Avatar: The Way of Water‘s James Cameron has heard the Saturday Night Live Papyrus jokes. On BBC Radio 1 with Ali Plumb, the director had to explain himself. It was a pretty fun little bit of conversation that saw the beloved filmmaker tell the world that he didn’t even know that they had borrowed the font. (In actuality they didn’t, but we’ll get to that later!) He saw the SNL sketch after someone brought it to his attention. Cameron was absolutely stunned that they would go to such great lengths for the concept. After all, the way the Ryan Gosling sketch was filmed is very different than the rest of the NBC variety show. But, when you’ve got a good idea, you have to run with it. In a way, people remember that silly Papyrus sketch just as much as the original theatrical run of the movie. But, the director takes any and all jabs at his premise in stride. Check out his full comments down below!
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“It haunted me. Not really,” Cameron joked. “It is funny. I’m just astonished that they spent that much money on a little cinematic vignette that’s around such a wispy, thin concept. I said, ‘Alright guys, we are now doubling down! We are using Papyrus for everything! The funniest thing about that whole story is I didn’t even know it was Papyrus, no one asked me! I just thought that the art department had come up with this cool font.”
The Art Department Reveals The Real Font
Entertainment Weekly caught up with producer Jon Landau to discuss everything Papyrus. He also had some revealing information about their process as a whole. “Yes, I’ve seen that. Ryan Gosling. Absolutely saw it,” Landau told the outlet when speaking about the Gosling masterclass. “It’s fun that it stimulated a conversation.”
“When we realized that the movie was going to expand into a franchise and we’d have other IPs, we went out and created our own font that we’re now using, and we call it Toruk, and it’s available for people to use,” he continued. “But the Papyrus font is a fun thing, and I also love the fact that… it was certainly several years after the movie came out, and I guess it illustrated to people who were questioning Avatar’s cultural relevance that it was still part of the culture.”
Did you think that sketch was funny? Let us know down in the comments!
