America 1987

Chapter 5 Catholicism

"If you don't mind, could I ask a few questions before we begin?" David asked casually.

"Of course, I came here to do as you say." Catherine reached up and brushed her hair back from her shoulders, placing her hands on her thighs with a dignified air.

"I saw in the information that you are a Catholic?"

"Huh? Yes!" Catherine was clearly not expecting the other person to ask about her religious beliefs. She thought they would ask questions related to the movie plot, and she almost couldn't answer for a moment.

"My mother is an Irish Catholic, and I am a Roman Catholic. I was a member of the local choir until I was 10 years old..."

"That's enough," David Ovitz gestured, stopping her from adding more information about the file.

"Are you familiar with Catholic doctrine?"

Although she didn't understand why the director cared about these things, Catherine thought about it carefully before answering seriously.

"I remember some of the more important doctrines, but I'm not so clear about the others."

"I see that your Catechism of the Catholic Church, Article 2116, clearly states that all forms of divination should be abandoned: whether it is seeking help from Satan or the devil, summoning spirits or other similar acts, those attempts to peek into the future are contrary to our due respect for the one God."

David recited the doctrine in an aria-like tone, which not only surprised Catherine but also drew the attention of several assistants.

"The Catholic Church believes that human life and future are entirely in God's hands, and attempting to predict or control the future through supernatural means is a sign of distrust and an infringement on God's sovereignty."

"Ms. Zeta-Jones, some plot points in our film may touch upon this doctrine,"

David paused, giving her some time to process it, before explaining further, "So if you're Catholic, perhaps..."

When casting the male and female leads for the original film, several big-name actors declined the role because of the film's psychic and spiritualistic elements.

David needed to ask before the formal audition, although he didn't think a newcomer would give up the opportunity to play the lead role in a mainstream Hollywood commercial film because of something like that.

At last……

"No problem," Catherine replied as expected, her tone conveying a sense of relief, as if to say, "So that's why."

"Although I am of Catholic origin, I am not so devout as to adhere to all the doctrines."

She paused, seemingly realizing that what she said was somewhat inappropriate, and then added, "Besides, the plot in the movie where good people go to heaven and bad people go to hell is very much in line with the core doctrines of the Church, and Our Lady will understand."

Catholicism is one of the three major branches of Christianity. Its core belief is the Trinity, it honors Mary, the mother of Jesus, as the "Holy Mother," and it uses the Bible as its religious scripture.

"Alright, let's move on to the next question." After asking the religious question, David immediately moved on to the next one.

"Could you cut your hair a little shorter?"

After a brief moment of thought upon hearing the question, Catherine quickly agreed.

The female lead in the original film sported a classic short bob haircut, which sparked a huge fashion trend after the film's release and became one of the most representative women's hairstyles in the early 1990s.

It was later widely imitated in various films and television series, such as Monica in Friends and Matilda in Léon: The Professional.

Returning to Catherine herself, although she is most famous for her long, flowing black hair in "The Mask of Zorro," she has also appeared on the big screen with short hair.

In the film that won her the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress, "Chicago," and in "The Terminal," released in 04 and co-starring Tom Hanks, she both appeared with short hair.

The short haircut in "Chicago" was something she insisted on, so Catherine's quick agreement was not unexpected for David.

Catherine felt a little strange, but mostly delighted.

Auditions are a standard procedure that every actor goes through after entering the industry, and she naturally did a lot of preparation.

Whether an actor has a role during an audition can be clearly indicated by the director's attitude, questions, and behavior.

The simplest and most direct way to judge is by the length of the audition.

A long runtime indicates that the director is willing to spend a lot of time exploring the actors and has a genuine interest in them; a quick ending often means that the director has no interest at all or has never seriously considered the actors.

There was no time display device in the audition room, which was to deliberately downplay the sense of time.

But Catherine felt that the time she spent just thinking about and answering these questions before the formal audition had already exceeded the time any of the previous people had spent entering the room.

Moreover, she felt that the questions the director had just asked should have been asked after the audition was successful.

But now is not the time to think about these things, because the music has already started.

The formal audition began.

The song is very beautiful. It begins with gentle piano chords, making the listener feel as if they have been pulled into a scene from an old movie.

As Catherine mimicked the gestures of making pottery in the air, she thought to herself that this probably wasn't the original theme song for the movie, because it felt strangely familiar.

Before she could think it through, the melody of the song slowly rose, and her emotions gradually built up. Catherine was also drawn into the mood, as if her fingertips were truly gliding across the damp clay.

The music soon ended, its overall rhythm slow yet full of tension, like a constantly flowing river, sometimes calm as water, sometimes turbulent.

This is the theme song of the movie "Ghost," titled "Unchained Melody."

As Catherine suspected, the song was indeed not originally created for this movie.

The original version was first released in 1955 as the theme song for "Prison Break," but it did not cause a particularly big reaction at the time.

It wasn't until the release of "Ghost" that it regained popularity, even becoming a global phenomenon and a classic memory for a generation.

The pottery scene in the movie, which blends perfectly with this music, has become a classic moment in the film. Many Hong Kong films in the 90s parodied and paid homage to it, and it has become a kind of popular culture.

So when David was choosing the audition scene for the female lead, he didn't hesitate to choose this one. If he could perform this scene well, the movie would be halfway to success.

In fact, when the original creative team was auditioning for the female lead, in addition to this scene, there was another scene where the female lead, Melly, was crying her heart out after the male lead, Sam, was shot and killed. This was used as a backup audition reference.

But after thinking it over, David dropped it.

He felt that unless one was a seasoned veteran actor with exceptional talent, it would be extremely difficult to achieve the level of acting where one could cry on cue.

In the Hollywood casting process, actors are usually given only a few pages of key dialogue excerpts before the audition, generally no more than four pages, with very little information.

The background and context of this scene are basically explained in just a few brief sentences. The rest is left to the actors to fill in the blanks with their own imaginations.

Moreover, there are no physical props or sets during the on-site audition, which places very high demands on the actor's ability to immerse themselves and project their emotions.

It's manageable for some actors who are relatively calm and don't experience significant emotional fluctuations, but asking inexperienced newcomers to perform a heart-wrenching performance of a husband's death on set is somewhat of a challenge.

The fact that it took so long to select the female lead in the original timeline must have been due to this factor.

Actually, it wasn't really necessary. In the final cut, most of the shots in that scene were focused on the male lead, Sam, while the female lead's crying was almost just background noise. The audience and critics' attention was mostly focused on the male lead.

The input and output were completely disproportionate, and the cost-effectiveness was too low, so David did not use this as a backup audition reference.