A real-life Willy Wonka: Meet the chocolatier behind the Timothée Chalamet prequel

Candymaker Gabriella Cugno discusses how she created the edible sweets for the musical prequel film.

Those involved with the making of Wonka, and even folks in her personal life, have already taken to calling Gabriella Cugno the real-life Willy Wonka. The part Welsh, part Italian chocolatier, who designed all of the sweets for the prequel musical starring Timothée Chalamet, is still wrapping her brain around that new moniker.

"It's just crazy to think that I worked on the film," Cugno tells EW over Zoom from the kitchen she opened in her hometown of Cardiff, Wales, just 15 minutes away from the city center. "It was such a magical experience. It was just amazing to be able to be Willy Wonka behind the scenes and come up with these creative ideas from the script and work with all these amazing people."

The film’s director Paul King and producer David Heyman certainly think she lives up to this nickname. "Paul will say that he's glad the film is over so that he can return to his normal weight. He definitely indulged in Gabriella's chocolates," Heyman says.

"The highlight of the prep for me was our weekly chocolate tastings where I had to approve them," King recalls. "They didn't need to taste good at all," he adds, noting how actors can simply act like they’re eating on camera. "But we made sure that they tasted as good as they looked."

Cugno’s golden ticket came in the form of an email. She noticed it was a job for a film, though she just assumed they needed someone to provide catering for the production. "I replied, and then it came back and the signature was Wonka," Cugno remembers. She soon found herself on a Zoom meeting with the film’s prop master Jamie Wilkinson and other department heads, including from art direction and set decoration. And a few months later, Cugno relocated to London where she crafted such edible delights as the Hover Chocs, Thunderclouds, chocolate teacups, and Giraffe Milk Macaroons seen in Wonka.

It’s the kind of job that Cugno has been more subtly pulling off in her own career. The pastry chef worked in restaurants in Cardiff since she was 15 years old, while also pursuing painting in school. "I actually cooked my final exhibition exam just because I love the link between food and art," she remembers. "It could be a box of paints or a pantry of ingredients. What you do with it, with your imagination, your hands, your skills…that process is something I love."

On the cusp of her 20s, Cugno had her own Wonka moment. Just as Chalamet’s Willy headed to the European metropolitan of the Gallerie Gourmet to make it big as a chocolate maker, she went to London where she worked full time at a chocolate shop and pâtisserie, while learning the cooking basics at college.

It’s that mix of culinary precision with fantastical ideas that seem to define Cugno’s chocolates, whether it’s commissioned work like a giant chocolate egg painted over with a majestic rainforest scene or day-to-day treats like her sumptuous hazelnut and orange bars. The candy for Wonka, however, was "definitely on another level," she says.

Cugno revisited Mel Stuart’s 1971 classic Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, starring Gene Wilder, noticing how literal the character was. "If he's making something and it needs a kick, you put a sneaker in the mix," she says as an example. "If it needs to be warmer, he would put in a coat." She took the same approach to the new film, which focuses on a younger version of Willy and acts as a prequel to Stuart’s movie.

Take the Thundercloud, which was the first chocolate Cugno made for Wonka. "I remember I was in my hotel room reading the script," she recalls. "This was one of the first ones that came up: thunder in a glass, liquid sunlight, all of this stuff. If it's going to be a Thundercloud, it has to look like a thundercloud." She sketched out at least 10 different variations of what the Thundercloud could look like, nixing options as she went along based on what was technically achievable with chocolate molds. Often times the props department would step in to 3D print specific molds for her to use. Then came those show-and-tells King and Heyman spoke of.

Being able to actually make edible props for the actors made King feel as though he had been given "the keys to a magic kingdom." Though Heyman points out a challenge that comes with that. "Having made films with children before, you've got to be sure the sugar levels are not out of whack," he says. "If your kids have too much sugar, if adults have too much sugar, it can lead to quite a manic set." Calah Lane, who plays the young girl Noodle, restrained herself, Heyman adds. "I'm not sure how much she spat out or how much she swallowed, but I don't think she swallowed everything."

The final feat that cements her Wonka status is creating her version of a Roald Dahl signature: a chocolate river. In a nod to how Augustus Gloop nearly drowns in the original film, Wonka sees the villainous Chocolate Cartel attempting to wipe out Willy and Noodle by trapping them in a swiftly rising vat of chocolate. And yes, that chocolate was very much real.

"We ended up making this huge vat of lukewarm hot chocolate that Timmy and Calah were swimming around in," King says. "That felt like a really daunting task, especially as we were [filming] it again and again," Heyman adds. "We needed the feeling of them in a place that's spinning, especially as they get submerged and [making] sure that it was warm enough for them to be in there. I would say that was probably one of the more challenging, practical elements of the shoot."

Fortunately, Cugno didn't have to worry about where to find that amount of chocolate. Warner Bros. had already taken care of that. She just had to worry about keeping the chocolate melted. "If we're outside, and this was filmed in the winter, it would freeze or harden," she remarks. "At the scene, me and the guys who were on the prop section would have pans of chocolates and making sure that it was at the perfect temperature."

But, like the master chocolatier she is, what she remembers most is the whimsey that came with bringing this element to life. And she seems to appreciate a good pun! "It was a very, very wonky experience," she says, playfully.

Wonka is playing in theaters starting this Friday. Watch EW's Around the Table with the cast below.

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• Wonka review: Timothée Chalamet leans into sense of pure imagination in musical prequel

• Wonka director 'didn't want to reinvent' the Gene Wilder film

• How 'Pure Imagination' became Wonka's guiding light

Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly.