"The X-Men cast didn`t read the comics from which their movie
roles were derived, and the same can be said for Yancy Butler. In fact,
like a lot of actors, Yancy Butler didn`t read many superhero comic books
at all when she was growing up. "I was a Mad Magazine reader. I really
wasn`t into superheroes," she admits. "I also did read Archie, Betty &
Veronica, Doonesbury and other newspaper strips, but never a real hero
comic." Of course, lack of familiarity doesn`t mean that Butler can`t portray
a comic book character.
So,
if she wasn’t a fan of the comic book, then what attracted this veteran
action-adventure star to take on the eldritch blade? "I was really attracted
to the script," says Butler. "I hadn`t known the comic book. I kind of
heard of Witchblade but I never saw the comic book until I got the part.
I wanted to do it because, Ralph Hemecker, who`s the director, is this
incredibly innovative storyteller. By going down and creating these situations,
he showed that Sara Pezzini has a lot of dichotomy. She`s both very strong,
but also very venerable at the same time. She`s very dualistic in nature.
Sarah has incurred some losses—her dad and her best friend. She`s soon
going to lose her partner. She`s not a happy puppy when we pick up in her
life."
As
portrayed by Butler and directed by Hemecker, the character of Pezzini
was a darn good cop. In fact, she`s a gold-badged detective with a great
partner named Danny Woo (William Yun Lee). When we first meet her, we learned
that her childhood friend was recently found dead of a drug overdose. Pezzini
suspects a local made man for not only killing her friend, but also of
having something to do with the death of her father, another hero cop.
As one can imagine, her opinion of this capo isn`t the highest.
The
relationship quickly reaches a head when she and her partner meet up with
the capo and one of his goons on the streets of New York. The goon loses
his cool and pulls out his guns. While Woo quickly pins down the capo,
Pezzini chases the hit man into a museum. There she comes in contact with
a medieval weapon display. A sword and gauntlet in the collection virtually
leaps onto her hand, saving her life from a rain of bullets in the process.
One of those bullets hits a gas pipe, and you can imagine what happens
next.
The
most bizarre thing is that, while the goon ends up more toasted than a
campfire marshmallow, Pezzini walks out of the explosion without a scratch.
She also finds she`s wearing a bracelet she never saw before.
Comic
book fans know all too well, the bracelet-sword is the mythical Witchblade,
whose former owners included such noted female warriors as Joan of Arc.
Pezzini doesn`t have a clue about this, but you know she`s going to find
out that being the bearer of an eldritch weapon has its fantastic moments.
The
thing is, even though Witchblade could have gone headfirst into the fantasy
realm, at its core it stays a cop drama. This appealed to Butler to no
end.
"I
liked that this project didn`t go the way of a lot of other adaptations,"
says Butler. "Often the women end up being caricatures of themselves. They
become either the mean hard-ass or the sexy whatever. For better or worse,
I just don`t care about those kind of roles as much. I look for characters
that work more in terms of a real person. I think Witchblade is very realistic.
I couldn`t help but think, What the heck would you do if you woke up and
this thing was on your wrist and all the people around you were dying?
So I think people can relate to Sara."
Also
like a good cop drama, the series is drawing heavy on its actors to carry
the project, especially Butler. "Yeah. Bless Ralph," Butler jokes. "Being
in 95% of film was fun...now. I joke with them that, when we go to series,
we definitely need a B story so I can get some time off. Besides, all these
other characters need to be known, which will happen. Otherwise, it was
a lot of work.
"Ralph
and the powers that be were the ones who brought it down to a realistic
level. This way I really care about Sara and what happens to her. She was
designed to be a more realistic character than the comic right down to
her wearing more sensible shoes. The main concept of the series is this
mysterious bracelet on her wrist and how she reacts to it.
"I
mean we`re not acting in the Comic Book Zone."
Sara
Pezzini is in her red Versace dress and the metal bra, as I call it, that
kind of outfit wouldn`t presume well for an NYPD detective. You would not
see her running down the streets of New York dressed like that. The good
news is Mark Silvestri and the powers that be were also happy with the
way we portrayed her."
Not
that there aren’t some sequences wherein Pezzini does wear a metal bra—or,
to be more accurate, a metal teddy. It was primarily used only in dream
sequences, and it wasn`t much to Butler`s liking. When asked what it was
like to wear that get-up, she called it "cold and heavy," adding, "It was
kind of fun, but it was not that user-friendly. We actually had two suits.
The first was kind of the sexier version of the one that was shown at the
end. But those were fantasy sequences, so it was appropriate for her to
be all donned in armor. But to wear that all the time would have been...well,
you know...a nightmare."
On
the other hand, it appears that Butler had a great time working with the
other actors, particularly Lee; Kenneth Welch, who plays her C.O., Joe
Siri; and David Chokachi, who plays Jake McCartey, her new partner after
Woo`s untimely demise from the same mafia capo.
"All
my relationships with the actors are really wonderful. I`d love to see
how they play out," Butler raves. "I mean, poor Jake! Here`s this character
who`s obviously in love with Sara, and she`s frustrating him every possible
second. She comes to his apartment looking for help, climbs into his bed
with her clothes on, and falls right asleep! Then in the morning when he`s
making breakfast for her, she bolts right out the door. David and I are
constantly joking about him playing Jake. I`d like to see where that goes."
As
for William Yun Lee, even though his character is killed early on in the
film, that doesn`t mean you`ve seen the last of him. Butler hopes that
he will return when Witchblade becomes a regular series, because of the
chemistry established between the characters. "We actually nailed that
pretty quickly," she says. "William Yun Lee is a doll to work with. I think
his character has been left very open because the chemistry was so good.
The idea is if we do go to series, why not have it go kind of Quantum Leap-ish,
where Sarah goes back in time or have Danny come back again from the dead
to talk to her. We left that very much open."
As
for the direction, you can`t help but notice that Hemecker stole a couple
of pages from John Woo`s book: bullets traveling in slow-motion and the
extremely acrobatic, semi-surreal fist fights. Butler should know this,
as she co-starred with Jean-Claude van Damme in Woo`s first American movie,
HARD TARGET (1993).
"It`s
very balletic, poetic choreography," she notes. "What made Witchblade so
different from the action pictures is you always have to react to something
that you don`t see, whether it`s a speeding bullet or a bad guy off the
screen. With this movie, we were reacting to the Witchblade, which we had
no idea what it was going to look like until after the film was done. What
many people don`t realize is most of that was done in post [production].
I mean I was wearing a metal glove, but where the bullets were going to
ricochet, how it was going to look overall, I took a leap of faith right
into Ralph`s arms."
This
meant Butler did a lot of blue screening for this film. While not unfamiliar
with the process, she still found doing Witchblade presented its own challenges.
"In films like The Perfect Storm, you knew a wave was coming at you and
could react to that," she noted. "With Witchblade, we were all kind of
learning as we went along on how we wanted to portray this thing. Not only
was my character learning with the audience, but so was Ralph, as we learned
what was available to us. So I never quite knew what I was reacting to.
Silvestri was around. Thank god. But there`s only so much consulting you
can do."
At
present, TNT has only committed to the movie pilot, not the series. Butler
thinks the series is only a matter of time, however. For starters, Turner
will be airing the telefilm seven times over the next week. "They even
moved up the air date," Butler adds. "It was originally supposed to air
in October. That`s never a bad sign.
"I
would love to see this go to series, in part because I`m curious to see
what happens to her. We left the series so open-ended. I know when something`s
good, honestly. I don`t promote all the things I do. This has the potential
to be extremely juicy. I say this because I was in all but about five frames
of it, so I have a good idea of how good it is. There`s things in here
that I`m agape about. There are shots that after I saw them I am so enthralled
by them that I think it`s great.
"In
fact, I think they would be very silly not to take it," she concludes.
"I think it`s a great show and extremely marketable. Whether it ends up
a couple of movies or a full series, it`s extremely lucrative, and `tis
the season for hero shows."
There
aren’t many comic book fans out there who had a problem with the X-Men
movie after actually seeing it. Somehow, one has the feeling that after
seeing Butler in Witchblade, fans won`t have a problem with her, either.
