Artists speak about the mystery and motion of automata

This is the third video segment from the special feature included on the Blu-ray release of the movie Hugo. I had the pleasure of being interviewed for the feature which is titled The Mechanical Man and the Heart of Hugo. In this clip, I say a few words about the questions that automata raise in our minds. Other speakers in the clip include Martin Scorsese himself and artist Thomas Kuntz, whose incredible automaton art is also shown in various moments in the clip.

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Dug North speaks about the Maillardet automaton for Hugo bonus feature

I was interviewed recently for one of the bonus features for the DVD release of the movie Hugo. A team  associated with Paramount came to my studio to film an hour-long interview. Many of the questions I fielded were about the history of automata. This naturally lead to questions about connections between the automaton in Hugo and any historical automata. As it turns out, the automaton in Hugo is closely tied to a real automaton.

Here is a short clip from the special bonus featurette titled The Mechanical Man at the Heart of Hugo. In this segment, I say a bit about the famous Maillardet drawing automaton at The Franklin Institute. I had the pleasure of seeing the automaton in action during a visit there a few years ago. I think my reverence for the masterpieces comes through in the clip.

I particularly love how my segment transitions to Ben Kingsley's. I do hope that I set him up well.

Here is a web page where you can see the video of Dug North speaking about the Maillardet automaton.

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