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All of us have felt that at one time or another. All of us have asked ourselves, “Where do we belong? Where do we fit in? Who is our tribe? Who’s going to love us and be there at the end of the day to tell us everything is going to be okay?” Those are enduring themes.

Other than the first Fantastic Beasts film, this is perhaps the biggest movie you’ve made in over a decade. How did it challenge you in a different way?

I feel this was just different. I approached it the same way I always would have. The challenge was trying to honour the weight and depth of the themes that are explored, but do them in a way that was accessible. It’s not a kitchen-sink drama, but it deals with themes that really good, strong BBC television dramas have dealt with. And it does it in such a way that’s accessible to children and accessible to people’s imagination, all the while never straying from the truth of what’s going on in the tale.

And it does deal with weighty matters — particularly due to the forced separation between Dumbo and his mom. But it’s not heavy handed.

Tim was very judicious in how he promoted this notion of keeping it simple. He didn’t want to gild the lily. There are so many themes that are important and big, and then there’s a flying baby elephant. There’s so much earnestness in the story already that Tim wanted to make sure we didn’t hit people over the head. There’s a moment at the end of the film between Dumbo and the kids, and in another filmmaker’s hands that moment might have been played a lot more emotionally. But that would have been an act of manipulation and I think Tim just played the scene really easy and it has a sweetness that it might not have had if it became wrought with emotion and sadness and stuff.

What do you think about Disney doing these live-action revamps of their animated classics?

I think there’s a criticism that they’re only doing it for money and, of course, Disney wants to make money. But when you get somebody like Tim Burton, who is a strong visual artist and a keen storyteller, somebody who has a passion for the work, then you hope the film is given a new life by virtue of its mere existence. We’ll find out. The audience will justify the making of it. As I said, the themes explored in this film are as pertinent today as they were in 1941, if not more topically in a way because of the illegal separation of child and mother.