There was a time, early in development for Project Hail Mary, when directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller briefly considered a splashier actor for the character of Rocky. The arachnidlike rock alien who strikes up a friendship with the film’s human lead, Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling), would need an affecting voice to bring it to life. Given the directors’ history in animation, there’s another reality in which a seasoned sitcom star would lend a voice to Rocky. But that notion completely changed with the arrival of James Ortiz, an award-winning puppet designer and performer who’s created marvels in plays like The Woodsman (which he also directed) and a recent revival of Little Shop of Horrors.
From the moment Ortiz was cast, it was clear he was Rocky — but it took a meeting with creature designer Neal Scanlan — an alum of Jim Henson’s Creature Shop and the master of many contemporary Star Wars creatures, including the Porgs — for all of that to truly crystallize. Scanlan’s own VFX house built the Rocky puppets we see in Project Hail Mary, all with Ortiz’s performance in mind. As Project Hail Mary launches, and Rocky begins to melt all our human hearts, Inverse caught up with Ortiz to get a sense of his journey and to learn why old-school tech like puppetry is still so crucial to making fantastical dreams come true.
