At 63, veteran actor Hugh Grant confessed that he wasn’t happy about playing an Oompa Loompa in the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory prequel, Wonka.
The film which is out this month is something that Grant describes as drivel.
Speaking about the camera rig he had to wear around his head he said, “It was like a crown of thorns, very uncomfortable. I made a big fuss about it, I couldn’t have hated the whole thing more.”
“And frankly what I did with my body was terrible, and it’s all been replaced with an animator.” He said it should have been a fun experience but it was all done by an animator in the end.
He said he had nothing personal against the film but claimed that it was because he had commitments. “I slightly hate [making flims] but I have lots of children and need money,” he said. Grant has five children; Tabitha, 12, John, 11, Felix, 9, and a 6 years old daughter and a five year old. The younger two children’s names have been kept out of the media.
Grant was confused
Grant also spoke about the role of CGI in the entertainment industry saying that it was confusing and made people unable to tell what’s going on. He said when making Paddington 2 in 2018 he had asked, “Is that a real bear?”
Wonka director Paul King said it was precisely Grant’s biting humor and sarcasm that made him choose Grant for the role.
“The Oompa Loompas don’t have any dialogue in the book, really, and the films, they’ve sort of got very little. But in the book they do have these very, very long songs – or they’re presented as songs, they’re poems.”
“But they’re so funny, and I was reading them sort of trying to get a voice in my head, and they’re so sort of biting and sarcastic and scornful and incredibly funny, and Hugh’s voice just kept coming towards me.”
The film Wonka focuses on young Willy Wonka and how he came to meet the Oompa Loompas.
Cover Photo: IG