The (Human) Man Behind The ‘ABBA Voyage’ ABBAtars

deadline.com:

EXCLUSIVE: Baillie Walsh (Being James Bond:The Daniel Craig Story) is the man who helped put pop stars ABBA back in the concert arena for the first time in 42 years.

The British -born filmmaker behind a string of James Bond videos ,music videos and feature film (Flashbacks of A Fool) clarifies that  Agnetha Faltskog, Bjorn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson and Anni-Frid Reuss  aren’t  actually on stage live performing in ‘ABBA Voyage’ at the purpose-built 3,000 seat  ABBA Arena located in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, East London,”they’re ABBAtars,”he says.

The capacity crowd at the ABBA Theatre didn’t care.They were lost in their own ABBA state of mind, a few climbing onto seats to gyrate along to the ABBAtars performing Mamma Mia!

and Dancing Queen on stage.The show’s a creative phenomenon, one that involves producers Ludwig Anderson and Svana Gisela; director Walsh ,movement director and choreographer Wayne McGregor; concept artists Johan Renck and Martin Renck; a thousand-strong technical team from Industrial Light and Magic plus musicians, a backing group and countless other production technicians.The participation of the ABBA performers themselves was key.“Once I decided the show was going to be a live concert with life-size avatars of Agnatha, Bjorn ,Benny and Anni-Frid, I wanted the real world and the digital world to blend,seamlessly,” Baillie explains.That meant bringing ABBA into a studio for weeks of motion capture sessions.”We filmed them for five weeks ,and then we worked with body doubles to create younger versions of themselves,” says Walsh.Walsh has mapped out ,in clear detail, every second of the 90 -minute concert show.