea
- we're going to be defining the different races, some human, some
not so human - like the underground race we see in the first two hours.
It's going to be Captain Zoom's job to unite this planet."
The heart of this series
would be this actor trying to fulfill the biggest role he has ever
had, which is the role of the Promised One," says Copp. "And to the
people of Pangea he is their hero. There's a conflict between
the guy inside and what he's all about - an egotistical coward, and
yet having to lead these people and get comfortable as their revered
leader."
"There is also the conflict
between Tyra and Captain Zoom," says Goodman. "Tyra
is the real leader, and she must accept this vain, self-centered guy
as the messiah!"
No matter what the future
holds for Captain Zoom, it's creators are proud of their work.
"Even if we never do it again, I'm very happy with what we've accomplished,"
says Brian Levant. "I'm supposed to be out doing features and stuff,
but my heart is really in Captain Zoom. I've enjoyed every
moment of it, particularly designing the ships, the weapons, the costumes
and the world - and getting the imagination pumped up."
•
STARLOG/January
1996