M. Night Fans » Blog Archive » Cliff Curtis talks Fire Lord Ozai in The Last Airbender

CraveOnline interviewed Cliff Curtis about his work on the tv series Trauma and The Last Airbender came up.  Here’s a portion of that interview.

CraveOnline: How was shooting The Last Airbender?

Cliff Curtis: It was wonderful. It was really great and it’s also great that I’m going to be able to work the two. I’m not giving up film. I’m just doing another job that happens to be on television.

CraveOnline: Are you playing a character from the animated series?

Cliff Curtis: Yes, I am. I’m playing fire lord Ozai.

CraveOnline: Did you take anything from the animated form?

Cliff Curtis: I’ve not watched it. I didn’t want to watch the animated form because I knew the director, M. Night, was going to depart from that.

CraveOnline: You must be dealing with a lot of pyrotechnics. How do you deal with that?

Cliff Curtis: Fire, well, that’s a good spin. Is there anything in particular about fire? Yeah, just don’t touch it. I don’t know, don’t touch it, you’ll get burned. In particular, I’m so in the world of making a movie. They have safety meetings before anything is done and all the safety people gather around, so I’m so protected from the fire, I don’t even get near it.

CraveOnline: Do you have a visceral feeling when the explosions go off?

Cliff Curtis: No, because both of my characters, whether it’s Rabbit or the fire lord, actually are very comfortable in those situations. So I pretty much just ignore it.

CraveOnline: Both this show and the Airbender movies, this will be the first time you’ve played the same character more than once. Is that a different approach?

Cliff Curtis: I’m yet to discover that. I don’t really know. You’re right, I haven’t done that so I’m about to figure out what that’s like. I think the big difference so far that I’ve discovered is that in a film, it’s very contained. So we know before going in to make the film what the film’s going to be, and then when the film is completed, we find out what it is. Whereas television, as far as I’m discovering, it evolves. As the show evolves, everything’s fluid. Characters can disappear tomorrow as you see in the pilot.

CraveOnline: What is M. Night like on the set?

Cliff Curtis: He’s very deliberate and predetermined, extremely. He’s planned everything. Storyboarded to the frame.

CraveOnline: So you’ve seen the movie already pretty much?

Cliff Curtis: No, he doesn’t show those to you unless he’s trying to explain what he wants in a scene, so I only get a portion of that, that’s relevant to what we’re shooting.

Read the rest at CraveOnline