In 1999, when there were top 100 lists everywhere of the best this and that of the 20th century, only one title was on both the list of best novels and the list of best movies: Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. Today, we mourn the loss of Miss Lee, whose later-year troubles, with reports that her new book was published without her informed consent, will fade while the original book and movie will never dim.
When I was writing my first book about movies that help families discuss important values like integrity, courtesy, empathy, and helping others, I realized that I could have included To Kill a Mockingbird in every category. It is one of the best movies ever made that shows us how children see the world. It has one of the most beautiful and evocative movie scores, by Elmer Bernstein. It has Gregory Peck’s Oscar-winning performance as Atticus Finch, a lawyer so principled he inspired generations of idealistic college students to go to law school. (Their chagrin on seeing a different version of Atticus in the later book will fade as well.)
It is about race, family, honor, and standing up for what is right. It has Robert Duvall’s first movie appearance, where he breaks your heart without saying a word. And it has one of the most beautiful final lines in all of literature, again about Atticus, who was sitting by the bed of his injured son, Jeb. “He would be there all night, and he would be there when Jem waked up in the morning.”
Copyright Warner Brothers Entertainment 2015Nicholas Sparks is one of the must successful and best-loved authors in the world. All of his books have been New York Times bestsellers, with over 100 million copies sold worldwide, in more than 50 languages, including over 65 million copies in the United States alone, and all of them have been made into movies, with stars like Paul Newman, Kevin Costner, Ryan Gosling, Channing Tatum, Rachel McAdams, and Robin Wright. Sparks is the man behind some of the most memorable love stories of the past 20 years, including “The Notebook” and “Dear John.”
The newest film based on his books is “The Choice,” with Benjamin Walker and Teresa Palmer as a couple who meet as neighbors on Sparks’ beloved North Carolina coast. I was delighted to get a chance to talk to him about what he loves so much about that setting and why letters are always a key feature of his stories.
Why are old-school letters on paper so important to your characters?
When I went off to college, back then they use to charge per minute on just regular phones. So I had to correspond with letters. My mom would write three letters a week and one of the high points of my day was to reach into the mailbox and to get letters. I was from that generation. I’m a person who is used to handwriting thank you notes and things like that. That has just evolved over the years into letters of appreciation for those people with whom I worked and of course letters to those whom I love. And so for me it’s natural and almost expected even in the age of email and texts and things like that, and it is sad to me that there will be some people who never get a personal letter ever in their whole lives.
In “The Choice,” Travis and Gabby learn that sometimes the people who bother us are the people who are best for us. Why is that?
I think that is hard to be bothered by someone unless you have some sort of relationship with them in general. I don’t mean really bad people, but the people who just get to you — you really can’t hate someone so much deep down inside unless you love them. And I think that by bothering what these people are doing is essentially challenging them to be the best versions of themselves. That’s a wonderful thing that we should always aspire to be, to be the best version of ourselves that we can possibly be. But the conflicts of the choice we see when Travis (played by Ben Walker) is saying “You’re bothering me,” he is saying “You are making me a better person, you’re making me the best version of myself and that’s hard for me at this time in my life.” And I think there’s something wonderful in that because that is a lifelong journey with ups and downs.
The beach and the ocean always play a very important role in your stories and it’s never been photographed more beautifully, more lovingly that it is in this film. What do you think we learn from going out on the water and experiencing that atmosphere?
There’s a few reasons why those elements seem to recur in both my novels and my films. I like stories that are set in coastal North Carolina. North Carolina is a little unique in that it’s a state in which the closer you get to the coast the smaller the towns become. And small towns on the beach means a slower pace, a slower rhythm of life and I think a slower rhythm of life allows people more time to think, more time to simply be alone and simply just be like Travis does in his chair, his single chair on the back lawn until he brings a second one and I think that’s when people are able to connect at the most human level, when the world slows down enough for each of them to really be able to talk and listen and be heard.
In the film, Travis tells a lie about a lizard, and lets a little girl think that her lizard has not died. Do you think that was the right thing to do?
I think in this particular context yes because it was a lizard. I certainly would not have done the same thing with a kitten, or a dog but as a father you do want to shelter your kids from the harsh realities of life when it’s possible while at the same time preparing them for a life that will be include some harsh reality and I know that often there are moments in which it’s very hard to have certain kinds of conversations with your children and certainly those conversations would be different depending on the child’s age.
Travis and Gabby both learn that they jumped to the wrong conclusions about each other; is that something that is true to an extent of all people who fall in love?
Their first impressions were made during a moment of emotion, so to speak, or at least hers were, and when people are in an emotional state they are not always the people that they are the rest of the time. Their emotions were faulty so that led to I guess a faulty persona that wasn’t necessary reflective of who they are most of the time. At the same time I think that first impressions can be very accurate, not always but I think a lot of people can form opinions about another person within a few minutes of talking to them if they given the chance to really have the kinds of conversations that lend themselves to it.
Do you ever learn something new about your story by seeing it in the film?
Without question I learn something new every time. I learn different ways in the future for example to condense two characters into one for the sake of efficiency. I learn to think in terms of even when writing to think in terms of making the scene visual to the reader.
What is the biggest challenge do you think of taking a novel and making it into a movie? Doesn’t it lose some of the descriptive language that you have worked so hard on?
Primarily I think what’s lost is the ability to have characters be introspective so you know what’s going on in their heads. At the same time, a novel is a story told with worlds and in film it’s a story told with pictures. So some things are better in one, like introspection, and other things are better in another like arguments or car chases or fires. Anything exciting always works better in film or even in this particular case the scenery works better in film that I can ever hope to portray in the novel. So the challenge is to take a story told with words and put it into a story told with pictures, well knowing some things work better in one than the other whilst still maintaining the spirit and intent of the story, the spirit and intent of the characters. I think that certainly “The Choice” was able to do that. And I have been very fortunate in that all my films were able to do that.
Which of Todd’s films do you think she was the proudest of?
I think it has to be ‘You Made Me Love You,’ which Thelma made in England with Stanley Lupino. She loved her time making the movie and often commented afterwards that it was a film she was very proud of. In fact, just days before she died, Thelma spoke to an English reporter and said she was desperate to return to England to make another movie. On her last night alive, she spoke to Lupino and the two made big plans to work together again.
Do you know if she preferred drama to comedy?
I am pretty sure she felt conflicted. In one sense she was hugely popular with comedy roles, but in another she desperately wanted to break into serious drama. Her role in ‘Corsair’ was supposed to be her big break but it was a disappointment in many ways, and critics made it clear that she was better suited to comedy. What really irritated Thelma was that she became stuck in short comedy movies for Hal Roach, and wanted very much to have larger roles. I don’t think she minded comedy half as much as she minded being pigeon-holed into these small parts.
Which is your favorite, and why?
I have two favorites. One is ‘Speak Easily’ with Buster Keaton and the other is ‘You Made Me Love You.’ ‘Speak Easily’ is hilarious and Thelma really shows off her comedy talents. Her part is substantial which is pretty rare for her, and there was a good chemistry with Keaton. I really enjoyed ‘You Made Me Love You’ for several reasons. Firstly it is a very funny film and secondly I love that it was made in England (where I live) and you get to see a lot of the English countryside in the movie. When I first watched the film, I could only do so online and the version I found was in a dozen parts in no particular order! It was really hard work to watch and discover what order the parts went in. However, it has just been released on DVD in the UK, and my husband bought it for me this Christmas. It was fantastic to watch it in one big chunk, instead of a dozen small ones!
What resources did you use in your research that had not previously been examined? Where did you find your most surprising information?
I was very lucky to have access to the Coroner’s Inquest, which is well over 100 pages long, and then literally thousands of pages of press reports, interviews, stories etc, from the 1920s and beyond. When I discovered Thelma had visited England, I was determined to find out a lot about the trip, so I started researching newspaper articles that were printed in the UK at the time. I found out that she had visited Scotland, and a lovely lady at the Glasgow library was able to send me some really substantial interviews that Thelma had done on her arrival. To my knowledge, these had never been used by a biographer before, and were of great interest in a general sense because she described her plans for the trip, her hopes and dreams etc. However, the most surprising information was when Thelma suddenly started talking about encounters she had had with gangsters in the USA. In fact she told reporters that one mobster had sent his men to see her safely on the boat to England. This was a brilliant find for me, because up until that point there had been no mention of Thelma ever talking about gangsters during her life. Of course underworld characters have been tied to her story for many years, so it was amazing and exciting to read Thelma’s view of them, over two years before her death. These interviews were gold to me, and I’m so grateful to the librarian who sent them to me.
Todd’s insistence that she was not “discovered” through a beauty contest and that she did not need to go beyond what the character was experiencing to call up tears show that she took acting seriously. Who do you think gave her the most significant guidance about acting?
Thelma went to the Paramount School, which was designed to train would-be screen actors and actresses. However, I don’t think she really got much acting experience out of it, and she also expressed that herself. Ironically, while she grew frustrated with her Roach comedy shorts, I do actually believe that it was Hal Roach who gave Thelma the most significant guidance. She made dozens and dozens of short movies and each one gave her a great deal of experience and confidence. Before she became a Roach player, Thelma was the first to admit how inexperienced she felt, but towards the end of her life you can really see her shine in those movies. Her confidence is everywhere apparent.
If you could interview Todd, what would you want to ask her?
That’s a great question! During the writing of the book, I’d have asked what the real story was behind her death. Now that the book is finished, I’d really like to ask if I did a good job with her story. If she approved of my work, then I’d be a very happy lady.
You lay out the possible scenarios to explain her death, from accident to suicide to murder. Which do you think is the most likely?
For me, I think the murder scenario is definitely the most likely. The idea of an accidental death is just not something I buy into. Why would Thelma walk 271 steps up a windy cliff-side, wearing an evening dress and high-heels in the middle of the night, to get to a garage because she was locked out of her apartment? The last time she was locked out she actually smashed the window to wake up her partner, Roland West. He said that no-one could keep Thelma out of a place she wanted to enter, so why was she kept out that night? Roland West’s window was incredibly close to the door she was supposedly locked out of. How could he not have heard her pounding on the door or window (especially since we know he had a dog in the room)? There are so many questions about that scenario. I explore it all in the book, but basically I find the entire accident story suspect at best. Others would disagree of course, but that is my own, personal opinion.
You seem to like writing biographies of beautiful blondes who have experienced great loss. What do we learn from their stories?
It has never been a conscious decision to write about blondes, but somehow I always seem to! My next book is about Carole Lombard who of course is another blonde with a tragic end. I think we all learn something different from their stories, and what I take away from it is probably in contrast to what others may take from it. For me, the most important thing as a biographer, is to show my subjects as human beings. Thelma was not just “the body in the garage;” Carole was not just “the one who died in a plane crash,” and Marilyn was not just “the blonde who might have committed suicide.” They were all made of flesh and bones like we all are. They had their good times and bad; their accomplishments and their regrets. If we all realize that these ladies were real-life people, not just images on the screen, then I know I have done my job.
Debbie Reynolds’ New Book: Make ‘Em Laugh: Short-Term Memories of Longtime Friends
Posted on December 27, 2015 at 3:50 pm
Debbie Reynolds can be described with the term used for one of her most memorable characters, Molly Brown. Indeed, her previous memoir is called Unsinkable. On screen, she has appeared in classic films like “Singin’ in the Rain” (when she was still a teenager), “Tammy,” “How the West was Won,” “The Pleasure of His Company,” “The Singing Nun,” and “Mother.” While most often remembered for musicals and comedies, her work in “The Catered Affair” and “The Rat Race” show that she is a gifted dramatic actress as well.
Her new book is Make ‘Em Laugh: Short-Term Memories of Longtime Friends, she tells stories about her friends and colleagues from the golden era of Hollywood, including Lucille Ball, Frank Sinatra, Bette Davis, Phyllis Diller, Gary Cooper, Judy Garland, and Bob Hope.
“Make ’Em Laugh” recounts — sometimes gleefully, sometimes mournfully — Reynolds’s experiences in and outside the movies, using many items from her archives, scrapbooks and diaries. The book also offers candid shots of “America’s Sweetheart” with the likes of state dignitaries and even circus animals to gauge and eulogize the changing tides of Hollywood and the studio system.
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. On screen, she has appeared in classic films like “Singin’ in the Rain” (when she was still a teenager), “Tammy,” “How the West was Won,” “The Pleasure of His Company,” “The Singing Nun,” and “Mother.” While most often remembered for musicals and comedies, her work in “The Catered Affair” and “The Rat Race” show that she is a gifted dramatic actress as well.
, she tells stories about her friends and colleagues from the golden era of Hollywood, including Lucille Ball, Frank Sinatra, Bette Davis, Phyllis Diller, Gary Cooper, Judy Garland, and Bob Hope.
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