For the 2001 comedy Monsters, Inc, Pixar Animation Studios devised all manner of squishy, creepy, cuddly, fuzzy, wobbly creatures to populate that tale of monsters who harness the energy of human screams to power their city.
Now, the film’s prequel, Monsters University, takes its familiar lead characters — the short, green, one-eyed Mike and his tall, furry sidekick, Sully, back to school.
Several new colourful characters attend the college, but one of the most curious additions is Art, a purple long-haired hippie-esque monster majoring in new-age philosophy. He’s one of the misfits of Oozma Kappa (“We’re OK!”), a fraternity Mike and Sully join.
With his wide, rainbow-shaped stance, he’s the kind of student who keeps a dream journal and is excited to “laugh with you and cry with you”.
From his shape, to his no-worries personality, to the way he moves (and scares), Art proved to be a designchallenge for the film-makers and animators.
The film-makers and animators were trying to base characters on college types, like jocks, cool kids and nerds. “And then there’s Art,” said the film’s director, Dan Scanlon.“We didn’t know what Art was. He was this mystery. And in a weird, kind of wonderful way, that became who Art was. We realised that that itself is a college type.”
STRETCHING A CONCEPT
Scanlon initially proposed making Art a theatre major. So sketch artist Chris Sasaki began with drawings in which he looks more alligator-like and sports a scarf.
“We were playing around with this longer-shaped, chest-out character, where he’s more theatrical and over the top,” Sasaki said.
But the story went in a different direction, and Art became more mysterious.
When the Oozma Kappa members are under threat of arrest, Art screams out, “I can’t go back to jail!”, One-liners like that abound, further complicating this character and what the audience does or doesn’t know about him.
It was art director Dice Tsutsumi’s idea to make Art purple, while the stripes came from Sasaki.
“I remember wanting to do the striping to kind of feel like tube socks in a way,” Sasaki said.
One feature that remained throughout the evolution of the design was Art’s giant mouth, which takes up much of his face. The team didn’t want the teeth to be sharp.
“We wanted them to feel a little less threatening and kind of inviting,” Sasaki said.
In the movie, Art is heavy on fur, especially at the feet, with small mangled speckles of different colours in that fur. His stance, movement and arms had three inspirations.
One was the whimsical performance troupe Mummenschanz.
“I showed Dan some YouTube videos, and there was this particular performance with a person inside a gigantic coiled tube,” Nierva said. “The tube was a character playing with a big ball.”
Another was the Muppets. Like those characters, Pixar wanted to make Art and the other monsters appealing, approachable and nottoo scary.
The third was a Saturday Night Live sketch, featuring Chris Farley as the motivational speaker Matt Foley who lives “in a van down by the river”.
“It’s the way that Chris Farley stood,” Nierva said. “He would spread his legs wide and put his arms between his legs as he’s making his point. And we loved how that look felt.” THE NEW YORK TIMES
Monsters University opens in cinemas tomorrow.
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