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Catwoman’s on the prowl for this week’s Larger Than Life inspiration Today we will talk about the movie Catwoman (2004). Before you start thinking that Catwoman herself was based on an agile, sexy, feline-like woman, I’ll tell you straight off the bat (no pun intended): She’s not! Not in real-life anyway. Ardent comic fan or not, almost everyone knows that the character of Catwoman is based on a fictional heroine by DC Comics. Today’s Larger Than Life column will be about one of the villains in the movie, Laurel Hedare, who is rumoured to be loosely-based on a real life personality…
Before we let the cat out of the bag… However, dear readers, I will not release you from my grasp before I throw some random tidbits about Catwoman at you (because you probably were expecting to find out who the main character was based on, and not some evil nemesis of hers in the movie, no?). If you’re one of those ardent comic book fans, you may know that the comic character Catwoman was partially inspired by Ruth Steel, co-creator Bob Kane’s second cousin by marriage. This was mentioned in a November 1989 publication by Bob Kane himself, “Batman and Me”. Catwoman’s original name is Selina Kyle, unlike Patience Phillips as portrayed in the movie.
Nope, no Batman in this movie. Not even in the Facebook group. Now that we have some background on the characters this movie was based on, let’s throw all of that knowledge out of the window. The Catwoman movie is yet another loose adaptation of the popular comic book franchise, so don’t watch the movie, expecting Batman to pop out from the shadows and Catwoman having a romance with him.
Sharon Stone as villainess Laurel Hedare: Who knew evil could be so lovely? Let’s now focus on Laurel Hedare, played by the beautiful Sharon Stone. This anti-ageing cosmetics mogul is plotting to sell defective beauty products which make skin look younger and prettier, but without constant use, decay. Although it resulted from a production error, it’s indeed a great ploy to force your customers into buying a lifetime’s supply of your skincare products! So what happens then? Of course someone finds out about the ploy and has to be killed. That someone is Patience Phillips, artist and graphic designer for the company. However, Patience is reborn as Catwoman by the blessing of a cat goddess which she had encountered earlier on in the movie (trust me, this is NOWHERE in the comic). Thus begins the unravelling of the yarn by newly-empowered Patience, and the unleashing of all things beautiful and evil by female antagonist Laurel Hedare.
Save us!
Who could an evil villainess possibly be based on? Evilness aside, let’s bring in real-life anti-ageing advocate and entrepreneur, Heather Bird. She has no official link to the movie, but there are a few articles which somehow pinpoint her as the inspiration for our evil movie villainess. Word has it the movie was to be set in Salt Lake City, Utah, instead of Gotham City, as mentioned in its pre-release information. (A horrible revelation for the comic book fans!)
Heather Bird (right) pictured here with her husband, Robert Tchenguiz (left) Coincidentally, Salt Lake City is the hometown of a particular Ms. Bird. It also turns out that during the movie’s development, Heather Bird was basking in the media spotlight in Europe for her introduction of a revolutionary new anti-ageing cream. Coincidence that our fictional villainess, Laurel Hedare’s evil plot is centred on a similar product? Perhaps not. Apparently, the working screenplay of the film also referred to the fictional cosmetics company as “Avenal Beauty”. Now “Aves” is also the scientific Latin name for “birds”. Sound like someone’s surname, huh? Now, don’t even begin to ask why both Laurel and Heather are both beautiful and blonde women who are obscenely rich.
YA RLY. There are large glaring differences though: 1. Heather Bird: (Presumably) Not evil; Laurel Hedare: Evil Well, that’s all the time we have, folks! Tune in next week for the next instalment of Larger Than Life! |
