When I interviewed Eva Green for Casino Royale, I tried to get some His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass gossip out of her. While she confirmed that the film version of Philip Pullman’s anti-religion fantasy book would retain all the Church-y aspects that we once thought had been excised, the only other ‘interesting’ thing she had to say about the film was that all of her polar scenes were shot with a green screen.
Has the French actress spilled to her own countrymen? Hard to say – a French site has a scan of her interview with Francais magazine Studio, which mentions her costars in The Golden Compass as Nicole Kidman, Eric Bana, Kevin Bacon and John Hurt. Which is weird, because those last three names are totally new in terms of being associated with this film.
So is it possible that these three guys will be in the movie? I think Bana would make a great voice for Iorek Byrnison, the warrior polar bear. And heck, Kevin Bacon or John Hurt would be fine voice actors for any of the main character’s daemons (in this world every human’s soul is represented by an animalistic daemon). But I think what’s really going on here is that the Studio piece was long lead, and that these names were being thrown around at the time. I would say that it’s a false alarm… for now.
By the way, I never reported this on CHUD, but Sam Elliot has been cast as the Texan aeronaut Lee Scoresby – an unbelievably good bit of casting. I wonder if Kevin Bacon had been considered for that role.