Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes Star Talks Taking Over Franchise From Andy Serkis

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is now playing in theaters, and the film’s preview night set a new franchise record. The film is currently up on Rotten Tomatoes with an 81% critics score after 203 reviews. ComicBook’s Spencer Perry gave the film a 4 out of 5, and called it “a grand time, and a worthy follow-up.” This marks the ninth Planet of the Apes film since 1968, and it takes place hundreds of years after the events of the previous trilogy, which starred Andy Serkis as Ceasar. While Serkis does not appear in the newest installment, the actor did share some advice for the new cast via Zoom. ComicBook recently had the chance to chat with Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes star, Owen Teague, and he talked about following in Serkis’ footsteps. 

“Finding the truth of the character,” Teague replied when asked what his top priority was when bringing the character Noa to life. “I mean, that’s kind of where it all comes from, is just approaching him as you basically as you would a human. You just have this kind of extra layer of physical and vocal work that you do on top of that.”

“But really, you know, figuring out where he’s coming from emotionally and what drives him is the key,” he added. “I mean, playing an ape kind of changes your perception of what being human is, I think. But one of the things that I learned about apes making it was that they can have the capacity to lie. They can be deceitful with each other. They’re very political.” 

Owen Teague Talks Advice From Andy Serkis:

ComicBook also spoke with Teague earlier this year, and he talked more about his Zoom call with Serkis.

“Well, yeah, we met on Zoom. I think he was working or directing something at the time, so he couldn’t actually come to Australia, which was a shame, but just the fact that we got to speak to him at all was amazing,” Teague explained. “It was so valuable getting to talk to him. He’s been one of my reasons for being an actor since I was six years old, so it was very surreal for me. But it was really good to talk to him about just how similar performance capture is to live-action work.”

“His biggest thing was to approach this the same,” he continued. “You’re just acting. This is acting. You’re putting on a costume of this physical character, but everything else remains the same, which was really helpful to hear because I think I’d kind of been neglecting that a little bit. Maybe I’d been putting too much emphasis on the physical side of it. So yeah, he was just lovely. He was so generous and he worked with all of us in groups and yeah, he’s amazing.”

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes is now playing in theaters.