The SmurfsAn Interview with Hank Azaria
By Max Evry
Hank Azaria Turns Evil For ‘The Smurfs’
For over 25 years Hank Azaria has been best-known as the main utility voice on “The Simpsons,” voicing some of the most beloved side characters on the show including Moe, Apu, Chief Wiggum, Comic Book Guy, Carl Carlson, Cletus Spuckler, Professor Frink, Dr. Nick Riviera, Lou, Snake, Kirk Van Houten, the Sea Captain, Superintendent Chalmers, Disco Stu, and Duffman. With such versatility it’s no wonder the producers of the new film version of “The Smurfs” sought Azaria out to portray the villainous sorcerer Gargamel, originally voice on the American cartoon by the late Paul Winchell.
“The Smurfs” began life in the 1950’s as comic book characters created by Belgian cartoonist Peyo, then became a worldwide Saturday morning/merchandising phenomenon in the 80’s. In the new film the lovable “3-apples-high” blue creatures have to flee Smurf village and escape through a portal to modern-day New York City with Gargamel in hot pursuit. Neil Patrick Harris plays a kindly advertising agent who takes the Smurfs in.
As Azaria explained when talking about the role to us in New York, while shooting on-location portions of the film in our fair city he managed to blend right in despite a grotesque nose, hump, and monk’s robe.
How did you mentally deal with the 100+ hours of make-up you put in over the course of the shoot?
HANK AZARIA: What Zen exercise did I to get through mind-numbing… the first time they did it took four hours, then they got it down. Their record was an hour-thirty-seven, not like I was timing it or anything. Usually about an hour-forty-five. There were three lovely people who put all that on there. We all liked classic rock, so we would pick which band we would listen to that day, then reminisce if we saw that band and where. That’s pretty much how we got through that time. I shaved my head, but not because I’m method, just ’cause it saved me about a half hour in the chair.
What was your inspiration for the character and the laugh?
HANK AZARIA: I thought that I could get away with doing Gargamel without an evil laugh. Like, “Ahh, that’s so cliché to do an evil laugh.” “Yeah, that’s why you have to do it.” To laugh as hard as I could in that voice was the evil laugh. It ended up sounding sorta similar to Paul Winchell, which I was actually kinda happy about. I just wanted to make him funnier. I felt in the American cartoon Gargamel was very one-dimensional, didn’t express himself very much. I was glad when we were looking for ways to make him funnier, which for me was mostly because he seems to be married to the cat.
What was it like actually filming in New York City with millions of people walking around?
HANK AZARIA: Gargamel in Manhattan should probably be made more of by people, but I think New Yorkers would just roll with him. Sure enough we discovered that was the case. Weirder than shooting as Gargamel in Manhattan was often the make-up trailer was on 48th and set was on 45th, so I had to just walk three blocks as Gargamel with no context of the movie even. People would look, but they would do what New Yorkers do, which is they’d acknowledge it then look away. Don’t want to engage with the nit. No one said anything. It was amazing.
I got to visit the set in Astoria when you were shooting this grand song and dance number, which was not in the film. Were sad to see that go?
HANK AZARIA: It might not even make the cut of the DVD, that’s how great my song and dance skills are. I am not a great musical performer, so it was fun to do but I trusted if it got cut there’s good reasons for it. It’s never going to make me sad if some song and dance I did got cut.
“The Smurfs” is now playing in theaters everywhere in 3-D.
