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English subtitles by Carolyn Burke
Good morning, hello. I'm Massimilano Studer.
I'd like to speak with Francesca...
Hello! I've just received from your colleague at the store in Venice
the documents, the invoices...
I assure you, at this point, our interests and availability
to produce a little documentary, a report on the work that
was behind the production of these masks for the film.
If you agree, we will come to Venice in the next few days
to do the filming in your store
and to do this video-interview.
Okay. So, we'll be in touch in the next few days to confirm the details.
Ok? Good-bye, good-bye...
The ferry? Either the number 1 or the number 2
Thank you. Good-bye
I would say that the idea to produce or to tell the story
that there was behind the production of the masks of "Eyes Wide Shut"
surfaced a few years ago, and that, at the time, studying at the university,
I got to read a book by a French critic named Michel Ciment
who had interviewed Kubrick several times.
In one interview, in particular, during the making of "A Clockwork Orange,"
Stanley Kubrick declared -- we're talking about the '70s -- that he was interested in
making a film based on a novel by Arthur Schnitzler:
"Dream Story".
Jumping then to the story from 1999, the year the film came out,
that I remember I went to see at first in Milan and I was struck, I remember --
this very strange film, in the typical style of Kubrick
where one very important part was dedicated to the masks,
to the masks that you see in the film...
This film was very important because it was the last one made by Kubrick.
I was saying briefly, the story --
I'll jump ahead to August 2012, because on that occasion I was in Venice with my
companion who wanted to buy a mask from Venice and at that point
I decided it was time to go and find the store. The artisans
who contributed to the making of the film "Eyes Wide Shut" which had become absolutely
the last masterpiece of Stanley Kubrick.
The idea to make the masks was born in the '80s when the Venetian Carnival
had started to be popular again. Actually, the people made it popular
and the events they were doing every year.
And I had this idea about the masks. They fascinated me. A little bit old, deja`-vu, a little bit alive, no?
And I tried, around '80-'82, to make some masks but they turned out to be dreadful rubbish!
It wasn't the right time. So, I continued to study and look around. Until a new inspiration
came to me, maybe that term's too presumptuous...
Maybe it's better to be a little sensible. The term escapes me. In short, they were beginning to come to me better.
In the winter of 1985, I started to create again, and the first models came out.
At that time, this shop was born: Kartaruga. It was a strange thing because outside the shop
there were three turtles. At least I thought they were turtles! Instead they were three pineapples...
At the beginning it seemed like a museum because there were only 10-15 masks and that's it. All formed.
I had a little bit of luck because, doing experiments -- I made
the things during the winter -- I had used new techniques but also new colors.
A little bit I was remaking my things like the 1400s or 1500s, studying how they glued together the marble
or looking at Byzantine things. In short, ranging quite a bit because in those times
I was teaching at the Arts High School. Probably, there is a bit of a mix and relevance.
The shop was going forward, all the same. In those times, I did my first experiments
on this genre of mask that I later used for Tom Cruise's face.
There, then, obviously, was one of the important aspects that fascinated me
already as a spectator and then as a contributor to Kubrick's work. There was the charm
that emanated from the mask worn by Tom Cruise in the film. Because this mask
had this very Italian face. A smile that reminded you of that mocking smile of the Mona Lisa
by Leonardo Da Vinci. It seems like she's smiling, but in reality, she's serious. She had
feminine lips but seems masculine. It turns out to be worn by a male actor
so that it has this ambiguous mystique, almost androgynous, that I wanted
at all costs to try to understand. I was interested in understanding if
the creator of this mask had chosen a male model or a female model:
at that time I didn't know if the model was male or female.
Several masks have my face as a basis. Or I had taken the mold to maintain
the points of support on my face. All the rest, that is, all the masks
of the "Commedia dell'arte," were based on the support points of my face or
of whoever was right near me. This mask, this face was decorated
and embellished, but, in fact, the true base is this.
Even here, you can see better how it is. This is an androgynous mask.
Neutral, I would say the cast of this face was made on my ex-girlfriend.
It was modelled and simplified: I took off all the specific, physical
characteristics of the person. What's left is the mouth,
the nose, the cheekbones and the chin. The lower part of the mask.
What personalizes it a bit is...
the mouth smile. Here, we lowered a little bit
the protuberance of the cheekbones and cleaned around the eye, to make it neutral.
To render it perfectly androgynous, as I was saying before.
There are different photos...
Let's say we worked together.
In those years, it helped me to work, to make the masks. These products
were also made from that model. In the production, with the paper and with this specific technique
with which this mask was made.
Let's say that looking at the mask you can't tell if it's male or female.
Absolutely. Whoever puts this on, this is the advantage of this mask,
if it's a male or a female, the mask changes.
Thus, it is perfect under this profile. In other words, these masks,
which are simpler, are actually more complex.
Here, from this one was born this other one. So, let's say this one was decorated
with macrame and crackled. I believe that it was created in 1980, last century!
In '85 or '86, I would say.
This mask, as a decoration, was taken a bit ... I'll tell you something else:
I was teaching and I taught for 27 years at an Arts High School.
And so, it was a historic revisitation. Even if it doesn't seem so, it gave me the inspiration
for a vision of byzantine painting. For everything that I did, I used
a historical memory of things. Theory in the field, Gestalt, Marcolli...
Let's say that it came from my work at school.
What does it mean? It means that, going back to books, I used
what was historical. So, when a product was made
well or poorly, it wasn't an invention from nothing. But it was a
revisiting of things. I'll give you an example.
This, for example, I call it "Inca mask."
Maybe it makes you remember something. Just to bring up the discussion of
historical memory. Looking at it like this, someone could say: but this,
maybe I've already seen this; I know it, but I don't know what it is.
If you want to see the Inca bas-reliefs, -- when there were the representations
or the rites, the witch doctors, or the overseers of the rites --
it had a crown on the head with feathers.
Now, working with this memory, making the connection is easier.
That's why this mask is called Inca. Because you recall this thing
you've seen. So, the people, in the moment that they see it, they don't
know how to identify it, but they have seen it. Obviously, it's been reworked and
made modern, etc. etc. This is a thing. The other thing, however
Now, it's not there... For example, the American Indians -- you know them, right?
That they all have this diadem with feathers around it. Well, this mask,
putting the feathers in this way, does it make you think of the diadem with the feathers
like the American Indians? Do you see where the connection is?
They are all associations of things that already exist.
So what was I trying to do? To put into a modern key
what the American Indians were before. Or like with everything the diadem that comes down.
And with this idea, this mask was made.
So, I went in this store, "The Canovaccio", I spoke with the owner
of the shop. He declared that he worked
with Kubrick. He showed me the masks, the three main masks
in the film that clearly were given... they were transformed automatically
into the official symbol of the film. Because the whole film played on this mask.
The first thing I asked was, "But, do you have documents that can prove
this involvement?" Because when this film came out, all the shops in Venice
were declaring that they had worked with Kubrick.
Instead, they showed me the invoice, signed personally by Jan Harlan
who, for the record, is Stanley Kubrick's brother-in-law and who was
there for the making of all the Kubrick films, from "Clockwork Orange" on.
Jan Harlan was here around the end of June 1997 and took the masks
which he had selected in our store. The first time was June 27, 1997,
then July 4, 1997, and finally September 18, 1997.
This is the invoice from the end of June 1997. This is Jan Harlan's signature, for goods received.
Here, six masks and then at the beginning of July... and, right here other masks...
Some masks had been part of our collection, others were decorated
with specific requests. During these meetings, Jan Harlan also revealed to me
the name of the film that 'Maestro' Kubrick was making. He told me that it was based on
a story by Schnitzler, precisely "Dream Story", and that the title would be
"Eyes Wide Shut". He told me then that he would have visited other ateliers
because he was working with a group: he didn't go into specifics
about what kind of group it was. He would have chosen even more masks here,
but one would notice the lines and the styles of one single store
if he had chosen everything here. This mask had the luck
to have been chosen by Kubrick.
But he wasn't here. I have to tell you another story in '85 and '86
I was a client of this young couple, students. Josie was from London, and Karzan, her boyfriend,
was Kurdish. We met one another through work. They decorated ceramics
that they bought in Bassano, and then sold them around trying to pay their way
through university. We struck up a friendship, respect, trust, etc. And we went on like this
for a bit. At a certain point, however, Josie decided to go back to London.
She went back to London, and they had the idea to open a shop in Camden Town.
Once the store was open, they asked me if I could furnish it. Of course,
I did it with extreme pleasure. So, I decorated with these masks.
One lovely day, Josie phoned me, and she explained
that a woman had come in to the shop, Marit Allen, asking for masks which
would be in a film that Kubrick was to make or was making. And that probably
there would be someone who would visit the shop in Venice to look at, or rather, to buy
these masks. Here I met Jan Harlan. I had the contact with him.
A nice person, fashionable, reserved. I remember a white "thing" -- his clothes
were always white: either white or cream. His hair was maybe whiter than mine, I don't know...
And I remember the presence of the person. However, I sincerely cannot focus it.
Probably it was Marit Allen. They came here and they chose both the masks that
I showed you before but also some others. For example, this one. For us, this
is a tragic Pierrot: from the physical characteristics, more or less, you can see. The same
technique of work. This mask was chosen as the "*** master". This whole
meeting happened around June or July of '97. I remember that coming back to
Tom Cruise's mask, it came out that there was a problem, that the mask seemed
to be bothering him because it was too small. This problem came out because probably
Cruise wanted a mask that fit his face perfectly. This instead was a
standard of a certain type. I was asked if I was available to go to England and
produce a model to make a mask specifically for Tom Cruise. I told them my price.
And Jan Harlan, I remember, phoned Kubrick, and at the end of the discussion, said:
"Tom Cruise is a star, but I'll try to convince him to use this mask
without resorting to a mask made specifically for him and that fits him to
perfection." Because, in the end it was just fine but clearly
there is a type of face that is great but another type, no.
The person who was with Jan Harlan during the visit to Canavaccio Atelier in 1997 was Edda Del Greco and not the costume designer Marit Allen
But this is just a little joke of Francesco Ceccamore's memory.