The Alice In Wonderland World Premiere
A long entry with lots of pretty pictures. Curious?
Alice in Wonderland is a classic twisted fairy tale, something as British as tea-parties and the book is an integral part of childhood’s world-round. After all, what young girl doesn’t dream of following her heart to another world, even if that world sometimes leads to trouble? Wonderland’s convoluted logic and eccentric characters can be genuinely frightening. Iconic images of hearts and cards, rabbits, clocks and tea-parties are never far away from the minds of even the most main-stream fashion designers. And for all of those reasons I ADORE Alice In Wonderland.
Tim Burton is a director I am very passionate about. His dark, Gothic sensibilities are exactly what I look for in a film and his visual style is instantly recognisable. So, Burton’s upcoming reimagining of Alice In Wonderland is something I have been very excited about for quite some time.
Last Halloween, even, my other half and I went as Burton-esque versions of The Mad Hatter and Alice - we’ve been putting these costumes together for quite some time, constantly working on improving them and are both really rather proud of our efforts. So, when we heard that the World Premiere of Alice In Wonderland was to be held in London’s Leicester Square, we couldn’t resist joining in with the party!
Oz: 
Oz and I:
We knew it was going to be a pretty big affair, so we were up at some un-godly hour and arrived at Leicester Square at around 7:30ish, thinking we’d done pretty well for ourselves. We were wrong! Many people had camped out over night, in sub-zero temperatures and the main viewing area opposite the entrance to the cinema was already jam-packed with people! Nevertheless, we managed to get ourselves a place at the barrier past which the cars drove to the red carpet. The atmosphere was wonderful - lots of people had dressed up. We were stood next to some amazing girls who had come all the way from Sweden. They had dressed up as some of Johnny Depp’s most famous characters. There was Jack Sparrow,
], Sweeny Todd
, Edward Scissorhands
and Willy Wonka
. They looked great together [pic] There were also several Mad Hatters - in my opinion this guy was the best hatter there
he was really sweet and had come from Manchester. His hat was made out a camping roll! These two seem to be in all the media shots we’ve seen!
There were also card soldiers, lots of people with a queen of hearts theme, people in bunny outfits and Tweedledum and Tweedledee. Oddly, though, the only other girl I saw dressed as Alice was about 4 years old! We all got a lot of attention and were in countless tourist pictures from that day, which inflates my ego! On the personal side of things, I had a tutorial at 12 I just couldn’t miss. So, I had to go halfway across London, Alice dress and all. The stares I got on the tube were priceless enough, but that was nothing compared to how it was once I got onto campus. I am a LAW student! People already think I’m weird! The tutor couldn’t resist asking me about it and wrote my name as ‘Alice’ on the register sheet. One girl even took a photo of me. I’ve never felt so simultaneously nervous and amused! The crowd got thicker progressively. Sadly, though, for every lovely person who was sweet and understanding, there was a pushy idiot trying to wiggle their way through to the barrier and being thoroughly obnoxious about it. They put up signs
and some haphazardous giraffe shaped topiary
... it looked like it’s head was going to fall off at any moment. Also, the red carpet wasn’t even red, it was green! But, this IS Britain after all. At about 3pm, it started to rain. A sea of umbrella’s naturally emerged. That was, in fact, more frustrating than helpful, though as by which point the crowd was fairly packed, so the rain just dripped from umbrella to umbrella down and onto the people bellow. The crowd was so packed in, I couldn’t even get at my coat on and within minutes was soaked through. I even attempted to keep the rain off with a tablecloth draped over my head, looking like a school nativity Virgin Mary! Naturally, that was when all the press arrived - there were all sorts - TV crews and photographers from every country imaginable. We gave several interviews and had lots of pictures taken of us. I like to think we gave slightly more intelligent answers than most of the 15 year old girls there who seemed to have only two words in their vocabulary - Johnny Depp! So far, we have had a brief appearance on GMTV We’ve had a photo in the Daily Mail Online http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1253805/Alice-In-Wonderland-Royal-World-Premiere-Anne-Hathaway-Helena-Bonham-Carter.html We’re on an AFP article... I’m looking decidedly miffed!: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teEfSMs9k9I And we’re in the background of a Newsround interview: http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/hi/newsid_8530000/newsid_8538100/8538175.stm And there is a brief flash of Oz on the OFFICIAL Disney video of the premiere: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABApu3xJz6k At around 5:45, the stars started to arrive. They all drove past in their cars with tinted windows, so it was very difficult to tell who was who, actually. The only person who had their window wound down and waved was Matt Lucas. Generally speaking, there were an awful lot of celebrities there for the sake of it. People like Daisy Lowe, who I honestly couldn’t care less about! Tim and Helena arrives together, we caught a good glimpse of them, but sadly they didn;t come anywhere near. From a distance we also saw Matt Lucas, Mia Wasikowska, Christopher Lee, Anne Hathaway and Alan Rickman (I REALLY Wish I’d gotten closer to him!) Micahel Sheen was good enough to come over and sign a picture for me, though. The real focus of the entire thing, however, was Depp. He did his job well, waving lots as he got out of the car, doing his TV interviews and then coming back to sign hundreds of autographs. A whole lot of screaming ensued and there was a nasty crush with the crowd surging even further forward. This increased my discomfort even more as it meant there was an umbrella handle wedged into me. Sadly, it was raining SO hard, that by that point the photos we had were soaked through and the pen wouldn’t take, so I have a squiggle and poor Oz only had a line! He was, very sweet however and told us our outfits looked great which was fantastic. Depp is an incredibly talented and hardworking actor and a very good looking guy for his age, but nevertheless, there is so much MORE to this film than just him. But to 98% of people at the premiere he was the only focus. No-one seemed to give a damn about Burton, the creative visionary without whom the film wouldn’t even have existed. People were downright rude about Mia - which I think is highly unfair considering the film hasn’t even come out yet! At the end of the day, Depp is just a human being, like everyone else. To put him on some kind of pedestal and camp out overnight for him seems mad to me. Besides, he’s married with kids - it’s never going to happen! Also, Depp was lovely enough to spend a lot of time over in the disabled viewing area and take some pictures with them (whereas there was no time to do that with everyone) and this mouthy girl behind me was really cruel and jealous of that. For all you know those people could be dying of cancer. There is absolutely no need to be so bitter and it won’t solve anything or make him love you. Grow up! Anyway, these were the best shots of him I managed to get. They are pretty bad, but my fingers were so cold, I could barely press the button to take the pictures:
EXTREME close-up!:
Probably, and sadly the best shot I got:
There were a lot of people there who were apparently there who we didn’t even see. Most of them came in through a side-door because of the rain, it seems. I fully understand that the celebrities don’t want to stand around in the rain more than anyone else... but simultaneously, the fans have waited outside in that rain all day, you could at least make a brief appearance, you have umbrella’s after all! I’m glad I did it, it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. But I really don’t think I’d be in any hurry to do it again. I’m getting just a little too old and cynical to really understand all the crazy hysteria and hype. And the rain really did NOT help - I was so cold, I physically could not stop shaking and shivering, most other people were no better off. Maybe for a smaller film with less famous actors - we’ll have to see, I guess. Overall, my experience of Wonderland wasn’t so wonderful -hopefully the film will improve my spirits.
Oz and I:
We knew it was going to be a pretty big affair, so we were up at some un-godly hour and arrived at Leicester Square at around 7:30ish, thinking we’d done pretty well for ourselves. We were wrong! Many people had camped out over night, in sub-zero temperatures and the main viewing area opposite the entrance to the cinema was already jam-packed with people! Nevertheless, we managed to get ourselves a place at the barrier past which the cars drove to the red carpet. The atmosphere was wonderful - lots of people had dressed up. We were stood next to some amazing girls who had come all the way from Sweden. They had dressed up as some of Johnny Depp’s most famous characters. There was Jack Sparrow,
], Sweeny Todd
, Edward Scissorhands
and Willy Wonka
. They looked great together [pic] There were also several Mad Hatters - in my opinion this guy was the best hatter there
he was really sweet and had come from Manchester. His hat was made out a camping roll! These two seem to be in all the media shots we’ve seen!
There were also card soldiers, lots of people with a queen of hearts theme, people in bunny outfits and Tweedledum and Tweedledee. Oddly, though, the only other girl I saw dressed as Alice was about 4 years old! We all got a lot of attention and were in countless tourist pictures from that day, which inflates my ego! On the personal side of things, I had a tutorial at 12 I just couldn’t miss. So, I had to go halfway across London, Alice dress and all. The stares I got on the tube were priceless enough, but that was nothing compared to how it was once I got onto campus. I am a LAW student! People already think I’m weird! The tutor couldn’t resist asking me about it and wrote my name as ‘Alice’ on the register sheet. One girl even took a photo of me. I’ve never felt so simultaneously nervous and amused! The crowd got thicker progressively. Sadly, though, for every lovely person who was sweet and understanding, there was a pushy idiot trying to wiggle their way through to the barrier and being thoroughly obnoxious about it. They put up signs
and some haphazardous giraffe shaped topiary
... it looked like it’s head was going to fall off at any moment. Also, the red carpet wasn’t even red, it was green! But, this IS Britain after all. At about 3pm, it started to rain. A sea of umbrella’s naturally emerged. That was, in fact, more frustrating than helpful, though as by which point the crowd was fairly packed, so the rain just dripped from umbrella to umbrella down and onto the people bellow. The crowd was so packed in, I couldn’t even get at my coat on and within minutes was soaked through. I even attempted to keep the rain off with a tablecloth draped over my head, looking like a school nativity Virgin Mary! Naturally, that was when all the press arrived - there were all sorts - TV crews and photographers from every country imaginable. We gave several interviews and had lots of pictures taken of us. I like to think we gave slightly more intelligent answers than most of the 15 year old girls there who seemed to have only two words in their vocabulary - Johnny Depp! So far, we have had a brief appearance on GMTV We’ve had a photo in the Daily Mail Online http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1253805/Alice-In-Wonderland-Royal-World-Premiere-Anne-Hathaway-Helena-Bonham-Carter.html We’re on an AFP article... I’m looking decidedly miffed!: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teEfSMs9k9I And we’re in the background of a Newsround interview: http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/hi/newsid_8530000/newsid_8538100/8538175.stm And there is a brief flash of Oz on the OFFICIAL Disney video of the premiere: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABApu3xJz6k At around 5:45, the stars started to arrive. They all drove past in their cars with tinted windows, so it was very difficult to tell who was who, actually. The only person who had their window wound down and waved was Matt Lucas. Generally speaking, there were an awful lot of celebrities there for the sake of it. People like Daisy Lowe, who I honestly couldn’t care less about! Tim and Helena arrives together, we caught a good glimpse of them, but sadly they didn;t come anywhere near. From a distance we also saw Matt Lucas, Mia Wasikowska, Christopher Lee, Anne Hathaway and Alan Rickman (I REALLY Wish I’d gotten closer to him!) Micahel Sheen was good enough to come over and sign a picture for me, though. The real focus of the entire thing, however, was Depp. He did his job well, waving lots as he got out of the car, doing his TV interviews and then coming back to sign hundreds of autographs. A whole lot of screaming ensued and there was a nasty crush with the crowd surging even further forward. This increased my discomfort even more as it meant there was an umbrella handle wedged into me. Sadly, it was raining SO hard, that by that point the photos we had were soaked through and the pen wouldn’t take, so I have a squiggle and poor Oz only had a line! He was, very sweet however and told us our outfits looked great which was fantastic. Depp is an incredibly talented and hardworking actor and a very good looking guy for his age, but nevertheless, there is so much MORE to this film than just him. But to 98% of people at the premiere he was the only focus. No-one seemed to give a damn about Burton, the creative visionary without whom the film wouldn’t even have existed. People were downright rude about Mia - which I think is highly unfair considering the film hasn’t even come out yet! At the end of the day, Depp is just a human being, like everyone else. To put him on some kind of pedestal and camp out overnight for him seems mad to me. Besides, he’s married with kids - it’s never going to happen! Also, Depp was lovely enough to spend a lot of time over in the disabled viewing area and take some pictures with them (whereas there was no time to do that with everyone) and this mouthy girl behind me was really cruel and jealous of that. For all you know those people could be dying of cancer. There is absolutely no need to be so bitter and it won’t solve anything or make him love you. Grow up! Anyway, these were the best shots of him I managed to get. They are pretty bad, but my fingers were so cold, I could barely press the button to take the pictures:
EXTREME close-up!:
Probably, and sadly the best shot I got:
There were a lot of people there who were apparently there who we didn’t even see. Most of them came in through a side-door because of the rain, it seems. I fully understand that the celebrities don’t want to stand around in the rain more than anyone else... but simultaneously, the fans have waited outside in that rain all day, you could at least make a brief appearance, you have umbrella’s after all! I’m glad I did it, it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. But I really don’t think I’d be in any hurry to do it again. I’m getting just a little too old and cynical to really understand all the crazy hysteria and hype. And the rain really did NOT help - I was so cold, I physically could not stop shaking and shivering, most other people were no better off. Maybe for a smaller film with less famous actors - we’ll have to see, I guess. Overall, my experience of Wonderland wasn’t so wonderful -hopefully the film will improve my spirits.