Kaya and Dylan talk with Teen.com

Teen.com visited the set of The Maze Runner and talked with Kaya and Dylan!

Check out the highlights below:

Kaya on expectations versus reality of being the only girl on set:

"Terrifying. Absolutely terrifying. Not only is it my first big American film, but it's a full cast of boys, so I was like, 'Oh, I’m gonna be the girl. I'm gonna be all emotional and they're gonna hate me. And I'm gonna complain about the bugs, and they're gonna think I'm stupid' and all these things, but one of my best friends back at home is a boy and I've kind of been brought up around boys, so I'm quite comfortable with them. The first thing I actually said to them when I met them was that I was really gassy on the plane. And I think that kinda gave us a nice even level, and we bonded really quickly — with all of them."

Kaya's thoughts on reading the book:

"I hadn't before I heard about the project. Once I started hearing about it, I read the first book, The Maze Runner. I didn't wanna read the whole trilogy purely because these kids have no memory. They don’t know what's happened, or what is going to happen, so I thought it'd be best just to stick with the first one and I absolutely loved it."

Kaya on Thomas and Teresa's relationship book versus movie:

"I think that they know they've met each other before. They have memories; fragments of memories from before that they know no one else has. So they know that they are connected somehow. We've tried really hard to focus on their relationship being a friendship; a connection that could possibly become more. But in this movie, it doesn't. We didn't want it to be a cheesy love story because these kids are trapped in a maze and they're trying to get out. That’s the most important thing. We wanted to keep that real. So the focus is on them trying to work as a team; to work out why they're important, why they're different and what that means for everyone else."

Kaya on survivalist training:

"I was involved. My involvement really consisted of watching the boys do it. But I did join in a little bit. But my character arrives, and then the next day they escape, so... But I did get into — I learned how to make a raft. I jumped around a bit and we did some drills, and we actually camped out in The Glade overnight, which was the best experience. That was the best way to understand the nature and the animals and the noise. Just us — me and 15 guys and two survivalists in the middle of Louisiana. What could go wrong? There was a thunderstorm — that's what went wrong. From 3 o'clock in the morning, none of us slept, but I was terrified. I've never been so scared in my life. I've never seen lightning that looks like strobe lightning in a night club. It was unbelievable. We don’t have storms like that in England. I was convinced that we were going to flood and drown and die. They all looked after me and it was fine. We made it out alive."

Kaya on doing her own stunt work:

"I do! I don't have any crazy, crazy stuff to do. That was one of the things that attracted me about the project. I've never been a sporty person at all. I don't exercise, I eat s*** food, I’m awful. I read the script and I was like, 'Can I physically do this without passing out?' But I thought, 'I wanna do that. I wanna push myself to be running around all day with a load of boys and hold my own.' And I feel like I have; I feel like I've done quite well. There’s been a couple of times where I've been like, *moans* 'Take me home.' But they've all kept me going; they've all said, 'You can do it.' They've never made fun of me; they've never tried to put me down or tried to say, 'You're the girl. You're not good enough.’ They've been so supportive. With the whole cast, they all wanted us to do really well. So I feel like I've got to do all the action stuff."

Kaya on her wardrobe:

"I had long conversations about the outfits at first and I was like, 'Please, don't put me in shorts and thigh-high boots and a tank top. It's not about that.' And they've been great. They've sort of been like, ‘No, we have to think about this. She’s just come up from the book. We'll have one outfit.' And this [motioning to her attire] is her outfit. And it’s comfortable, it's light, but they're not trying to make me look sexy, which is great. Like no makeup, dirty all the time, which I love. Five minutes in the morning getting ready. I can stay in bed for an extra half an hour, it’s great. They wanted to have a very natural look to their surroundings. We all kind of blend in. Especially when filming in The Glade, which is all outside. We all sort of fit into the environment. So that was what was important. We get dirty every day. No glamour."

 

Dylan on seeing himself as Thomas:

"No, I keep thinking about it — it's funny because I actually didn't at first. I didn't think I was right for it mainly because I didn't get called back at first for, like, a month and a half, so I must've not been right for it. But now that we’re shooting it and we've been in production all this time, I can’t believe I wasn't going crazy for not getting the callback because it’s [the kind of] role I've always wanted to play."

Dylan on relating to Thomas's 'good intentioned rebel' nature:

"I've always been the same way. I have different ways of thinking. I'm not shy about them either. And that could sometimes strike people in a certain way. Like, just because you're adamant about what you believe in, but I've always been that way and that’s something that's really primal in Thomas as well, so I think that’s why I can play it, or relate to it and understand him."

For more of their interview check out the rest of Kaya and Dylan's!

Featurette: James Dashner Visits Set

Check out the second The Maze Runner featurette of James Dashner visiting set for the first time and Wes giving a tour around the Glade!

Page To Premiere visits TMR Set

Page to Premiere was one of the lucky few outlets to visit The Maze Runner set last year.

Here are the highlights:

Wyck on Wes Ball:

This is the thing that Wes [Ball] is great at. He can walk in and immediately know, from his visual effects background, ‘I can shoot here, and put the walls in here,’ or ‘No, that doesn’t work for this reason.’ We tried to limit how many times we actually have to see the walls, we obviously want to tell the story, and we want to feel them. Just the nature of it being surrounded by trees let the actors feel like they’re surrounded by walls. Yet every time you look at the village, we’re into woods and a hill, so you don’t have to see the wall in the background of every shot.

Dylan on stuntwork:

I’m always game to do it. I have to realize though that there are some things I can’t pull off as well as a stuntman can. There’s a compromise. I have to know sometimes that it’s better to let the stunt guy do it. Like, rolling down a hill. There was a scene where I had to trip and roll down a hill. There’s no way that A) the production was going to let me do that, or B) that I could pull that off take after take. So it’s a compromise with your stuntman. You let him make you look awesome for that frame.

Wes Ball on Kaya as Teresa: 

I wanted Kaya from the very beginning. I just saw her. I had seen SKINS and stuff and she was much younger, but you see it in the fan responses. I think we’ve got some tremendous response to our casting so far. Everyone is like “Of course. That’s Gally” or “Of course, that’s Teresa!” Teresa is always described as “pale, dark hair, tough girl” and that’s Kaya. She’s gorgeous, but it’s a natural beauty. It’s not like a supermodel beauty and I can’t wait for people to actually meet Kaya on this movie. I think she’s going to be fantastic.

Kaya on TMR cast off set:

 We’ve been going to the cinema a lot. I love that over here you can watch films at midnight, you can’t do that back home. So we’ve been going to late night movies a lot which has been fun.

Ki Hong Lee on getting the part of Minho:

I went in and I auditioned like everybody else, got a call back, kept getting call backs. And I could feel it, I could feel it, like the role was there, I could feel it but it wasn‟t mine yet ya know? And it was torture for like a month, two months or something. I finally got the call, I got the call from my agent he said “Ok, the wait is over, you got it” and I was like [silence]… He’s like “Do you need a couple minutes?” I was like “Yeah!” (laughs) I hung up the phone and ran to my mom and like “MOM, I GOT IT I GOT IT!” It was craziness for five minutes.

Thomas Brodie-Sangster on making Newt his own: 

 I take [Newt] on and I deal with the character in a personal way. I concentrate solely on that and if I make that work then I can only hope that fans appreciate that. You can’ t please everyone. Everyone’s got their own idea of who should be in their head. So I can only do what I think is right and hope that that works for everyone else.

Chris Sheffield on book-to-film changes for Ben:

We definitely stay true to the book. Specifically with Ben there are some differences. Ben’s a runner in the movie; Ben’s not a runner in the book. ‘The Changing’ is, I’m just going to say, takes you by surprise in the movie…for sure. You’ll definitely love Ben and then you’ll just have to see what happens.

Page to Premiere's set visit and their forty things they learned on the set!

Collider Visits the TMR Set

During filming Collider visited the set and sat down with Dylan, Kaya, and Wes to talk all things The Maze Runner.

Here are the highlights:

Dylan on being cast as Thomas:

Just like anything, I just auditioned for it. It’s funny. The way Wes told me it happened was, at first, I went in on it initially with the casting director, just like everybody. I didn’t hear back for like a month and a half, because Wes was like, “His hair is too MTV!” That’s what he thought, which was so funny. Then he saw a picture of me with more regular hair, the buzzcut or something from Teen Wolf, and he brought me back and it worked. It just ended up working out.

Dylan on potentially sacrificing himself for others:

When you think about it, I think it gets in your way, in your head about it. But instinctively, I’m always one who will lash out at anyone hurts my friends, viciously, kind of. Like, murder. [Laughs] No, but I’m very protective of the people I love. Sacrificing is a whole other thing. I don’t think you often come to that situation in life. But it’s a primal instinct, but maybe. Put me in that situation and we’ll find out!

Dylan on leading man pressure:

Yeah, yeah, there’s always pressure. Not pressure per say, I guess. You’re always conscious of what you’re doing. I don’t feel like I have to be the leader here or anything, I don’t have to take the reins. I think we have such an awesome group of actors so I don’t necessarily feel that way. But I can sometimes get into the head space of self-doubt. It’s just a human trying to act, essentially, but sometimes it can be a lot. But at the end of the day, I’m in love with what we’re doing. I’m in love with the movie that we’re making and the people we’re doing it with. Wes, my bosses and this whole group. I’m just trying to focus on the experience and what we’re doing with it. I think you yield the best result with that mentality, I think.

Dylan on his running skills: 

You see, that’s funny. You’d think they’d have to. He’s a Maze Runner! But sometimes with casting, I think about this sometimes. I never ran for them or anything. I just happen to be able to run really fast. I hate running, though. I love this running—long-distance, get out of here—but I’d be down to do a sprint any day, then wake up the next day and not be able to move. I love sprinting, which is such a weird sentence. [Laughs] But no, they never tested my running ability. I didn’t have much time to physically prepare at all. I do work every night on Teen Wolf, so to get up on your feet every day … I’m not in bad shape, but I’m not in great shape. I’m not somebody who works out every day, who goes to the gym ever. But it works with the character. I’m not supposed to be ripped. It’s about the heart that’s put into everything. When my character runs, he doesn’t even know he’s running. He’s just doing it. It’s instinct. It all plays well into the story.

Kaya on her first experience on a big budget set:
I tried to go into it treating it like any other job which I think is what you have to do. I’m really lucky it’s a big Hollywood film and everyone really cares about it. Everyone wants it to be made because they want it to be a good story. They’ve put a lot of time and effort into it. It doesn’t feel as though it’s just here for the sake of doing another young adult film.  If you speak to Wes, he really gives a fu*k about it!  And when you have that passion and when you have that dedication, it’s the same as being as being on the low budget set ever. It’s just that there’s loads of free food which is great!


Kaya on the most challenging part of playing Teresa:
Probably the physical side. I had never done an action film where I’ve had to run around, especially running after Dylan where he’s all athletic and American and great at sport. And I smoke and drink, typically English, so for me I’ve been pushing myself to get into shape and actually exercise and try to keep up with them all. It’s been a great challenge for me. I’ve been able to stand my ground. I didn’t want to be the pansy female, I wanted to give them a run for my money and I feel like I have! 


Kaya on what she's most looking forward to filming:
I can’t wait to do all the Griever stuff when we’re being attacked, because I’ve never worked with CGI or special effects so I’m really interested to see how that’s done.  And to kind of push myself to be afraid of a guy in a lycra green suit, that’s what I’m looking forward to. And the Maze stuff, because it all fascinates me how big this whole thing is and that there are three cameras. It’s still really exciting to me, so I can’t wait to see how the big stuff is filmed.


Wes on record amount of daily setups:
Yeah, well as it is my first movie and stuff, our first day we got 36 setups or something like that, which is supposed to be a lot. One day we actually got rained out for half the day and so we lost half of our day. We had six hours and we got thirty-nine setups on that day. That was a crazy, crazy day. That was nuts. That was our Ben banishment scene, which is going to be freaking intense. It’s going to be really brutal and it’s a scene that almost all the fans… When I first started this movie, I tweeted all the fans and said “Hey guys, what are your favorite scenes from the book?” I made sure all of those scenes are in this movie and Ben’s banishment was one of them and that was one of those days where we were just knocking stuff off and personally for me I love when we get into that stuff. We storyboard a lot, but I love when we are just going in there and just almost on the fly making stuff and discovering moments. It’s just fantastic, where you can really go in there and be creative and everything.


Wes on camera setups and blocking out scenes:
You have your master, you go in and get that and say “That’s great. Come in here, get this shot. Go over here and get this shot.” As we blocked the scene, we’d go in and rehearse it, block it, start getting the lights ready, and then we’d start talking about where we were going to get our shots and our little angles and all of this great stuff and then at the same time sometimes we are running three cameras at the same time. Well today we’re doing two. Well, actually we have three in there, but three cameras all of the time doesn’t help us so much. You start getting on top of each other, so I find two cameras is awesome, because we can get there and just fish for awesome moments, then occasionally have that third camera coming in for the big crane wides and stuff like that.

Please check out the rest of Collider's interview with Dylan here, Kaya, and Wes! Be sure to catch Collider's 45 Things to Know about TMR from their set visit here!

James Dashner's Set Visit Blog

James Dashner visited The Maze Runner set for a couple of days and blogged about his experience on his website.

Here are the highlights:

On The Glade: 

One of my favorite things about this trip was that everyone referred to the Glade as the Glade. Not the set, or anything else. The Glade. Like it was a real  place, which upon visiting, it feels just like that. The crew members (and there are many, literally hundreds, who are working on this movie) are doing an excellent job of making it come to life.

On Wes Ball:

Wes gave me a tour of the Glade, leading me from one giddy moment to the next. I loved his enthusiasm. At some points he’d suddenly drop into a crouch and hold his hands out, making a frame, sweeping to show me the scene he envisioned for that spot of woods or field or building. Just like I tweeted, I know I’m the person MOST excited about this movie, but Wes comes in at a pretty close second.

Fanart and the Grievers:

Wes gave me a tour of his office, where each wall is covered with concept art for the film. Once again he displayed that kid-in-a-candy-store enthusiasm, describing scenes, showing off the Grievers, telling me how his vision for the movie will come to life. I loved every minute of this. And let me tell you this: the Grievers are going to terrify audiences worldwide. Their transformation to a cinematic experience on the big screen will be perfect. Bigger and nastier.

'Be sure to check out the rest of James Dashner's set visit blog here!