"300" press conference held in SL

“300” film cast, crew hold event in SL
By PHOENIX PSALTERY Staff writer The cast and crew of the new film “300” gathered in Second Life recently for a press conference. Several dozen journalists, many of whom were completely new to Second Life, gathered in the Silverscreen sim on Friday morning. Appearing in Second Life were author Frank Miller (FrankMiller Oh in SL), the film’s director Zack Snyder (ZackSnyder Oh in SL), and actors Gerard Butler (GerardButler Oh in SL), Lena Headey (LenaHeadey Oh in SL) and Rodrigo Santoro (RodrigoSantoro Oh in SL). “300” is based on Miller’s graphic novel of the same name. Set in 480 BC, the army of the Persian Empire, headed by the Emperor Xerxes (Santoro) has invaded Greece and threatens the city-state of Sparta, ruled by King Leonidas (Butler). In the face of overwhelming odds, Leonidas defies Xerxes’ demand for the surrender of Sparta, leading to the Battle of Thermopylae, in which a combined Greek force of some 4,000 soldiers, including 300 Spartans (hence the title), takes on the Persian army of 100,000 or more. As the title implies, however, “300” focuses on the Spartan soldiers.
	THE CAST AND crew of the recently released film “300” came to Second Life for a press conference Friday morning. Left to right: author Frank Miller (FrankMiller Oh in SL), director Zack Snyder (ZackSnyder Oh), and actors Gerard Butler (GerardButler Oh), Lena Headey (LenaHeadey Oh) and Rodrigo Santoro (RodrigoSantoro Oh). –Photo by PHOENIX PSALTERY
	The press conference, held over streaming audio, was very relaxed and entertaining. Host Maxwell Lisle coordinated questions submitted in chat and presented them to the cast and crew, who obviously were having a fine time, joking and making wisecracks back and forth. Miller has previously written and directed a number of other projects, including Sin City 1, 2 and 3 and RoboCop 2 and 3, as well as being a legendary comic book author and artist. Asked whether the film was faithful to his vision of “300,” Miller said, “I’m overjoyed… Zack has taken my book and taken it some places unexpected, and in general just amplified it and made it more powerful than anything I ever had in my head.” Zack Snyder is probably best known for directing “Dawn of the Dead,” and is slated to helm the production of “Watchmen,” another film based on a graphic novel. Snyder said he was inspired by an image in the original graphic novel of Leonidas being shot with dozens of arrows, saying, “That would be a cool shot in a movie; if we could make a movie that looks like this, that would be a reason to make a movie.” Butler is best known for his starring roles as the Phantom in the film version of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Phantom Of The Opera,” as well as “Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life,” “Reign of Fire,” and “Dracula 2000.” According to Butler, he trained six hours a day in order to be in the physical condition he needed to be, adding that acting against a green screen required him to trust Snyder “not to make me look ridiculous, like I was fighting penguins, or something.”
COMIC BOOK LEGEND Frank Miller is seen here in avatar and real life form. The author visited Second Life last week with the cast and crew of “300” for a press conference. -Photos by PHOENIX PSALTERY, Courtesy Photo
In response to a question concerning what they thought of their Second Life avatars, Miller said that he liked the fedora that his very accurately rendered avatar wore, causing Butler to comment, “Frank’s [avatar] is way more handsome than Frank actually is — we’ve all commented on that.” Headey said that she thought her avatar was “hot,” adding, “She’s [got] large boobs, I’m quite happy with that,” eliciting laughs from her fellow cast members. As to whether she would continue to use Second Life for personal use, Headey said, “Personally, I think it’s all a bit weird, to be honest.” The Silverscreen sim where the event was held belongs to Picture Production Company (PPC), which, according to their website, is the largest specialist film marketing agency outside of North America, having been at the forefront of the industry for over 20 years. PPC has offices in London and Los Angeles, and produces marketing materials and campaigns for clients such as Universal, Paramount, Dreamworks, Buena Vista International, Warner Brothers and 20th Century Fox. They purchased Silverscreen in November 2006 as a venue for events including film premieres, preview screenings and Q&As, with the intent of building a community around film and the film industry, creating a virtual space where film aficionados can meet and talk movies. Other groups involved in the project were Crayon, the V3 Group and Adam N Eve. Further similar projects are expected in the future.