D23: Tron Legacy panel

D23 was Disney’s inaugural showcase of all things Disney, from their theme parks to TV offerings and even feature films. One of the most interesting films at D23 was Tron Legacy, the sequel to the groundbreaking 1982 CGI Science Fiction film. The producers Steven Lisberger and Sean Bailey were on hand to talk about the film and we were there to learn about the new film. 

Q: How did you pick up on any of the DNA of Tron and expand it? 

Sean Bailey: I think we were really fortunate in a couple respects, when ultimately I got involved with the movie five years ago or so. Shortly thereafter we found a young filmmaker named Joe Kosinski and Joe followed a couple very smart early decisions. He really respected the work of Mobius and Sid Mead. He said, “Who are those folks out there today?” And immediately, we kind of commenced the search for who are the most exciting designers out there in the world, irrespective of whether they were in the movie business or not. So we brought in a guy named Daniel Simon who is one of the most leading edge auto designers from Germany. A guy by the name of David Levy who’s an architecture guy primarily. And then what Joe told them was there is incredibly design in the original Tron, the ’82 picture. Look at the light cycle, look at the Recognizer. but how do we take it and evolve it to that extent? So really kind of more than an inspiration or jumping off point, we actually just said a lot of this stuff, we don’t think there’s any reason to fix what he designed. 

Steven Lisberger:  There’s almost a feeling that when we made the first film, it was a wide open frontier and we could do anything and we didn’t have to worry about making it real or what it really meant specifically in our lives, this technology. Now it’s 25 years later and it’s a different time for a different generation who actually lives with technology every day and has to incorporate it. So it’s a little bit like cyberspace is the same but it’s moved on past being a frontier to a place where civilization really exists. 

Q: Casting Jeff? 

Steven Lisberger:  Well, Jeff actually was The Dude even back then. He was easy. People were saying, “What’s a video game? A video game movie? Disney studios? No, I cannot do that.” Jeff read the script and came out to the office and said, “This is far out. I want to do this.” And I said, “Well, that’s good.” And I thought he was going to leave and I thought we would talk about it some more. He said, “So, do I have the gig or not?” I said, “You’ve got the gig.” And then he left and I walked out and told the executives and the other producer, “I just hired him.” They said, “You didn’t even talk to us.” That’s how it went. 

Q: How did you cast Jeff back and new characters? 

Sean Bailey: My own experience with Battle Zone, because obviously I wasn’t there, is I think what we kind of did, which is I think an ambitious choice, storywise we all sat down and said, “Let’s make this a standalone sequel.” Meaning the movie can exist on its own. You don’t have to have seen the ’82 film as all of you will do or have done, but we’re going to accept that the events of 1982 of the movie happened, that Kevin Flynn went in, battled the MCP, came out. Encom exists and we’re going to say, we first started by building all the intervening mythology, in ’82 and 2010. So this movie takes place in 2010, deals with the son of Kevin Flynn, Sam Flynn and events have really changed, both inside the system and in the world outside from what we learned in ’82. So I think I’m excited by the choice because this is a continuation of the narrative and with that went some design choices... 

Steven Lisberger:  It’s almost like Flynn got to create the future of the internet but only his version in his own little fiefdom. It’s his virtual world.

Q: Did Jeff come in asking about it? 

Sean Bailey: No, we did an interesting thing where our partner at the studio, Brigham Taylor, and Steven and I, early on when we were just thinking about the story, went into the powers that be and said, “Hey,” we talked about what I remembered from Tron and our kind of collective memory of it where I said, “To me, if you’re going to make Tron, we have to look as much at what’s this experience like as what is the story. I don't know how you just read a script on Tron and say okay, let’s go hire a director.” We think we have to do visual on it as well. And so we started while we were building the story, we built the two in concert, much more like I guess an animated movie. So what we did was we initially wanted to go shoot this test. We built out storyboards, concept art and we brought Jeff in very early and we said, “We don’t have a script to show you. Here’s kind of our idea. We want to kind of do this idea of a sequel. So you’re Kevin Flynn and there’s also a big wrinkle and you’re going to play another guy in the movie too.” So Jeff is in the movie in two parts. We said, “Here’s kind of what we’re thinking. We’d like to go just shoot this and we need you to be in it.” I guess a little bit similar to what he did back then, said, “That’s far out.” So it was lucky. From my recent experience with him, this is a guy who wants to push it. He’s ambitious in his acting choices and he’s ambitious of if you’re going to try stuff that’s never been done before, I’m in.