Alex J. Berliner/AB Images, 2; Alamy
It’s been over forty years since Mario made his video game debut as the hero of the 1981 arcade classic Donkey Kong, though at the time he was only known as “Jumpman.” Since then, he’s appeared in over 200 video games, a Saturday Morning cartoon, and now two movies. And the success of Donkey Kong gave the world not just one star, but another one too: creator Shigeru Miyamoto.
Miyamoto is credited as the brains behind not only Mario, but Zelda, Star Fox, Pikmin, and more. He’s been the creative and philosophical force that has powered Nintendo for decades, and has achieved iconic status in the gaming industry that few can match. But he didn’t do it alone. Beginning with 1985’s Super Mario Bros., Miyamoto began collaborating with composer Koji Kondo, whose keyboard arrangement for the game became a masterclass in elegant simplicity and crept into the minds of gamers for generations.
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The most obvious industry parallels for the two might be Walt Disney (Miyamoto) and John Williams (Kondo). The former pioneered both game design and artistic direction, which arguably saved the entire medium. The latter breathed life into virtual worlds, with tunes as addictive as the gameplay itself. Together, they built Nintendo’s legacy with some of pop culture’s most memorable characters and music.
Now they’re working to bring that legacy to a whole new generation, as well as to an audience that may never pick up a controller. As a co-production between Illumination and Nintendo, The Super Mario Bros. Movie feels like a labor of love in almost every way, and much of that is thanks to the creative input of Miyamoto and Kondo. Miyamoto, who brought his stewardship of the brand to the film as well as the recently opened theme park, worked with the Illumination creative team to find the right angle to rig Mario for the big screen. Kondo, who worked with composer Brian Tyler, provided nearly four decades of expertise and arrangements that influenced film music.
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Following the film’s LA premiere, Rolling Stone sat down with the duo to discuss the difficulties of adapting their work, Bowser’s fingers fitting into piano keys, and how sometimes success can actually be a curse.
Why is now the right time for Mario to make the leap to the cinema?
Miyamoto: So, about 10 years ago – up to that point, Mario was made specifically for a video game. And we had created Mario as a character to be used in video games as we make new ones. And for this reason we have not put any external details unnecessary for the game, as this could lead to limitations in the future. [So] Things like “What’s Mario’s favorite food?” “Does Mario have a brother?” “Does Mario have a sister?” All of these questions were unnecessary. We didn’t do that. But when it comes to movies [that kind of] Fringe information and details become important, they become decisive. That’s something we kind of had to deal with.
And about 10 years ago, after that time where [people were saying]”It’s either Nintendo, Sega, Sony, or Microsoft” After all that was wrapped up, we wanted to focus on the idea that people like Nintendo and love Nintendo as Nintendo, not specifically as a specific game. And together with Mr. Iwata, we decided that we wanted to shift focus and take a more IP-centric approach. And within that kind of approach was the idea of creating movies, theme parks and things like that.
Why was Illumination the right partner to bring this to life?
Miyamoto: After making that decision to go the IP-centric approach, we had talked about potential partners and then our encounter with Chris [Meledandri] was interesting in that we got to know each other and realized that our philosophies and the way we think about creating something new are very similar. We thought this would be a great match and decided let’s work together to create something new. And it was just this kind of joining forces of these two different creative minds, and then we finally decided to do a new film and it’s been a smooth process from there ever since.
There were times when people would come up to the original creators, Nintendo, and say, “Here’s the kind of movie you want to make. And here’s how we can extend that to the business.” And back then, when we changed our approach, we felt that it should be Nintendo that creates something like this. With Chris, it wasn’t like, “Hey, let’s make a Mario movie.” It was like, “Let’s create something new,” and that kind of shift in perspective and how our approach to making something was what this partnership was really made it work.
Tanooki Mario, OP since 1988. Nintendo
Kondo-San, how was your experience working with composer Brian Tyler on the music for the film?
Kondo: The entire film was, of course, composed by Brian from start to finish [Tyler]. We really wanted him to take control of this process. My contribution to him was to provide what I thought was game music – a list of game music – that would go with the various scenes I had seen in the film. And then Brian took up some of those suggestions. And then he added different musical phrases. He took those and added those phrases to the overall score, rearranging things in a way that supported the film as a whole.
I didn’t give specific instructions to say, “Please use this music in this scene.” And the reason for that is because I didn’t want people to be taken out of the film by listening to a piece of game music that doesn’t fully fit that particular scene. So it was really just suggestions, which I thought would help, and then Brian could take that back and weave it into the overall composition for each scene. And again he has come up with this truly amazing piece of work.
There’s a delicate balance between music composed for the film and needle drops of popular songs. What helped find this balance?
Kondo: As for those outside pieces, those licensed pieces of music, I really think it’s because of the [directors]. And I think in this case they did something that worked flawlessly within the overall structure of the film.
Are there any tracks that you wish would have made it into the film?
Kondo: NO! I want to make the music myself! [Laughs]
Miyamoto: There were temporary licenses in the film [tracks] that were put in. [We] then went in and attempted to replace them with songs created specifically for the film. But there were still scenes where we felt the licensed songs worked better, and those are the ones that are left. Another thing we thought about was [that] All of the music created for the film – including Nintendo music – has no lyrics and vocals, and a score with no lyrics and vocals might be a little off, so we thought it would be good to have. We sort of drew on the licensed music to provide vocal lyrical relief in the musical score.
Up to this point, has there been any internal debate about the decision to bring back The Plumber Rap or The DK Rap?
Miyamoto: This is actually something that both the screenwriter and director decided early on that they wanted to be part of. And on our part, there was a lot of nostalgia because we did some of that PR work in New York [to dig up those tracks] So I think it was a pretty unanimous decision.
“Addicted to the brothers.” Nintendo
There is a scene early in the film that recreates the side-scrolling nature of a traditional Mario game. What were the challenges of bringing the visual language of a video game to the screen?
Miyamoto: [When] We are talking about Mario games, there is the experience of playing a Mario game, and I think there are a lot of difficulties. We had a lot of trouble initially getting this abstract idea of what an Action Mario game was like, and then we struggled to recreate that visually. And it was difficult. But while we were trying to work on the film, we were able to do a few select scenes that really capture that. As you mentioned, the early scene where they’re running down the street, or even the course that looks like it was made by Mario Maker, stuff like that. And as we were completing those scenes, it really dawned on us that even if we’re just using things that look and feel familiar to people who’ve played the games, like the assets and whatnot, we were able to do something creating that was compelling and felt good, and I think after that it became a lot easier to handle and a lot easier to think about.
In the film, Bowser is portrayed [by Jack Black] like he had some sort of Neil Diamond-esque tortured soul vibe. If the video game version of Bowser was a musician, what kind of guy would he be?
Kondo: I really think Bowser is a layered character depending on the game we get him in [or] we’re talking about it, so I think he would be really in the mood [no pun intended] with the game itself.
Miyamoto: Talking about the fact that Bowser plays the piano himself was a big factor, because when the idea came up that Bowser could play the piano, we were like, ‘How big does the piano have to be for him to fit? Are his hands caught in the keys? Will he be able to hit the right keys?” All those doubts and questions came up, but only the image of Bowser sitting in front of the piano really did it for us.
One of the most surprising additions to the film is the fact that Mario and Luigi have this very well developed family. What was the approach to introducing these characters?
Miyamoto: I mentioned we [actively tried] not add unnecessary details for the video games. But you know, the fact that there are other Italian immigrants in Brooklyn who live in the same household as a family – with a family feel like at home – we thought was very important. And about 20 years ago there was an illustrator named Mr. [Yōichi] Kotabe, who had illustrated a diagram of Mario and Luigi’s family. So that’s what we based on. And Illumination then took that and added their kind of flavor and touch.
As for Mario’s mom and dad, those were based on some old, vintage illustrations we had. Once that was settled, I really thought about it, “How do the brothers fit into their family? And how is Mario’s relationship with his father and mother?” Then through that, it [kind of] influenced what Cranky Kong’s relationship with Donkey Kong would be like. [We also] had this rich couple, the mother and father of Franz the dog. Pauline was there too, but you know, some of the characters that appear on TV are probably the only “new” characters that we’ve created. Everything else was created with what we already had.
A Luma in a real existential crisis. Nintendo
Mario has been around for over 40 years and the film contains references to everything including Spike from Wrecking Crew to Lumas from Super Mario Galaxy. How did you decide which eras in Mario history to draw inspiration from?
Miyamoto: So as far as the characters go, initially we were very fortunate that the directors of Illumination, the writer, basically the entire staff was so savvy and loved Mario. In fact, they probably know more about it than I do. It was really a process of people dropping assets like this or asking the question, “Do you have any assets related to this thing that I want to link to?” Stuff like this. So it’s a combination of the 40 years of content that we had, coupled with this team of fans who want to make this, so the only problem was sorting all of that.
You mentioned Spike from Wrecking Crew. This idea came up and we were like, ‘Oh, this could be fun. It would be a lot of fun to see.” Another example: I thought we had to place Donkey Kong somewhere in New York, but the idea of placing Donkey Kong in his world in the Mushroom Kingdom was a pretty big step – and an adventurous step – which we could not have imagined.
And speaking of Easter eggs, there are simply countless of them. I think you need to see it more than five times. Five times probably won’t be enough for everything.
Kondo: There are a lot of sound effects and not just sound effects [the film world] but integrated into the music.
Miyamoto: I think we probably provided the team with over a hundred sound effects. Even Mario’s jumping noise in the Japanese version has a different voice for every single “Wahoo!”. In the game, it’s mostly the same voice. So we had a lot of fun with all of that.
Kondo: I think it would be interesting to see how many people get that when Luigi gets a call, the ringtone… I don’t know if you noticed that. This is the turn on [sound effect] for the Game Cube.
We are in an era of popular culture where video game adaptations in film and television are on the rise. What do you think of this trend and what role does Nintendo play in it?
Miyamoto: I find [that] Nintendo always wants to do something different as soon as it becomes popular. So I hope it doesn’t get that popular! [Laughs]. Because we really want to concentrate on our work [this one] movie for the moment.
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So now Mario is a movie star. Bowser is a rock star. Are you ready for your Rolling Stone cover?
Miyamoto: Absolutely please. We would love it!