Editor’s Note: This was originally published for FANGORIA on October 22, 2014, and we’re proud to share it as part of The Gingold Files.
Director Bong Joon-ho’s Snowpiercer (on Blu-ray and DVD from Anchor Bay and VOD from Radius-TWC) is a visual marvel, but it’s also a model of taut, imaginative storytelling. To help him realize this action-packed, character-rich scenario, Bong brought on board Kelly Masterson, a longtime playwright who made a striking impression with his first produced screenplay, Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead. Fango sat down with Masterson to discuss his trip into a frozen future.
How did you come to collaborate with Bong on Snowpiercer?
It was absolute serendipity, out of the blue. Director Bong had seen Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead and admired it; I didn’t know him and had never met him, and he just called me up one day. It was not “Do you want to take a meeting, do you want to discuss it?” or “I’m interviewing writers,” none of that. He said, “Do you want to collaborate with me?” I was familiar with Mother and had not seen his other work, but I didn’t really need to see anything else; Mother was enough. I said, “Yeah, absolutely, man,” and that was it; the next day, we were working together.
Did you actually collaborate face to face, or was it a lot of electronic communication?
It was mostly electronic communication. We met in LA and spent a couple of days talking about the script, and by that point he had kind of a first stab at it. We talked about the characters mostly, and the themes, and then he sent me home to New Jersey to work. After that, every Monday we would Skype; I would be in New Jersey at 7 a.m., he would be in Seoul at 7 p.m., and that’s how we did our drafts.
Bong spun off his own scenario and characters from the Snowpiercer graphic novel; how much did you get to invent of your own?
He did give me a little bit of free rein. Mostly what he needed from me was to help him realize the characters he had invented, especially the English-speaking people. He did give me the liberty to create characters as we went along; I think Fuyu [Stephen Park], the Japanese sidekick to Minister Mason, was one of mine, and maybe a few others, but mostly they sprang from director Bong’s head.
Was there any kind of language barrier in terms of communicating and writing with him?
No, not really. [Motions to where Bong is giving an interview with a translator] Don’t let him fool you; his English is actually pretty good. When he gets excited, when he gets ahead of himself, he’ll switch into Korean, but for the most part we would communicate in English. We really transcended language, because we started talking in terms of how to tell a story, and we meshed very well there. He’s very, very visual; he would approach a scene like, “I want a man with very dark skin and fish that’s bright red.” He thinks in images like those, which is not how I think; I think about characters and what they’re feeling, so we sort of went hand in glove. He would bring images and visions, and I would bring words and feelings to the characters.
Tilda Swinton and John Hurt were cast very early on; did you write specifically for them, or any of the actors?
No, but there were two I kind of knew he wanted. One was a wonderful New York actor named Paul Lazar, who has done other films of his, and I knew what part he wanted Paul to play. We also talked early on about Alison Pill for her tiny little role, and wrote it with her in mind—oddly enough, since it’s not an Alison Pill part, but she brought her own crazy zaniness to it. I know we talked every now and then about other actors he had in mind, but when I was writing, I wasn’t thinking about Tilda, I wasn’t thinking about John, or Chris Evans or any of those folks; I was really just thinking about the characters.
Pill and also Swinton’s roles are really out-there and outrageous; how do you approach writing characters like those?
Director Bong gave me great freedom with Minister Mason, and I got to write that amazing seven-minute speech, which was inspired by a bit of action he had given her. She puts a shoe on the guy’s head, and that was the jumping-off point for me. I didn’t have a clue how it would be played; I thought it would be Star Wars, a sinister, menacing delivery, not like a wacky, cartoonish villain who’s still sort of realistic and all the scarier because she’s a bit comical. I had no idea Tilda would do that—and in fact, we wrote that part for a man. When Tilda took the part, we didn’t change any of the words; we didn’t change anything from he to she, and some of the characters call her “sir.” She wanted to do the film, and I believe director Bong originally said, “I don’t have anything in this film for you,” and she said, “Well, I want to play that part.” So I had no idea it would be played like that. I knew Alison’s character was pretty bizarre, but beyond that, what makes it all the more so is that she plays it so cheerfully. That’s what’s so scary about her.
Did any of the other actors surprise you when you saw how they played their roles?
Yeah, we had written Edgar, Curtis’ sidekick played by Jamie Bell, as sort of mentally challenged and dim-witted, and that’s not the way Jamie played it at all. He played Edgar as mischievous and impish and a troublemaker, which was a very interesting choice. Another thing was, we knew Gilliam, the role John Hurt plays, was a great part, but then you get an actor who’s even better than the material and he just elevates it. John brought such great strength and years of struggle and hardship to that role, which made it so much greater than I had envisioned it would be.
You wrote Gilliam as having one leg; was there any consideration about the difficulties that might pose for the actor?
No, I didn’t think of it at all; that was somebody else’s problem [laughs]. I wasn’t too concerned about it. I’m sure director Bong must have thought about, “How am I going to do this, because he has one arm and one leg; how do we make that happen?” But it’s movie magic.
Was that character named after Terry Gilliam?
I don’t know, and I never asked that question; it never occurred to me that we were doing a homage to Terry Gilliam. It’s clear now that I’ve seen the movie, because I can see how director Bong was influenced by Gilliam’s films, but we never talked about it and it wasn’t necessarily our intention to do that.
Looking at Snowpiercer and The Host, it’s clear that environmental issues are important to Bong. Are they a concern of yours as well?
Yes, certainly. I have a political bent. I have to tell you, though: I believe it’s very dangerous for me, or any writer, to get too invested in a message. A metaphor is great only if the story still works, and what was more important to me was that the characters had to work. We could have just done a documentary if all we wanted to do was convey a message. I am concerned about global warming, and I think this is a relevant time to look at this movie and ask ourselves, “What are we doing to our planet?” As far as the story goes, that’s less relevant, because Curtis’ journey isn’t about what happened outside the train, it’s about what happens inside the train, so that had to be my focus.
We talked about the actors surprising you; how about the visuals? Were you on the set at all?
No, I wasn’t lucky enough to go to the set; they shot it in the Czech Republic and I was working on other projects. But I was totally blown away the first time I got to see it. Director Bong showed it to me last summer in New York, at a private screening just for me, and I felt so honored. It was terrific; I was absolutely blown away. The violence is very different from what was on the page; when I saw what he did with that, it really was art.
The fight scene in darkness—was that written that way?
Yes, it was—but again, when I was writing it, I knew there would be night-goggle vision and the flame blinding them and so forth, but I couldn’t really understand it until I saw it brought to life. It’s an amazing visual experience.
There was a lot of discussion and conflict regarding which version of Snowpiercer would be released. Were you privy to all that while it was happening?
Luckily, I was not privy to the day-in and day-out, but I knew what was going on. In fact, when director Bong screened it for me, he asked me to give him some suggestions about voiceovers that might help in the event that it would be cut, and how we could make sure the story remained clear and still hold onto the important character information. I wrote those voiceovers, but luckily we never had to use them.
There was talk that Neil Gaiman was going to be brought in to write the voiceovers—was that true?
I don’t know, and I’m afraid to ask. I don’t really want to know [laughs]. Luckily, at the end of the day, happy ending: Harvey Weinstein was generous enough to allow us all to experience director Bong’s vision, and I’m so happy that everybody got to see it the way it was meant to be seen.
That said, was there anything you wrote, or that you and Bong came up with, that was either not shot or was cut out of his version of the film?
Yes, and I think that just happens with any movie. The part of Grey, who is sort of Gilliam’s right hand and is played by Luke Pasqualino, was much larger in the script. But I have to tell you—for the most part, director Bong knew what he wanted, he got me to help him put it on paper and that’s the movie he shot.
Snowpiercer is ultimately a hopeful film, which makes it a little different from Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead, which takes a despairing view of human nature. Given that, do you know why Bong looked at Devil and chose you for his film?
I’m not entirely sure, but I know he loved that movie and the characters, and I believe that’s what it was. The people in Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead are desperate and pushed to the edge, and it’s about what they do in that situation. Snowpiercer is the story of Curtis, Gilliam and everyone who’s trapped back in the tail section of the train—what will they do to free themselves, to define themselves? So I think he saw in Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead the same theme he had in mind for Snowpiercer. Also, I will tell you, director Bong has a fucking twisted sense of humor, and I share it with him. He’s one of the very few people who could look at Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead and see that while it’s very dark, there is also some humor there, and I think he really responded to that.
