When talking about performances and chatting with actors who have shared the stage, sooner or later the concept of chemistry usually appears. An undoubtedly abstract term that many professionals associate with something as mundane as hard work and preparation prior to shooting, but which, without a doubt, can inundate performances in feature films with an aura of mysticism, which tend to be remembered with special admiration.
Of course, the perspective of the directors on said chemistry is not unanimous, but James Cameron is clear that it is something very real. The king of the blockbuster has demonstrated his existence on numerous occasions ranging from the mythical romance between Jack and Rose in ‘Titanic’ to the surprising dynamic between the characters in Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jamie Lee Curtis in ‘Risky Lies’, but, for good old James, there is a more important connection than the one between actors.
exogenous reactions
In an Empire magazine special dedicated to his figure, Cameron has explained why values much more the chemistry between actor and director.
“Directors make thousands of decisions a day, but the most important one is whether or not to cast an actor, so I take the casting process very seriously. Actors tell me I spend more time with them at the first reading than in the rest of the castings. I want to get to know them, how they think and how they react to ideas that I might come up with on the fly. I say, ‘Let’s go to work,’ and we do it for half an hour or an hour as if they already had the part, and we solve a scene together. So I guess the answer to your question is ‘yes,’ but the most important chemistry is between the director and the actor.”
This does not mean that the person responsible for ‘Avatar’ and its sequel rules out the magic that sometimes arises between partners filming, and He does not hesitate to compare that of Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet in ‘Titanic’ with that of Zoe Saldaña and Sam Worthington in the hit ‘Avatar: The Sense of Water’.
“The chemistry between actors is also essential, especially in a love story, and I have had good luck with chemistry in the past. In ‘Titanic’ I cast Kate [Winslet] first and generously read with various candidates to play Jack. I saw how excited she was after reading with Leo. I watched him miraculously turn into Jack before my eyes for a few minutes, like a unicorn traversing a sunlight-lit clearing—a brief but unforgettable glimpse; but it was nice to have that glimpse validated by Kate.
It was similar in ‘Avatar’. Zoe got there first, and read with Sam, who had been a strong candidate before making the final decision. When I saw them together, the movie seemed to suddenly come alive. After that moment, I knew that all the visual effects challenges in the world couldn’t stop us from telling a powerful love story.”
As you can see, what we know as movie magic can happen long before the cameras rollneeding only a couple of interpreters and a few lines of dialogue to materialize.