When the cat doesn't come back, cast a wolverine

Now it can be told: the reason for the mysterious stuffed wolverine that is front-and-centre in Keyhole, Guy Maddin's madcap ghosts-and-gangsters movie at TIFF.

"I was supposed to be a cat, a living cat," says star Jason Patric, who plays a gangleader named Ulysses.

"And I'm allergic to cats. And Guy had a wolverine in his apartment. So I said, 'Why not make it that wolverine?'"

Maddin says he readily agreed to Patric's suggestion.

"A couple of other people were allergic to cats, too.  It was a lot simpler using the wolverine, because you dont' have to have a cat wrangler. And they take off like a shot as soon as you put them on the set. You spend 20  minutes chasing the cat down, and things like that. So just having a taxidermied what-not was fine with me."

He had a choice of stuffed animals, though.

"It was either a wolverine or an emu. The emu is in my wife's apartment."

-- Peter Howell.