Artemis Fowl: Why Hong Chau's Role Was Cut From The Movie (original) (raw)
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Hong Chau had a small but significant role in Artemis Fowl that was even featured in the movie's teaser trailer, but the actress didn't make it into the final cut of the movie. Artemis Fowl, the big-screen adaptation of Eoin Colfer’s popular fantasy YA series, had been in development hell for close to two decades by the time Kenneth Branagh’s movie premiered on Disney+. After having its release date moved back several times before Disney made the call to have the film skip cinemas altogether, it surprised basically nobody when the reviews were scathing in their criticism.
For fans, one of the most perplexing elements of the movie came in the form of the villain, Opal Koboi, who kidnaps Artemis’s father (played by Colin Farrell). Koboi is the main antagonist in the second book in the franchise, The Arctic Incident. In that book, Opal is a power-mad pixie who is responsible for organizing a goblin war against LEPrecon using outlawed weapons. Opal appears to have been a late addition to the Artemis Fowl movie, and the role is credited to three different body doubles (the villain has a distorted voice and her face is always in shadow). It's been speculated that Chau might have provided Opal's voice - or even may have been intended to play the character outright - but there's nothing official to support this.
Chau's actual role was in a scene that was particularly faithful to the books, which is why it's so unfortunate that it was cut. Chau is best known for films like Inherent Vice and Downsizing, as well as her recent turn on HBO’s Watchmen. You can watch her deleted scene in the "Extras" section for the movie on Disney+. In the sequence, Chau plays an old fairy that Artemis and Butler find in Ho Chi Minh City. They trick her into drinking a bottle of whiskey drugged with holy water, and the use the antidote as leverage to get answers out of her for their search. After receiving the antidote she sheds her elderly woman appearance and becomes an ethereal fairy who issues a dire warning before flying away.
Branagh has explained that major changes were made to Artemis's character to make him more sympathetic to audiences, due to fears that viewers wouldn't accept the more villainous version of him from that first book. That deleted scene of Artemis poisoning a fairy for extortion purposes was likely cut due to being too dark and painting the young protagonist as too evil (Artemis warns the fairy that the holy water will "burn [her] from the inside out" if she doesn't get the antidote).
Chau explained how she received the news about her part being cut in an interview with Anthem Magazine:
"I’m actually not appearing in Artemis Fowl. I got a nice letter from Kenneth Branagh informing me that they changed quite a bit of the story, so they had to cut the part I filmed. It’s alright because it was just a cameo and I had a good time. I would work for Mr. Branagh again in a heartbeat. I’m still in the trailer, for some reason. The director usually has nothing to do with the making and editing of the trailer. Most people don’t know that."
It's a shame that an actress as excellent as Chau is wasted in Artemis Fowl (although, in fairness, every actor is wasted in the movie.) Perhaps, in the grand scheme of things, it will be more beneficial for her to not be connected to this flop. For fans of the books, Chau's deleted scene is worth checking out as a glimpse of what a more faithful version of the movie might have looked like.
NEXT: Artemis Fowl Review: Disney's Botched Adaptation is No Criminal Mastermind