The
TV movie focuses on Detective. Sara Pezzini (Yancy Butler) as she tries
to come to grips with the awesome powers of the Witchblade, a mystical
gauntlet that grants its bearer incredible powers
Essentially,
this is exactly what Top Cow Publisher Marc Silvestri envisioned when he
optioned off the Witchblade property to the Oliver Stone production company
in 1997. The Witchblade comic featured a sizzling hot female lead in Pezzini,
plenty of action and a cutting edge supernatural twist. A "Witchblade"
TV project seemed like a slam-dunk.
But
bumps along the way, and Silvestri’s insistence on how the character should
be portrayed, slowed the process.
"We
pressed for the look to be ‘NYPD Blue’ meets the ‘X-Files,’ " explains
Silvestri, an executive producer on the project. "Frankly, that’s what
took so long to get it on the air, we didn’t want a campy comic book show.
We wanted to change the genre. We’re the first ones to take a comic book
property and treat it as a drama."
So
in came director Ralph Hemecker, a veteran of gritty, supernatural-oriented
dramas like "X-Files" and "Millennium." Tagging along was the raspy-voiced
Butler, who’s previously lugged around a holster and flashed a badge in
"Brooklyn South" and played a junkie on "NYPD Blue."
"You
buy her as a cop," adds Silvestri. "She’s very attractive but she looks
like she’s walked the street as a cop, like she’s seen some very bad things.
She’s seen the underbelly of society."
"You
don’t play a cop, you play a person who happens to be a cop," explains
Butler, who grew up on the schoolyards of New York City imagining herself
as the Eartha Kitt version of Catwoman. "Sara’s vulnerable and strong,
kind of like myself. She’s real, both good and bad."
While
"Witchblade" will adopt the spirit of the comic’s first eight-issue storyarc,
this won’t be "Barb Wire" or "V.I.P." About the only thing you’ll see Pezzini
flashing in this film will be her gun.
"If
we had gotten some bombshell playmate," admits Eric Etebari who plays the
young and mysterious Ian Nottingham in the film, "people would’ve seen
through it as just a typical bad guy action film."
Here’s
what you can expect to see in the "Witchblade" TV movie: A Gothic dark
moodiness to the project, compared by some insiders to almost being "Joan
of Arc"-like at times. A young, hip cast including "Baywatch" veteran David
Chokachi as Detective. Jake McCarthy, Will Yun Lee ("Profiler") as Pezzini’s
partner Michael Yee, Etebari as Nottingham and Anthony Cistaro ("Angel")
as Kenneth Irons, the billionaire obsessed with possessing the Witchblade.
Ironically, Cistaro roomed at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles
with Brian Haberlin, one of the original co-creators of the Witchblade
comic that exploded on the scene five years ago making artist Mike Turner
an overnight megastar in the comics industry
The
question all fans want to know though is what will Sara Pezzini’s Witchblade
costume look like?
The
good news is Butler will strap on the Witchblade costume, but unfortunately,
for most of the film this will consist of just the mystical glove. Because
of the cost involved, Butler will only morph into the full Witchblade costume
at the film’s climax.
"She
won’t look like Sara in the Witchblade costume in the comic," said Silvestri,
"it just wouldn’t translate. This won’t be one effect after another, it’ll
be a police drama. Sara will wear the Witchblade when it makes sense."
With
"Witchblade," the emphasis isn’t on the effects. It’s about the mood, the
look, the feel of this gritty, urban cop drama. But more importantly, it’s
about Sara Pezzini and the Witchblade.
