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*Judging by the enthusiastic reaction to just 20 minutes of footage from the upcoming “Dreamgirls” film at the Cannes Film Festival Friday night, we may very well have the year’s first bona fide Oscar contender.
(You can view the same footage the folks at Cannes saw HERE.)
Paramount Pictures and DreamWorks screened the footage for a standing room only crowd that included such celebs as Bruce Willis, Hugh Jackman and Britain's Sir Ian McKellen. Not only did an extended standing ovation follow the showing of four brief scenes, but shouts of “more” also rang throughout the theater, putting a huge smile on the face of the film’s Oscar-winning co-star, Jamie Foxx.
"They talk about the Oscar curse. I don't feel it right now," Foxx said to rousing applause following the screening. The Texas native, who earned a Best Actor Academy Award in 2005 for his starring role in “Ray,” was on hand at Hotel Martinez along with co-stars Beyonce Knowles and Jennifer Hudson.
Due in theaters this December, “Dreamgirls” is adapted from the Tony-winning musical about a female singing trio and their manager’s costly rise to stardom in the 1960s. Foxx plays manager Curtis Taylor Jr., Knowles plays the group’s lead singer Deena Jones, and newcomers Anika Noni Rose and "American Idol" veteran Hudson round out the trio.
Knowles, who played less challenging roles in “The Pink Panther,” “The Fighting Temptations” and “Austin Powers in Goldfinger,” said this film was her first major test as an actress.
"This was my first role," she told Reuters. "This was really my debut as an actor. It was the first role where I had to show that I can do the dramatic scenes and that I can play a character with range."
Beyonce, 24, also told reporters that she lost about 20 pounds for the part, which has her character fronting a group loosely modeled after Diana Ross and the Supremes.
"At the beginning (of filming), I was my normal weight," she said. "I actually gained a little bit, but then I lost 20 lbs. when I went from young Deena to old Deena. I wanted it to be something more than just make-up and hair. I wanted to see the change."
Knowles, wearing a blue halter dress designed by her mother Tina, assured folks that the weight loss was not due to pressure from Hollywood executives.
"Oh no, that was my idea,” she affirms. "The director (Bill Condon) actually kept telling me to 'eat, eat, eat' for continuity, but I really wanted to go all the way. I was inspired by Tom Hanks. He did it all the way (in “Castaway”), so I said, I can do it all the way."
Hudson, meanwhile, told reporters she was happy with her full figure and had no intentions of trying to slim it down: "Why fix something that isn't broke? Someone has to represent the average girl. Not everyone is a size 2."
Still, she added, "I've been trying to work out, to make sure my curves don't get too much curvy. I enjoy my jelly where it is."
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Beyonce Knowles, Anika Noni Rose, Jamie Foxx and Jennifer Hudson at Cannes Film Festival
Producer, Laurence Mark, tells Reuters that the film is far from finished, but the studios were so excited about their existing footage, that, “We wanted to put it in front of audiences, give them a taste of it and say, 'Here's what we have cooking, kids.’”
Also on hand to offer insights into their respective fields were: two-time Oscar-winning production designer John Myhre ("Memoirs of a Geisha," "Chicago"), who brought along scale models of different sets from the film; Oscar-nominated costume designer Sharen Davis ("Ray"), with mannequins displaying a few of the film's wide-ranging costumes; award-winning choreographer Fatima Robinson, backed up by a video monitor showing her working out dance moves with the cast; and twice Tony-nominated composer Henry Krieger, who composed the original Broadway musical "Dreamgirls," and returned to write new music for the film version.
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