Cornelius And Zira: 2018

Saturday 29 December 2018

Behind The Scenes

The making of Cornelius And Zira. Edmonton, north London, and Epping Forest and Lippits Hill in Essex in the spring and summer of 1977. Jackie Lawrence as Zira, Dave Barclay as Cornelius and Gary Cook as Milo. Featured cameramen are Jim Wesley and Andy Dumbleton.

Gary Cook as Dr Milo. Muzzle and brows appliance.

David Barclay sets up the Liberty 1 foreground miniature. Lippits Hill.

Gary at the early stages of the Zaius's Office set. Forest Road, Edmonton.

Gary decorating the Zaius's Office set. Forest Road, Edmonton.

Dave's storyboard / production sketch of Milo's cave.

Frank Seymour (Gary) in the makeup lab, transforming into the gorilla soldier Aboro.

Gary between takes. Lippits Hill.

Milo (Gary) work in progress. Forest Road, Edmonton.

Gary as Milo in Epping Forest.

Dave setting up a shot of the Zaius's Office set. Forest Road, Edmonton.

Dave applies adhesive to an appliance. Forest Road.

Gary, Jackie and cameraman Andy Dumbleton messing around between takes. Epping Forest, Essex.

The Zaius's Office set is complete. Forest Road, Edmonton.

As you can see, part of the set existed only as a foreground miniature.

Milo's cave entrance: watercolour foreground miniature by Dave.

Jackie, Andy and Dave between takes. Epping Forest, Essex.

Gary, Jackie and Andy between takes. Epping Forest, Essex.

Cameraman Jim Wesley and Gary between takes. Forest Road, Edmonton.

Cameraman Jim Wesley and Gary setting up a shot at Forest Road.

Ape City pre-production sketch by Dave.

Milo's cave foreground miniature. Lippits Hill.

Jackie studies the script while Gary looks on. For location long-shots, we used pre-prepared pull-on masks with the wigs attached. In the middle of summer these were extremely hot and uncomfortable so we'd take them off whenever we could.

Dave removes the Cornelius appliance at the end of a hard day's filming.

Dave (Cornelius and, under the name Ernest Morris, Dr Zaius). Age 17.

Jackie (Zira). Age 14.

Gary (Milo and, under the name Frank Seymour, Aboro). Age 16.

Jackie as Zira, filming the cave sequence at Forest Road. These are screenshots from a tape recorded on an early video camera!

Dave's Ape City miniature taking shape and, below, the beautiful finished article.

Gary as Milo, Epping Forest.

Jackie as Zira, mid-way through the makeup process.

Jackie Lawrence as Zira.

Saturday 22 December 2018

CORNELIUS AND ZIRA Part 7

In the concluding scenes of CORNELIUS AND ZIRA, a devastated Dr Milo races from the destruction of his cave and finds Cornelius and Zira, who explain that Zaius is only concerned with keeping ape society ignorant of the planet's past. Eager to share his other discoveries, he invites his friends to visit Taylor's spaceship, which he discovered in the Forbidden Zone and has repaired and restored.

Desperate to avoid the imminent war in the Forbidden Zone, Milo fires up the ship's ignition sequence and in moments the apes are airborne. Once free of Earth's atmosphere, they witness a blinding flash as the whole planet is burned to a crisp...

CORNELIUS AND ZIRA

THE SIXTH OF THE "APES" FILMS - AND THE BEST! In 1977, a group of teenage friends from North London recreated the world of the Planet Of The Apes in a short 8mm film, made on a shoestring budget over the course of the year and featuring home-made makeup, costumes, props and scenery, Helmed by lifelong puppeteer David Barclay, who went on to bigger and better things as a world-famous animation, motion-capture and puppetry professional in such epics as The Empire Strikes Back, Return Of The Jedi, The Dark Crystal, Labyrinth, The Little Shop Of Horrors and Cats And Dogs among many others, CORNELIUS AND ZIRA forms a bridge between the sci-fi classics BENEATH THE PLANET OF THE APES and ESCAPE FROM THE PLANET OF THE APES and reveals the untold story of how Cornelius, Dr Zira and Dr Milo fled the imminent destruction of Planet Earth. The main cast comprises David Barclay as curious chimpanzee archaeologist Cornelius and Jackie Lawrence as his wife, animal psychologist Zira, with Gary Cook (your host) as Dr Milo, Ernest Morris as the devious Dr Zaius and Frank Seymour as gorilla soldier Aboro. Produced and directed by David Barclay, who also created the prosthetic makeup in the style of the legendary John Chambers. This blog contains a collection of photos and animated screenshots, some of which you might have seen on my main Apes blog, Archives Of The Apes. Bear in mind that the original movie is on 8mm film, and much of the material presented here is third- or fourth-generation copies, so the quality may sometimes be a bit ropy.

CORNELIUS AND ZIRA