Uploaded March 2022 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
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For director Gore Verbinski’s 1997 film, #MouseHunt, Stan Winston Studio built an oversized animatronic cat - dubbed ‘Catzilla’ - which had radio control functions and a telemetry controller. Six puppeteers operated the mouse and cat puppets on sets that were scaled up to make the animals appear the appropriate size. These mouse and cat performances not only had to be realistic and match the behavior of their real counterparts, but they also had to be comedic in nature. This was no small task, as illustrated in the old story of the actor who, on his deathbed, declared that ‘dying is easy… comedy is hard.’
If one had to be a bit of an actor to puppeteer the usual ‘must eat, must destroy’ characters that came out of the studio, one had to be a bit of a comedian to create a performance of a mischievous mouse and his feline foil.
Fortunately, Stan Winston Studio had its share of in-house comedians. “In a way,” said Shane Mahan, “doing Mouse Hunt was like doing a Laurel and Hardy style comedy, which was so much fun for us. It was a really nice departure from the stuff we normally do. I loved everything about doing Mouse Hunt. And watching the film now, I think the puppet holds up really well. That mouse has some beautiful little expressions.” The primary trained mouse used in the film went home with Paul Mejias after filming wrapped and lived with him as a pet for two years. When he died, Mejias and other members of the Mouse Hunt crew buried him in a patch of grass in front of the studio. “His little grave is still out there,” said Mahan.
- #BehindTheScenes text excerpted from The Winston Effect: The Art and History of Stan Winston Studio by Jody Duncan.
More behind-the-scenes stories HERE: bit.ly/BlogsYT
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SUBSCRIBE on YouTube: bit.ly/Zp70T4 and RING THE BELL!
For director Gore Verbinski’s 1997 film, #MouseHunt, Stan Winston Studio built an oversized animatronic cat - dubbed ‘Catzilla’ - which had radio control functions and a telemetry controller. Six puppeteers operated the mouse and cat puppets on sets that were scaled up to make the animals appear the appropriate size. These mouse and cat performances not only had to be realistic and match the behavior of their real counterparts, but they also had to be comedic in nature. This was no small task, as illustrated in the old story of the actor who, on his deathbed, declared that ‘dying is easy… comedy is hard.’
If one had to be a bit of an actor to puppeteer the usual ‘must eat, must destroy’ characters that came out of the studio, one had to be a bit of a comedian to create a performance of a mischievous mouse and his feline foil.
Fortunately, Stan Winston Studio had its share of in-house comedians. “In a way,” said Shane Mahan, “doing Mouse Hunt was like doing a Laurel and Hardy style comedy, which was so much fun for us. It was a really nice departure from the stuff we normally do. I loved everything about doing Mouse Hunt. And watching the film now, I think the puppet holds up really well. That mouse has some beautiful little expressions.” The primary trained mouse used in the film went home with Paul Mejias after filming wrapped and lived with him as a pet for two years. When he died, Mejias and other members of the Mouse Hunt crew buried him in a patch of grass in front of the studio. “His little grave is still out there,” said Mahan.
- #BehindTheScenes text excerpted from The Winston Effect: The Art and History of Stan Winston Studio by Jody Duncan.
More behind-the-scenes stories HERE: bit.ly/BlogsYT
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
JOIN the Stan Winston School Community!
stanwinstonschool.com
facebook.com/StanWinstonSchool
twitter.com/SWinstonSchool
instagram.com/stanwinstonschool
pinterest.com/stanwinston
Visit our WEBSITE: stanwinstonschool.com
SUBSCRIBE to #SWSCA on YouTube: bit.ly/Zp70T4
