As the spirit moves him
Actor channels inner dog for role in Call of the Wild
Terry Notary didn’t fall into the film industry so much as he glided into it like the Cirque du Soleil acrobat he was. Notary had just left the circus entertainment company when Ron Howard spotted him teaching extras how to move like the Whos in Whoville on the set of the 2000 comedy How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
Notary had never worked on a film set before — the film’s stunt co-ordinator had recruited him and several other Cirque alums to create acrobatic gags for the Whos — and it seemed obvious to him that all of Whoville’s residents should move like they were from the same, however fictional, species. It hadn’t occurred to him that he had broken an unwritten rule of set decorum by taking it upon himself to teach them until the famed director called Notary into his office.
Luckily for Notary, Howard was impressed with what he had seen. The director asked if he would teach everybody. Within a week
Notary had a sound stage and equipment at his disposal. Also a job title he hadn’t previously known existed: movement choreographer.
Twenty years after Howard’s Dr. Seuss adaptation hit screens, Notary is still teaching actors how to move. He’s been a movement choreographer on the sets of the Planet of the Apes, Avengers and Hobbit franchises, among other films.
“It’s about undoing effort and getting back to our roots,” said Notary, 51, who can be seen in theatres playing Buck, the canine protagonist in the adaptation of Jack London’s The Call of the Wild, opposite Harrison Ford.
Social media users have got a kick out of GIFS highlighting Notary’s transition into the doe-eyed St. Bernard mix. But Notary said playing man’s best friend to a man played by Ford wasn’t awkward at all. “We just got super comfortable being really close to each other all the time.”
The Los Angeles-based actor used his own dogs — one, he said, is “dumber than a doornail,” and the other is “just the smartest thing you’ve ever met in your life” — as inspiration while getting into character.
He filmed them in slow motion in their natural habitat: the front yard. “It was interesting ... watching it back and really just seeing how they moved and the little nuances that they have,” Notary said. “They read everything, they read tone, inflection, expression and energy all at the same time. So it’s like this wave of everything coming at them.”
Notary has also studied apes — his favourite animal to play. “They’re just these beautiful souls that are connected and rooted and deep,” Notary said. “And soft, but with this beautiful integrity to everything they do.”
Notary believes actors can benefit from learning to move like animals — even if they don’t portray them on screen.
The difference, he said, comes down to “the social conditioning that we go through as human beings.”
“We become more disjointed and disconnected from our true selves. And getting back to that place is really, really important for actors in order to not bring baggage to their character but to create something fresh and new with each role.”