Colin Farrell’s Penguin is more Godfather than feathered fiend

When make-up designer Michael Marino sat down to transform actor Colin Farrell into the villainous comic-book bad guy Penguin, there was a lot happening on the drawing board. John Cazale’s Fredo from The Godfather was one inspiration. Disgraced Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein was another.

Marino said he also looked at images and footage of injured birds. “Older, grizzled penguins, which had these chipped beaks,” Marino said. “So on one side of his face in silhouette, you have this curved, scarred face on the side, but if you line it up with a photo of a bird, it mimics the mouth of a bird.”

Colin Farrell in The Penguin.Credit: HBO/Binge

The Penguin is a streaming television drama, spun-off the DC Comics Batman universe. It directly follows the 2022 film The Batman, picking up in the aftermath of that film, and exploring the criminal underworld of Gotham City of which anthropomorphic anti-hero Penguin is a core element.

In a sense, this is a modern spin on a superhero franchise spin-off, so it is leotard-lite. Think of it as having more in common with The Godfather than Super Friends. In the trailer, Penguin says he is chasing his own “American dream, a beautiful story with a happy ending”.

But in true Gotham style, it comes with a sting in the tail. “That ain’t the way the world works. America’s a hustle.”

The story of The Penguin begins, as it does in the wider DC Comics canon, with the story of Batman. Or, more specifically, The Batman, the 2022 film, directed by Matt Reeves, and written by Reeves and Peter Craig, and starring Robert Pattinson as Batman. (Honourable mention: it was shot by Australian cinematographer Greig Fraser.)

That film focused on two iconic Batman villains: Paul Dano as Riddler, and Zoë Kravitz as Catwoman. Colin Farrell’s Penguin had a smaller role in the film, and Barry Keoghan’s Joker made only a cameo. Not to mention some brain-bending confusion for fans, as Keoghan’s Joker, along with Joaquin Phoenix’s and Jared Leto’s renditions, means there are three versions of the character in play at the same time.

Farrell’s Penguin was, however, always destined for greater things. And by greater things, we mean his own streaming television series. The series follows Penguin – real name, Oswald Cobblepot – on his rise to the top of the heap in the Gotham City underworld.

The Penguin picks up the story one week after the credits rolled on the film. If you did not see the film, it ended – extremely mild spoilers – with Riddler killing mob boss Carmine Falcone (John Turturro). It is in the power vacuum following Falcone’s death that Penguin makes his play for control.

“It’s dark, that’s what I can tell you about it,” Farrell says. “It’s really dark and really heavy. It certainly was doing it. Which is not to say I didn’t have fun. I had an amazing time doing it. It’s incredibly violent.”

Most striking is the degree to which Penguin in no way resembles Farrell, courtesy of a brilliant performance and a complex facial prosthetic that takes hours to apply. “Once it all went on, honest to God, it overtook me, as I think it would most people,” Farrell says.

“It was such a blast. I felt somewhat untouchable in it. You get such licence to have absolute freedom of motion and expression and articulation of thought and feeling. It was really, really cool. I had no idea what I was going to do without that make-up. And then when I saw the make-up, everything was clear, the way the character moved, the way he sounded.”

Cristin Milioti and Colin Farrell in The Penguin.Credit: Binge

In one new twist, this iteration of Penguin will be seen without his trademark cigarette holder. That accessory has been a part of Penguin’s look since his creation by writer Bill Finger and artist Bob Kane for Detective Comics #58, published in December 1941.

“I fought valiantly for a cigar. I even at one stage said I can have it unlit, just let me have it unlit,” Farrell says. But the studio was adamant there would be no cigarette holder, and certainly no cigarette. To add insult to injury, the character also appears without his trademark monocle.

But Farrell is taking it all in his stride, and believes the absence of the villain’s signature accessories plays into the fact we are meeting Penguin during his origin story, while he is still finding his style. “The Oz that we meet hasn’t embodied the energy of the Penguin we recognise from the source comics and from previous films,” Farrell says.

“There can be days on a set if you’re doing heavy material, and it can be quite intense,” Farrell says. “Sometimes it can be hard to shake off. But essentially, you are playing dress-up, you are assuming the energy and the behaviours of someone else to tell a story. This was that on steroids.”

THE MANY FACES OF PENGUIN

Batman (1966-1968)
Perhaps the best-remembered version of Penguin was played by actor Burgess Meredith in the campy and colourful 1960s Batman series, known for its thin plots, hammy acting and over-the-top fight sequences. This Penguin chomped on his cigarette holder almost as ferociously as he chewed the scenery, and squawked memorably “qwa qwa qwa”.

Burgess Meredith as The Penguin in the 1960s.Credit: HO MOVIE STAR NEWS

Batman: The Movie (1966)
A feature film, spun off the ’60s television series, in which Meredith’s Penguin teamed up with three of the show’s other super villains – Joker (Cesar Romero), Riddler (Frank Gorshin) and Catwoman (Lee Meriwether, replacing TV star Julie Newmar) – and did battle with the Dynamic Duo of Batman (Adam West) and Robin (Burt Ward).

The New Adventures of Batman (1977)
Plans to put Penguin into another contemporaneous series, Challenge of the Superfriends, were scuppered so he could appear in this series, voiced by Lennie Weinrib. The series starred the voice of 1960s Batman TV series stars Adam West and Burt Ward, and featured a host of villains, including Penguin, Joker, Clayface and Mr Freeze.

Batman Returns (1992)
The second of Tim Burton’s Batman films offered the most substantial origin story for Penguin (Danny DeVito) ever seen: as an infant child abandoned by his family due to birth defects, and found by penguins in the condemned Gotham City Zoo. DeVito’s performance was memorable, opposite Michael Keaton’s Batman and Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman.

Danny DeVito’s Penguin faces Michael Keaton’s Batman in Batman Returns.Credit:

Gotham (2014-2019)
Developed by Bruno Heller, Gotham was a broad church of Batman-universe characters, in pre-Batman Gotham City. The series starred Ben McKenzie as young James Gordon, destined to be the city’s famous police commissioner, and Robin Lord Taylor played Penguin, a small-time thug turned rising mobster and comic foil to Riddler (Cory Michael Smith).

The Penguin screens on Foxtel and Binge from Friday, September 20.

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