Our tour continued through several other soundstages, each decked out with equally massive set pieces. Though now empty, Odin’s hall featured a magnificent throne and a court that held hundreds of extras just days ago.
Moving down one hallway, we passed a makeup room with an open door and, seated in the middle chair, a man was being made up as a Frost Giant (pictured in toy form on the left) from head to toe. He panicked for a moment, worried that we’d seen something we weren’t supposed to be privy to, but Kyle assured him it was alright.
This was Colm Feore (one of the most well-spoken actors I’ve ever encountered) and who ends up chatting with our group in full, seamless blue makeup.
“I didn’t really [know what I was getting myself into],” he laughed, “until they came to my house and they said, ‘Well we have to do an impression of your feet, your hands, your teeth, your head — well, pretty much everything. And then could you strike a sort of heroic pose, because we’re gonna take some digital photographs, and then they’re gonna copy this and make something.’ And I said, ‘Well, okay’ — out of sight, out of mind, you know, I really didn’t think about it. And then I showed up, went to Legacy, and they had pictures of me, the design, this, next to half-naked pictures of Iggy Pop. Now, without telling you too much about myself, half-naked, me and Iggy Pop look a lot alike. I’m not gonna tell you which half, but as you can see, I’m not wearing a lot of clothes.”
Feore’s character winds up going head to head with Thor, angrily having to appeal to Odin to give the God of Thunder what’s coming to him. Part of an entire race of blue giants, Feore stands as their king.
“[I]f you’ve seen any of the frost giants,” he said, “you know that I am, of course, the Napoleon of frost giants. We’ve got some massive, fabulous guys who dwarf me and they come in at around 8 and a half feet, nine feet. But no, can’t you tell by the commanding presence? I’m the boss. The music will be big, when I show up there’ll be a big storm, there’ll be wind. It’s worked out beautifully.”
Feore joked that his original plan was to do his version of an Anthony Hopkins impression, but that his hopes were dashes when Hopkins himself stepped into the role of Odin. Instead, he described his character as “an homage to Tony Hopkins with a whisper of Max Von Sydow filtered through Paul Scofield”.
“[We did] a tiny, intimate scene,” laughed Feore about working with Hopkins, “about two guys going, ‘Your kid’s a f–ing idiot.’ ‘Yeah, I know, but you were an idiot once too.’ ‘Not that big an idiot, I might have to kill him.’ ‘Oh please don’t.’ ‘F–k you!’ ‘F–k you too!’… And so that’s what we’ve been doing, trying to stay as on, you know. You don’t mess around with Ken because when the ship sails, the ship sails. You get a couple of chances to be in the movie, and as I’ve said, if I’m no good in this movie, it won’t be his fault. He’s tried everything.”
