OC exhibit showcases mechanics of movie monsters

The Abominable Snowman in the Matterhorn at Disneyland isn’t the only monster in central Orange County these days. A museum in Anaheim is the temporary home to some movie monsters. KPCC’s Susan Valot stopped by for an “inside” look.

Susan Valot: Walk into the Muzeo - an arts and culture museum across from Anaheim City Hall - and a giant crocodile meets you at the door. You may have seen him before. In the 2003 live action movie “Peter Pan,” he’s the crocodile with the ticking clock in his stomach. Muzeo Exhibition and Programming Director Joyce Franklin says the croc’s one of several examples of movie mechanics in the “How to Make a Monster” exhibit.

Joyce Franklin: The tail of the crocodile – when they made the crocodile, they didn’t make the full length. They made the head, so you can see that. And you could – they made the tail separately. So you would never see the WHOLE crocodile, but in the movie you’d see the tail wiggle, which is sort of like this [SOUND OF TAIL SQUEEKING AS FRANKLIN MOVES IT]. So you can see this flapping back and forth. And then you saw the head of the crocodile and the eyes blink every once in a while.

[sound of squeeking tail as it moves]

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Valot: A movie camera shoots the tail as you wiggle it. Your wiggling efforts show up on a nearby TV screen. You can look inside the tail to see the mechanics, too. Franklin says this is a hands-on exhibit.

Franklin: The materials they use – touch it. It’s very – it’s almost spongy. You look like it’s going to be hard, doesn’t it?

Valot: It feels like one of those, those squishy stress heads? [laughs]

Franklin: Yeah, yeah. The stress balls! Yeah, yeah. But that’s how most of the things are made. And then there’s one other that’s another one of my favorites.

Valot: We walk around the corner, past several versions of the talking gorilla from “George of the Jungle” and a creature that looks like something out of the Black Lagoon. Joyce Franklin stops and presses a button in front of a dinosaur that looks like he could be related to C3PO in “Star Wars.”

Franklin: This is the skeleton of this particular piece. And when this thing – [interrupted by roar of dinosaur]

Valot: The animatronic skeleton of a dinosaur moves as it roars.

Franklin: See how his eyelids open and close on this side? How the eye moves around? [ANOTHER ROAR] Isn’t that wonderful?

Valot: Different buttons trigger different movements on the dinosaur.

Franklin: You can see his mouth open and his head turn. So you have, you have control over what they would be doing in the movies.

Valot: Dinosaurs, Inspector Gadget, even an abominable snowman… all of these creatures were gathered up by John Cox’s Creature Workshop. He won a Best Visual Effects Oscar for the animatronics in the movie, “Babe.” The “How to Make a Monster” exhibit was a smash in Australia. That’s why Joyce Franklin of Muzeo wanted to bring it here – its first stop on the West Coast.

Franklin: There’s a lot of wonderful, wonderful work, artisanship that goes behind constructing these things. And they’re truly artists that put the technology together so that we can get lifelike movement from the pieces.

Valot: Franklin considers it art… in movie form. It’ll be in Anaheim until September.

[sound of dinosaur roar]