Madagascar Animators Made the Fur Fly

God is in the details and so, it turns out, is computer animation.

Take the lion in the new DreamWorks movie, "Madagascar," being released today. Named Alex, he has the voice of Ben Stiller, roughly 2 million strands of fur and three different manes.

They signal his progress from pampered Central Park Zoo attraction to a jungle animal who imagines his best friend, a zebra, might make a delightful dinner or savory snack. After all, a guy's gotta eat, and no one's lobbing T-bone steaks out in the wild.

"We had three wigs we swapped out at various points, just to subtly kind of show where Alex was in his savagery as it started to bubble to the surface," writer-director Tom McGrath says.

Animators had to figure out a way to allow the mane, with its 50,000 strands alone, to move when Alex leaned against a wall or put a paw on his head. "[They] would scratch their heads, come back a week later and say, 'OK, we can do it,' " he says.

"Madagascar" is about a lion, zebra, giraffe and hippo who live in comfortable captivity at the Central Park Zoo but, through a series of serendipitous events, end up marooned on Madagascar. In addition to Stiller, the voices include Chris Rock as Marty the zebra, David Schwimmer as Melman the giraffe and Jada Pinkett Smith as Gloria the hippo.

more: post-gazette.com/pg/05147/511161.stm (201)

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