Interviews With the Cinderella Cast
Tony asked Lily James (Cinderella) and Richard (Prince Charming), “Is there consternation when you take on an iconic character like Cinderella? Do you think ‘How can we do this?’?”
James replied, “Yeah, and there is great, great fear. But the thing that is amazing about Ken (Kenneth Branagh, director) is that he was, right from when I first met him, he was so clear about what he wanted. That we were doing such a classical faithful retelling but there were these little differences especially about her. Which made it, we felt, new and modern and more relevant.
“A lot of people have owned him before, before I am going to try and be him and in people’s heads, everyone has got this idea of what this prince is. So I have got a lot of terror going ‘God, am I going to be wrong. Are people going to not like what I do? Am I wrongly cast or you know all the kind of usual acts of paranoia things that you get.
“And then, uh, I went back to the original animation and there are only two or three scenes with the prince, we don’t even get to learn his name. So I got a bit of relief off that. And then me and Kenneth Branagh started to build a character up from scratch,” stated Richard Madden.
Cate Blanchett was also kind enough to answer the question for Tony. She said, “It’s absolutely sumptuous and delightful and genuine and it’s so refreshing to see a fairy tale that doesn’t have a kind of… uhm… a self-conscious twist to try and hook an audience in. I mean they have been really, really enjoyable but this is just… you can sense the classic.”
Again, “Cinderella” is in theaters right now and it is rated PG.
