Chloë Moretz Discusses the Tone of Tim Burton's Dark Shadows and Teases a "Really Dark Secret"
Posted 09.21.11 by BrentJS
Back in May, during the first week of production on his new movie, Dark Shadows, director Tim Burton (Alice in Wonderland) was asked to describe the tone of the movie. He seemed to struggle to find the right word for his adaptation of the '60s gothic soap opera of the same name, first calling it "weird," then "funny," and finally "ethereal." When young cast member Chloë Moretz was asked the same question during a recent interview with GTBP, she also seemed unable to pinpoint the tone, describing it as a mixture of several of Burton's classic movies and creating a new genre category for it: "drama horromedy thriller."
I have to say it’s a mixture of Beetlejuice, a teeny bit of Sweeney [Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street] and the scariness of Sweeney but the fun of Sleepy Hollow with the scariness of Sleepy Hollow. I’d definitely say it’s a lot like Sleepy Hollow because you go from the Ichabod Crane (Depp) character to the Headless Horseman (Christopher Walken) who’s comedic and yet terrifying. It straddles that fine line of camp and drama so it’s like a drama horromedy thriller.
Written by Seth Grahame-Smith (upcoming Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter), the movie follows Barnabas Collins (Johnny Depp), a wealthy 18th Century playboy who is transformed into a vampire after being cursed by a witch (Eva Green). He spends two centuries in a tomb and is finally awakened in the 1970s to find his descendants are a dysfunctional lot. Moretz plays Carolyn Stoddard, one of Barnabas' distant relatives, and she teased that her character has "a really dark secret" that will surprise even the fans of the original TV series.
[Carolyn's] a really fun character. She is crazy. She is this teenager, like 15-year-old hippie who is into The Carpenters and Alice Cooper. She’s super music-y and raw, like free love, you know. She’s fun. I can’t say much because he has a really dark secret I can’t tell you.
Dark Shadows is currently in production in England, filming at Pinewood Studios and on location. The cast includes Michelle Pfeiffer as Elizabeth Collins Stoddard, Eva Green as Angelique Brouchard, Helena Bonham Carter as Dr. Julia Hoffman, Bella Heathcoate as Victoria Winters, Jonny Lee Miller as Roger Collins, Gulliver McGrath as David Collins, Jackie Earle Hayley as Willie Loomis and Thomas McDonell as young Barnabas.
Next Showing: Dark Shadows opens May 11, 2012