>With Batman Returns, Tim Burton gave the world a sequel that astonished, delighted and shocked in equal measure. Now, 30 years later, the director sits down with Empire to revisit a truly singular superhero outing
>WORDS ALEX GODFREY
>PORTRAITS STEVE SCHOFIELD
>DIGITAL IMAGING JACEY
>TIM BURTON strides down the staircase of his London home, reassuringly dressed head-to-toe in black, save for a pair of black-and-white stripy socks (can you describe them as Burton-esque if they’re worn by the actual Tim Burton?). He greets Empire warmly, happy to reminisce about Batman Returns — ostensibly a superhero film, but absolutely a Tim Burton film.
>His first instalment, 1989’s brooding Batman, was a massive hit, changing the blockbuster landscape forever, paving the way for an entire industry. With so much riding on it, though, and with many other voices involved, it was a somewhat difficult experience for Burton, who then went off to make his passion project Edward Scissorhands. Yet inevitably talk soon turned to a Batman sequel and, with the promise of increased creative control, he decided to come back for more.
>Batman Returns, written by Heathers hotshot Daniel Waters (and later taken to the finish line by Wesley Strick), was a glorious, twisted, magical labour of love that deployed Gotham City as its playground, with Burton free to indulge his most fantastical whims. This time, Batman (once again Michael Keaton, once again cool as you like) would face a magnificent menagerie of villains: Michelle Pfeiffer’s damaged, unpredictable Catwoman, Danny DeVito’s drooling Penguin, and Christopher Walken’s corrupt Max Shreck. The result was a unique vision that hasn’t dated a jot — even if its more subversive excesses did upset some audience members at the time, leading to a lesser box-office and a change in direction from Warner Bros., who would then hire Joel Schumacher to take the series to less upsetting, less inspired places.
>Three decades on, Burton is ready to tell Empire the full story, frequently with a giggle. Afterwards, he leads us into a room housing a pinball machine tied to the 1989 film. “They didn’t make one for Batman Returns,” he chuckles. As he explains, this one wasn’t exactly engineered to be fun for all the family…
Batman was an enormous success. Do you think a sequel was always expected?
>No, I don’t think so. It was interesting, because those were the days before… “Franchise”; you’d never heard that term before. There were franchises, but that word wasn’t used, and people didn’t think that way, quite as they do now. A few years later, you’d hear the word “tentpole”. They use these circus terms for that franchise mentality, which is, obviously, where we’re at. I never heard the word “franchise” on Batman. On the second one, I started to hear that word for the first time.
I’d heard that you weren’t automatically up for doing a sequel.
>Yeah, that’s true.
Is that because you had a tough time on the first one?
>Yeah, I was a bit traumatised. All filmmaking is traumatic. I never did anything to make a big… you know, I just did things that I wanted to do. But I love Batman, I loved doing it, I love the character. That’s why I wanted to do it. I like that Phantom Of The Opera thing. So, it wasn’t like I had a bad experience; I was always interested.
Is it right that they gave you carte blanche on Batman Returns and said that you could do what you wanted with it?
>No, I don’t think they ever said that. But that’s what kind of happened. There was definitely more freedom, in a certain way. There’s never freedom on a big film, but it was a different energy that way, definitely.
Do you remember your first thoughts about what you might want to do with it?
>Well, it’s just those weird little hooks that hook you into it. I like the psychology of Batman. And Penguin and Catwoman, these animal people... For me, Batman is more rooted in a horror-movie kind of mythology. The idea of animal people, instincts of humans and animals. It’s just weird things that inspired me… bat, cat, penguin...
You told Daniel Waters to write the screenplay as if the first film didn’t exist, and it’s a very self-contained sort of fantasy land, from that script to the sets, the miniatures, the costumes, everything.
>Expressionist movies, those old horror movies that you don’t really know where they take place — that’s something that I grew up liking in all those old movies, and it’s something that I felt glad to be able to do. And to do it on this kind of level was amazing.
How did you want to develop Batman as a character from the first film?
>Well… you can’t go very far. Even little things: he unmasked himself, and you piss people off. And it’s like, “Well, wait a minute, that’s what it’s all about, it’s about a dual personality. It’s night and day. Two sides of the same thing.” He didn’t really change that much in a sense. I think it was just more giving him the circumstances of dealing with Catwoman and those kinds of things that broadened it out.
What’s especially great about Catwoman is her unpredictability. She’s not a, quote unquote, strong female character. She doesn’t quite know what she is herself.
>Yeah, and that’s why I love that character. That’s my favourite character. And that’s what Michelle did such a beautiful job with. To me, it’s a strong character, it’s not about being a strong woman. And I love that about her. With Michael and her and all of them, they’re like silent-movie actors. Michelle, she did things that I was so amazed and impressed by. She truly was that character, her unpredictability and her vulnerability and her psychology — everything all in one.
You had Annette Bening cast as Catwoman first, but then she became pregnant. How far along were you, in working with her?
>I spoke to her, and we did a little bit, yes. Not much. And then, it was a surprise. But that’s life. And things always have a way of working out somehow.
Had you known Michelle’s work? Did she have to audition?
>No, she didn’t. I didn’t know her work a lot, but I’d seen Scarface, I knew who she was. And right away… I met her and she was so great.
It seems she was game for everything.
>She was walking around on those heels on rooftops. I mean, she did all that stuff! Incredible. And that just gets everybody so revved up. She whipped, she… you know, she held a bird in her mouth for, like, 20 seconds and then let it fly out.
Did you ask her to do that?
>Yeah. [Laughs] I like asking people to do funny things.
Some people would say, “No, I’m not putting a bird in my mouth.”
>But then that wouldn’t have happened. And then physically, she’d do things like… When the cats are attacking her… Have you ever had a bunch of cats come up and start biting you? It’s some scary shit [laughs]. So she’s lying there and cats are picking at her and then she opens her eyes like a zombie. With some people, you’d have to do an effect, but she just did it on her own. So she was like, 100 per cent.
Was this some sort of sex thing?
Wasn’t it all?
Danny DeVito was game, too. Daniel Waters said that he originally wrote the Penguin in Danny’s voice, but then he read it and asked for it to be much weirder.
>Yeah, Danny is so game. Jack [Nicholson] did it with Joker too: when people get into certain make-up, they become something else, which goes back to Lon Chaney and all those great things that are exciting to see. Just kind of becoming some weird creature.
You suggest on your DVD commentary that the studio did not love the black goo coming out of Penguin’s mouth. What were those conversations?
>They kept making comments like, “What’s that stuff coming out his mouth?” And I tried to describe it, I tried to give them creative things, I tried to give them medical things, I tried to give them [laughs] case studies. Whatever. But to be fair, big studio, and they’re letting me do this. We had all these live penguins, and they’re like, “What the frick’s going on around here?”
Legend has it that Danny stayed in character on set. Michelle Pfeiffer said that if she looked over at him he’d just grunt at her. Was he always like that?
>Pretty much. People would walk by him in the make-up chair and he’d try to bite them. But you know, seriously, you’re sitting there for fricking eight hours and you’re looking at yourself turning into this giant slug. It’s gonna be hard not to, in a funny way.
He is so lascivious and lecherous as the Penguin. It’s kind of shocking, watching it today.
>I know. He’s like a weird creature pervert… yeah. It’s not very politically correct. But he was a complete character that way.
Let’s talk about the film’s sexuality. It’s pretty full-on. That hasn’t been done in any other superhero film before or since, not like that.
>[Laughs] Well, you go back to the first one, there’s a certain perversity in Batman. A kind of weird sexual thing just by looking at it. The original costume-makers worked in the fetish industry. It’s not that that’s what it was about, but it’s kind of there. And then you throw in Catwoman, and it just gets a bit more...
Daniel Waters has talked about the “kinky shit” in the film. He said that in terms of that, what people might think were bits of subtext were just actual text to you. >It’s true! To some degree. It’s just what it sort of is. So to me, it was just natural, all that stuff.
Christopher Walken’s Max Shreck was a new character. What was it that was exciting to you about him? Was it what you were exploring politically?
>Well, yeah, and also just about perception. It goes back to monsters. How the monsters are always misperceived. The Penguin and Catwoman are perceived as the villains, but he’s the face of what is normal in society, and business and power. Yeah, it is a sort of a comment on that. He’s the real villain. These others are perceived as that, but they’re just animal people really.
Talking of animals… you had lots of magnificent penguins in this film.
>[Laughs] Now, you wouldn’t do it, you’d just go CG. You couldn’t do it and you wouldn’t do it. We had to have giant air conditioners for them. All the sets had to be kept below 35 degrees, all the time. It’s like Method. It’s a surreal memory to me, having all these penguins in Burbank.
Do you remember when you first thought of having rockets strapped to penguins?
>I just did some drawings, little sketches. There was just something funny about, you know, rockets on… I just liked it, basically!
There was a Rolling Stone interview with you conducted during post-production, and while preparing the film to show to the studio execs, you said you’d rather show it to aliens.
>[Laughs] I think that was a comment about how I felt. When you’re making something, and I don’t like to be like this, but you always feel this adversarial thing. The artists versus the businessmen, the ‘this’ versus the ‘that’. I’m very grateful and I got through all of this stuff with them and it was good; there’s a lot of things along the way that just make you feel like you’re talking to aliens, and I’m sure they feel the same about me!
How did you go about navigating all of those things, the talks with merchandising companies and the likes of McDonald’s?
>They didn’t like the stuff coming out of Penguin’s mouth... I remember I said, “‘What’s that coming out of his mouth?’ Okay, what’s in your hamburgers? What the frick’s going on there? I’ll tell you what’s in there, you tell me what’s…” Come on, seriously.
So you literally had meetings yourself with these companies?
>Yeah. Oh yeah. Because, first of all — and I’ve constantly been through this, and with every movie it’s a struggle — if they’re gonna make something, I love toys. I’ve got a big, giant toy collection. I’m a good judge of it. I’ve done this stuff, I know what’s up. But yeah, it’s another moving trade.
Is it true that McDonald’s called off a Happy Meal tie-in after seeing the film?
>I think so. That’s what I’m saying, it was like, “What’s that black stuff coming out? Kids are gonna go off their Happy Meals.” Happy Meal sales would be down by 30 per cent. So yes, I think so. You know, it’s not something that devastated me. It won’t be one of my last dying memories, that McDonald’s cancelled their promotion.
Did you see the footage that went viral recently, from a 1992 TV talk show? They had a ten-year-old kid, USA Today’s junior movie critic. Did you see this?
>No.
This kid was very upset with the film. [Burton claps with joy]. He’s going, “It was very violent. It was a total attack against kids. The Penguin’s total goal was to hurt kids. I’ve never been scared of a movie like this before. It’s just not fair to kids. Penguin always had goo coming out of his mouth. Catwoman plays Tic-Tac-Toe on a man’s face.”
>[Laughs uproariously] I love it. I remember one guy reviewed Beetlejuice and he hated it. Everything he said was like that. But it made everybody want to go see it! [Laughs]
Batman Returns is dark, but in such a fun way. And it certainly doesn’t seem that dark now. It’s actually kind of joyful and delightful.
>Well, I’m not just overly dark. That represents me in the sense that… that’s how I see things. When I watch those old movies, there’s joy, there’s light in the dark. It’s not meant as pure darkness. There’s a mixture.
How far did you get into thinking about or talking about a third film?
>I’ll never forget it — I went in to see [execs] Bob Daly and Terry Semel at Warner Bros. We had a long meeting, and I started pitching ideas. And they kept saying, “Are you sure you want to do this? Don’t you want to do a movie like Edward Scissorhands?” And halfway through the meeting, I said, “Wait a minute, you guys. I feel like you really don’t want me to do another one, do you?” And they go, “No, no, no,” but I truly felt that. And I think that was true. My feeling was that the film didn’t do as well [as the first one] and it confused people a little bit. It doesn’t follow, you know, the way things go. And in the birth of the franchise era… I think they wanted to go a different way.
I get the impression that Michael Keaton wouldn’t have done another without you.
>I don’t think so. We used to joke that he’d be like Elvis — he’d be opening supermarkets in 20 years as Batman.
Isn’t it interesting how things come around, though? He’s said that he talked with the studio about a third film, and they were saying, “Why does it have to be so dark? Why does Batman have to be so depressed?” That’s interesting in relation to what they’re doing now, because now Batman is really depressed.
>I know! But [back then] they went the other way. That’s the funny thing about it. But then I was like, “Wait a minute. Okay. Hold on a second here. You complain about me, I’m too weird, I’m too dark, and then you put nipples on the costume? Go frick yourself.” Seriously. So yeah, I think that’s why I didn’t end up… I don’t know how much I pitched them. I think it was more the idea of me doing anything [laughs].
What’s it like for you to see that they’re doing these big Batman films now, continuing from what you started off… and there’s this very dark one now with Batman and Catwoman and Penguin in it.
>I haven’t seen it. I’d like to see it.
Is it strange, though, to see what’s come in the wake of what you started?
>Look, given who I am, it was good, because it felt new at the time. So for me, that was great. And it is funny to see this now, because all these memories come back of, “It’s too dark.” So, it makes me laugh a little bit.
At the time, you wanted to make a Catwoman spin-off film. How along the line were you with developing that?
>Well, I loved that character. But… Once you upset McDonald’s, it’s all over with. [Cracks up]
I know that Daniel Waters wrote a script that wasn’t what you had in mind for it. He said you wanted a Catwoman film that would be relatively low-budget, a small little drama. Not a superhero film.
>Exactly. Yeah.
What were your thoughts?
>Well, just that. Everyday life. Her as a character. I loved her character. Like you said, her fragmented quality, and who she is, and the split sides, the dual personalities and the kind of psychotic… that’s what I liked. Just, her. That’s about as far as it got, but that was the sort of feeling.
I wish Tim Burton would make a Batman comic, even a one-shot. Or that Batman 89 would ape his style instead of being so true-to-life
I don't know what it is that tickles me about drawing stylized cartoons like that and translating them into live costume and makeup.
Tonally, Batman Returns doesn’t quite feel like a sequel to the first film — it feels like it’s more in the spirit of, say, Beetlejuice.
>It’s not by design. Again, it’s more about feeling. Batman Returns, it was more me, and I had Bo Welch, the designer who had done Beetlejuice. So there were connections. But not in the sense of me wanting it to be more like that. It’s just… that’s what I felt like doing.
Well, it feels like more of a piece with where you were coming from with your other films. Much more than the first Batman.
>Yes. Well, definitely. It definitely is. And for all the points that you discussed. I did have more carte blanche on this. Partially because of the first one, and partially because they never really knew what we were kind of doing anyway. From Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure to Beetlejuice... Everything confused them a little bit. At that stage, I was kind of a mysterious figure, a cloaked figure, if you know what I mean. Like, “Okay, wow, we don’t know what he was talking about but maybe he knows.” I don’t know what I’m talking about but I know what I want!
Certainly your perspective is all over the film. It feels like a celebration of people who don’t fit in.
>Absolutely. The animal people. People that are perceived as others, you know?
Do you think fondly of it?
>I do. I really do. I feel really fondly about it because of the weird experiment that it felt like.
Well, it was a successful one.
>Yeah. I mean, it wasn’t… I think that was the issue again, when it came down to it — it wasn’t as [financially] successful as the first one and therefore that fed into their, “Why is it so dark?” It fed into the fears of people.
Which is a good thing.
>[Laughs] Except if you’re a studio executive.
That’s the end of the interview, I’ll post the rest of the pictures from the article. Most are on set behind the scenes stuff, some are Tim Burton sketches
Last one. I hope somebody else saw this thread
Good read. Thanks OP, here’s your (you)
>listen here, penguiBlack person
>[delet that in batmanish]
lol, such memetic pic
that was a fun interview, thank you for posting.
Thanks for the read. Returns was my favorite batfilm of the nineties.
Interesting, but not really anything new. Burton seems like he’d be sort of frustrating to interview.
Batman vs Wonka needs to be a movie.
I would love for Tim Burton to make a movie set on a beautiful summer afternoon, lots of greens and yellows and reds with no blue. All healthy-looking, tanned actors with vitality. You know, just to confuse his fans.
Aren't you describing Big Fish?
Everybody always forgets Big Fish. I love that movie, it's probably the last film Burton's made that I liked.
Big Fish had some scary shit in between the feel good parts, he can't help it
So did Pee Wees Big Adventure
Or edward Scissorhands. Or Mars Attacks. Burton went off the rails for a while but when I think of him I don't just think of gothy aesthetics, but 50's-60's suburbia.
You're both right. I forgot about them. The last Burton film I saw was probably Sleepy Hollow.
In the Superman Lives doc Burton said that was one of the reasons he wanted to do Superman ‘cause he wanted to challenge himself by making something more hopeful and uplifting.
>This kid was very upset with the film
>[Burton claps with Joy]
kek
Returns >>> 89
I wish tim Burton could make a bit of a come back his last few films have been crummy.
I think he needs a challenge, something out of his comfort zone he has to stretch to achieve.
He needs to get out of Disney
Most people they get to his age and they might not be willing to actually retire from their careers, but they're retired from challenging themselves or seeking adventure. Just don't have the energy for it anymore.
Batman Returns suffered at times because the studio gave him free reign to do weird shit, but these days studios like Marvel crawl up director's asses and inject their own dumb, off-theme ideas.
It was better when studios told creatives 'no', but did not offer their own ideas up, like in Batman 89. That's what made him successful at first, because it reigned him in so that he wasn't doing weird shit, while also asking him to solve his own problems so that the solution stayed on-brand.
Returns is front to back kino, idiots
The problem is the hard gothic nature of it. Gothic anything is not something that appeals en masse. Hes right in that Batman is a gothic character, thats what he's alluding to when he mentions old horror films and the german expressionist films which are gothic staples, in reference to Batman.
The thing about gothic media is that it disturbs you in a more subtle way. You dont necessarilly need to have a man being brutally killed on screen, its more about the undertone. So while it's humorous also, theres still a feeling of darkness that Batman films havent had.
It’s been the lackluster scripts. Plus he’s older now, he probably doesn’t care too much about staging a come back
It’s just part of me wishes he could stage a big come back and hit a home run with his last movie. Just to show he still “has it”
That goes for a few other directors I like too.
To me, the last Tim Burton movie that felt like he made it in earnest, at least within his own comfort zone (looking at you, Big Eyes), was the animated Frankenweenie film.
Returns is shit.
Thanks OP.
How much money would WB give to Burton to do another Batman film? They don’t care about a cinematic universe anymore so just frick it and let Burton do what he wants
Why wasn't he consulted about the Flash or Bagatelle?