WHIT STILLMAN: I'd like to
mention that four of our films were actually profitable. So it might be against
your principles. [LAUGHTER] One was unprofitable. It's the one with 1,000
extras at a disco. But Warner Brothers
paid for that, so we don't have
to worry about it. [LAUGHTER] And so, if we do decide to
do film investing together, I'd like to mention
how we do it. To show that our
interests are aligned, I put in a certain
investment, like 10,000, into the investment vehicle. And then you put in your $10,000
in the investment vehicle. And do any of you know con
where the guy does the rolled up dollars under the arm
and the old, in the 70s? That was done a lot. It's not that. It's actually an honest thing. And I thought maybe the first
project we could do together would be President Arnn's,
Churchill's Trials, Churchill's Trial. [APPLAUSE] [CLEARS THROAT] Because Churchill
movies are a genre. They're popular. I've always wanted to do one. I can never get that job. They get English
people to do it. And there's just three
sections of the book. So it could be a series. We do the first one, The
War, which is commercial. And if The War works,
then we do the other two. So that's how it works
in the film business. You have to do sort of
a genre, or a series, or something like that. Anyway, I have to say, I
think there's a big problem with this conference. There's far too much
emphasis on Jane Austen. [LAUGHTER] It gets repetitive. [LAUGHTER] The private theatricals
at Mansfield Park have been worked to death. So, tonight I prefer to
talk about James Bond. [LAUGHTER] The James Bond novels have
also been made into films. [LAUGHTER] And so, first I'd like
to do a kind of survey. Who here has not seen
a James Bond film? You've not seen one? Never? Wow. Who is seeing the
old James Bond films with Sean Connery
and Roger Moore? Great, good, good, good. Who's read a James Bond novel? OK, OK. So now we've done that. [LAUGHTER] So how did Bond become a craze? Ian Fleming's--
a bit of history. Ian Fleming's first novel Casino
Royale was published in 1953 and was moderately
successful in Britain. But in the US, where three
publishers had wisely turned it down, it ended up flopping. The next year, 1954,
the CBS Network did a one-hour TV version. But they put it into
an anthology series. In 1955 film rights to
Casino Royale were sold. But nothing came of that sell. Dr. No, the sixth novel
was published in 1958, and it's a really good book. I recommend it. Paul Johnson, who
became famous later as a conservative,
popular historian, was then a man of
the left writing in the New Statesman in London. And he excoriated Doctor No for
its sex, snobbery, and sadism. One would think that would have
piqued Hollywood's interest. [LAUGHTER] But the novel went unsold. It was only the seventh
Bond novel, Goldfinger, that in 1961 led Canadian
producer, Harry Saltzman, and American, "Cubby"
Broccoli, both based in Europe to license the
James Bond character for films. Several Hollywood studios turned
the project down as too British or too blatantly sexual. In those days
Hollywood didn't want to do blatantly sexual
films, just the obvious ones, with blatant, no. Eventually, the
independent-minded studio, United Artists-- United Artists is
a great studio. It was started by DW
Griffith, and Mary Pickford, and Douglas Fairbanks
back in the old days to make their own films. And it's maintained a tradition
until recent decades of really being the friendly studio
for independent projects and the interesting projects. So they agreed to fund Dr. No
as a modestly, budgeted film. They really had a modest budget. Four film directors
turned the film down, perhaps because of
the modest budget. Anglo-Irish writer, director,
Terence Young signed on. And he sought to
make the film funny, as he considered that
quote "A lot of things in this film, the
sex, and violence, and so on, if played straight,
would A, be objectionable, B, would never go past the censors. But the moment you make
it tongue in cheek, it seems to disarm." Corners were cut,
ingeniously, to keep the film within its tight budget. Dr. No's fabulous aquarium,
fabulous aquarium, was actually magnified
stock footage of goldfish. And they actually couldn't
afford stock footage of scarier fish than goldfish. [LAUGHTER] The scarier footage costs more. But the film was a big success,
and the rest is history. Except, not really. The films maintain their
glamorous, humorous charm through Sean Connery
and Roger Moore films. But in the decades since then
have become increasingly grim, action films just like
other grim, action films. But the initial critical
reaction to Dr. No was not unmixed, which
means it was mixed. [LAUGHTER] Time called Bond a
blithering bounder. Where does Time get
off to snub James Bond? A blithering bounder. And a great-big,
hairy marshmallow. I mean, you see Sean
Connery as James Bond, you think great-big,
hairy marshmallow. Maybe marshmallow meant
something different than. OK. [LAUGHTER] Oh, he almost always manages
to seem slightly silly. Well, anyway. The New Republic said it
never decides whether it's suspense or suspense spoof. The Vatican condemned the
film as a dangerous mixture of violence, vulgarity,
sadism, and sex. The Vatican, I
think was premature. Because I don't think Dr.
No-- well, I guess it was. But they'd definitely be
correct about the current films. Vatican is on target. The Kremlin said that Bond
was the personification of capitalist evil. [LAUGHTER] So I'm surprised everyone
here has not seen those films. [LAUGHTER] Both these controversies
only helped increase public awareness of
the film and greater cinema attendance. Thanks, Wikipedia. That's from Wikipedia. [LAUGHTER] So what is this to
do with Jane Austen? Well, from the film
industry point of view Jane Austen's novels are
like Bond novel's material. And normally no one is
interested in material until someone else
takes a chance with it, and it turns out well. Then some good
works are created. But after a while
it becomes a genre. And once something becomes a
genre, next it becomes a glut. It begins to verge on
and more than verge on, parody and travesty. I worry that we're going to
make the world thoroughly sick of Jane Austen, which
would be a great shame. Because she has
enormous value for us beyond being a purveyor of plot
lines for a romantic-period yarns. And where am I? Ch-ch-ch. Oh, the next paragraph. [LAUGHS] [LAUGHTER] Some seem to have the impression
that it was ever thus, that Jane Austen
adaptations have come out in a continuous stream since
time immemorial, not at all. How did Jane Austen finally
become film material? Sense and Sensibility,
her first published book, came out in 1811. The MGM Pride and Prejudice
did not come out-- which I think was
screened on a Sunday, did not come out until 1940. It was not badly received. The New York Times
reviewed it favorably. But it lost money. There would not be another major
film of Jane Austen's works for 55 years. You lose money, you
don't make films. Jane Austen was in
the film doghouse. 1995 was the year of the
Jane Austen Big Bang, four projects coming out, all
successful in their own terms. When it rains, it pours. There was Sense and Sensibility,
I consider the best film adaptation. The Colin Firth television,
Pride and Prejudice version, the best Pride and
Prejudice version probably. There is the British
TV film of Persuasion, which many people like. It's kind of a dowdy version
of a beautiful novel, but considered successful. And in its own terms,
Clueless can be mentioned. [APPLAUSE] A lot of us hate it, but
no, we don't hate it. I just didn't like
it at the time. The kind of cool take was,
oh, Clueless is the best Jane Austen adaptation. And that turned us against it. The next year brought the
Gwyneth Paltrow, Emma, the Kate Beckinsale mini series, Emma,
and the first of the Bridget Jones' novels, so heavens. The floodgates were open. Jane Austen was material, a go
to source for hacks everywhere, and some non hacks. The dirty secret of
Jane Austen world; generally Austen enthusiasts
divided into two groups. This is a dirty
secret, those who come to Austen from books and
those who mostly approach her from the film and
television adaptations. This week you've heard a
lot from those who approach Austen from her novels. And they're very critical
of a lot of the films. In the novels, moral
and character insights and subtle comedy loom large. And a lot of those
things are lost in films. Austen film and television fans
are more oriented to romance and Darcy's in wet shirts. I'm prejudiced. [LAUGHTER] But thanks to film
and TV Austen fans, her works have become a genre. Perhaps Georgette--
Heyer or Hayer? Hayer, Heyer? Georgette Heyer, Barbara
Cartland, and Brigerton are the next tendencies. Jane Austen, in her writing
is mostly anti-romantic. She will give her public the
final outcome they require. But it is quite reserved,
judgmental, thorny path to get there. She was even more caustic
in her private letters and her private perceptions. So there are different
ways of looking at in judging film adaptations. This week you've heard a lot of
judging the specific fidelity of the films to the novels. There's another
school of thought that a film has no obligation to
be faithful to source material. The only question is, is the
film a good film in itself however unfaithful it might be? There are a couple of theories
about adapting books into film. Though perhaps not directly
relevant to Austen films. Alexander Payne is
an indie director, who did a very good film based
on the novel, The Descendents, about the dramas in the life
of the dynastic Hollywood Hawaiian family. Has anyone seen The Descendents? AUDIENCE: Woo! WHIT STILLMAN: Yeah,
it's really good. He went to USC film school. You know what USC stands for? Does anyone know that? University of spoiled children. [LAUGHTER] Very true of the film
school, especially. And I think in the
cheating scandal that was also confirmed, the
college cheating scandal. Do people try to
get into Hillsdale? I guess so, OK. [LAUGHS] [LAUGHTER] OK, USC film school in
Alexander Payne's day, there's a famous class in
book to film adaptation in which the professor would
ask the students, what the film owes the original book. And they had to
shout back, nothing. The film means
nothing to the book. Payne's view is that you
owe nothing to the novel. But you remain
faithful to the spirit. Well, it's fine for him to say. In Austen's case,
though, I think most of the concerns
about faithfulness, which could be considered
nitpicking, are justified. Certain transformations are
not just unfaithful to Austen's perspective and insights. They traduce them. One turned a classic Austen tale
into Charlotte Bronte romance. Why not go to Charlotte
Bronte directly? The adaptation of her great
moral novel, Mansfield Park, was free with all
sorts of contemporary, political, and sexual concerns. Why? Why bother? Why not learn from the past
when we have the chance to learn from the past,
rather than lecturing the past, which can't hear us? Certain flawed books can improve
with well-chosen infidelity. Ian Forrester's greatly
admired novel, Howards End, I didn't admire, I have to say. I found it manipulative
and tendentious, one family absolutely charming,
sensitive, and wonderful, the other terribly,
terribly bad, and probably Republican,
except there in England. [LAUGHTER] For the film, the director,
James Ivory, screenwriter, Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, and
the cast of Anthony Hopkins-- Emma Thompson is getting
a lot of credit this week, Emma Thompson, Vanessa Redgrave
transformed Howards End into something really wonderful,
subtle, and beautiful, and much fairer to
the different people, although the bad people
were still pretty bad. When it comes to Hollywood's
search for material, what's in and what's out, James
Bond and Jane Austen are in. Charles Dickens and
Anthony Trollope are out. Many of the dynamics of social
tension and moral observation, people credit for
Austen's popularity, would also apply
well to Trollope. He also has a
reformist perspective some people reproach
Austen for lacking. And there are 47 of the
Trollope novels, not just six. So maybe we can hope and
look forward to that. I recall a meeting
a decade or more ago with a very, nice producer. Someone had sent her a
project about werewolves. She was excoriating. Everyone knows it's
vampires people want to see. Young people today
only want vampires. How can these people
be so clueless as to propose a
werewolf project? [LAUGHTER] Little did she suspect that
zombies, of all things, were just around the corner. [LAUGHTER] Werewolves still haven't
happened, I don't think. But there's always hope. And I think there's
a popular series that is a Wolverine character. And so, maybe that's
getting close. OK, adapting Austen. So Jane Austen, like
James Bond, is material. I experienced this
myself trying to write my first film, Metropolitan. I needed things for people
to say to each other, to argue about, defining their
characters and relationships. The idea that the heroine-- called Audrey,
because she was also inspired by Audrey Hepburn,
was a kind of Fanny Price. This first Jane
Austen collaboration was slight and nearly
accidental beginning, as do many things, with
a misunderstanding. I was praising
Austen's Mansfield Park to a literary minded
friend, when he informed me that the literary critic, Lionel
Trilling, whom we both admired, had destroyed Mansfield
Park, particularly its first, virtuous
heroine, Fanny Price. Trilling had written,
"Nobody, I believe, has ever found it
possible to like the heroine of Mansfield Park. Fanny Price is overtly virtuous
and consciously virtuous. Our modern, literary feeling
is very strong against people who, when they mean
to be virtuous, believe they know how to reach
their goal and do reach it. We think that virtue
is not interesting." Don't come to Hillsdale. [LAUGHTER] "Even that is not really virtue,
unless it manifests itself as a product of grace operating
through a strong inclination to sin." Wow. Our favorite Saint is
likely to be Augustine. At this point, we will
pause for film clips. So I hope it works. [VIDEO PLAYBACK] [INTERPOSING VOICES] - By Tolstoy, War and Peace,
and by Jane Austen, Persuasion and Mansfield Park. - Mansfield Park, you've
got to be kidding. - No. - But it's a
notoriously bad book, even Lionel Trilling, one of her
greatest admirers thought that. - Well if Lionel Trilling
thought that, he's an idiot. - The whole story
revolves around what, the immorality of a group of
young people putting on a play. - In the context of a novel
it makes perfect sense. - But the context of the
novel and nearly everything Jane Austen wrote is near
ridiculous from today's perspective. - Has it ever occurred
to you that today, looked at from Jane
Austen's perspective, would look even worse? [END PLAYBACK] WHIT STILLMAN: No, let's
do the next, lights. [VIDEO PLAYBACK] - I read that Lionel
Trilling essay you mentioned. You really like Trilling? - Yes. - I think he's very strange. He says that nobody could like
the heroine of Mansfield Park. I like her. And he goes on and
on about how we modern people of today
with our modern attitudes bitterly resent Mansfield
Park because its heroine is virtuous. What's wrong with a novel
having a virtuous heroine? - His point is that the
novel's premise, that there's something immoral in a group of
young people putting on a play, is simply absurd. - You found Fanny
Price unlikable? - She sounds pretty unbearable,
but I haven't read the book. - What? - You don't have to read a
book to have an opinion on it. I've haven't read
the Bible either. - What Jane Austen
novels have you read? - None. I don't read novels. I prefer a good
literary criticism. That way you get both the
novelists' idea as well as the critics' thinking. With fiction I can never
forget that none of it ever really happened, that it's
all just made up by the author. [END PLAYBACK] [LAUGHTER] [APPLAUSE] WHIT STILLMAN: Thank you. So Jane Austen threw me a
lifeline for this movie. Trilling, in his essay,
is incredulous that one of the novel's key
controversies-- and you've been over this so
many times I hate to bring it up-- when Fanny Price's Bertram
cousins and their guests propose to a play at
home, and she objects, setting her absent uncle and
benefactors opposition to them. I mean, I think a lot
of the descriptions of Fanny's objections
to the theatricals are off in the sense that
she's not against theatricals. She's not just
against theatricals. It's the specific situation
with her uncle, who's laid down the law against
this happening very firmly, and he's taken her in. And she came from such
a horrible background in Portsmouth, and he generously
has treated her as a daughter. And he's gone. And her elder cousin,
the Miss Bertram, has a very fragile engagement. It's sort of in jeopardy. And the idea of the
danger of this play in her fragile situation--
so I think people sort of are unfair to Jane
Austen and Fanny Price in how this is all happening. But what was sort
of a lifeline for me in getting this
material-- it's very hard sort of to come up with
a plot and situations that reveal characters
and advance the story. And so, I started thinking,
what could be liked, this sort of indefensible
position that someone takes, where it isolates them
from everyone else. Like someone, who does
not want to do something, everyone else wants to do
it, and their objections seem stupid, and silly. And they're idiots,
and why do you-- why do you want to do this? And this happens a lot. And I remembered a case
shortly after college where there was one of
those truth or dare games. And I didn't like
the idea very much. I didn't object to it. And it was really terrible. I mean, some people
ask questions they shouldn't have
asked, and the people felt obliged to answer when
they shouldn't have answered. And it was really embarrassing
and bad, bad, bad, bad. And so, I thought
maybe someone could-- sort of a more frivolous
type, could propose a truth or dare session. And Audrey objects,
and she's isolated. And then something comes out
in that that's sad and bad. And it advances the plot. So anyway, it really
helped me out. I mean, it's small
in the whole movie. But the Jane Austen
element was helpful. Also, as an aside, one thing
I've been thrilled here. I normally am
blocked from JSTOR. Do you know what JSTOR is? All the-- normally I have
to, you know, do some log in. And I can look at it,
but I can't download it. I'm such a cheapskate. [LAUGHTER] And there are just so many
things that I want to research. And I come to JSTOR. And it's, OK, now I can
read it, OK, quickly. I can't download it. And then magically, I
was here, in my room, and I'd go to things. And I could download it. It said download. Download, OK, download. [LAUGHTER] So tomorrow morning, I'm going
to be downloading every article I ever wanted to read. [LAUGHTER] Thank you, Hillsdale. [LAUGHTER] So anyway, Metropolitan
even got to be considered a stealth
adaptation of Mansfield Park by some people. So, it got Jane Austen
talked about a little bit. Oh, and about these essays,
the Lionel Trilling essay is really great. It's a really fascinating essay. He published it in the
Partisan Review in 1954 and collected it in his
book, The Opposing Self. And it's also just available
free on the internet. I guess it's been pirated. And then, there is a
wonderful essay replying to it from a retired Smith
College Professor, who recently died at 100 years old. So we don't know if he saw it. His name is Paul Pickrell. And he wrote this essay, Lionel
Trilling and Mansfield Park. It's on JSTOR. [LAUGHTER] And it's really interesting. He destroys
Trilling, but nicely. So my second Jane Austen
adaptation learning experience came-- I was really lucky
with Metropolitan. I was completely accessible,
and happy to meet with anyone, and do any project. In fact there's sort of a set
thing with indie filmmakers-- oh, my God, is it
getting that late? I better hurry up. So, that you make a first film,
and then studios come to call. And you get to make James Bond
films or interesting films. You don't have to
make your indie films. But, I want to make
a second indie film, which is a real mistake
because then they think, oh, you're only going to
do these little films. They can draw a line
between the two. Anyway, I was in the editing
room for a second film, Barcelona, and I already had
the idea for the third film, The Last Days of Disco. And a producer came out. I was working with this
company, Castle Rock, which Rob Reiner started. And it's this great company. And they backed
three of my films. So I'm really grateful to them. And this wonderful
producer, Lindsay Duran, had worked there. And she wanted to adapt
Sense and Sensibility. And she went first to
Rob Reiner because she thought there should be in
character, comedy guy who does this, character comedy guy. Rob Reiner passed on it. She came to me. I had this idea that I
should write original stories and then film them. And I was in between
these two projects. But I read the script. And it was Emma
Thompson's, early draft of Emma Thompson's script. And it started just
with the dialogue scene. So she took the
novel, got to the part where they're dialogue,
and dramatized them. And it seemed very drawing
room and sort of not dramatic and not passionate. So I read the novel,
and I realized there's a very, brief
narration at the beginning, without dialogue. And that it gives the whole
predicament of these sisters, who are the second family of-- I mean, if you've seen the film,
so you all know the story-- and how the sister-in-law
talks their elder brother away from the promise he gave their
father to take care of them. So they're left
essentially, destitute, in a horrible predicament. And Lindsay Duran said,
"Yeah, that sort of-- I was thinking about that." And wonderful director came
on to do that, Ang Lee, with a writing
collaborator, Jim Sheamus. They worked with Emma Thompson. That film turned
out so well I think, because you had these really,
brilliant filmmakers, and then someone who really loved Austen
and is really close to it, and knew the milieu,
Emma Thompson. And that collaboration
was so wonderful. And it really taught me to learn
that you can't really judge a script by an early draft. It's very hard to
imagine what a film's going to be like from a script,
all the good things that are going to be done,
and changed, and adapted. And also, that certain authors
have wonderful predicaments. And one of the things
that makes Jane Austen so great to adapt normally is
she has great predicaments. I mean, they're always so
interesting and sort of subtle. In any case, what
happened next was I did that film, The
Last Days of Disco. It wasn't profitable. So, Hollywood wasn't
calling immediately. It was well received
but not profitable. And I had also felt that the
three, dramatic stories I had to tell, I'd kind of done. And I had to have a
dramatic experience before I could do something else. And so, I was thinking
of doing adaptations. I got involved
with other people. And they all kind of went wrong. And there were all these
books under copyright, with living authors, and
studios, and producers. And like, you get four people,
five people involved in it everyone, likes something
different in the novel. Everyone has a different idea-- or the memoir or
whatever you're adapting. And then, there's a lot of money
for each year of the option. You haven't finished the script. It's not good enough,
and they don't want to pay for next
year, the option. They don't want to
buy it out, outright. There are all these problems. And living authors are big
problems, let me tell you. [LAUGHTER] Because living authors
very often want to get into the sausage factory
just when they shouldn't. Because things are pretty
ugly in the sausage factory. And so they sneakily get, bad,
early drafts, and read them, and say, oh, this is terrible. [LAUGHTER] And
then they really do everything possible to
torpedo the project. So, Jane Austen also has the
great virtue of never wanting to read your script-- [LAUGHTER] --of never getting
involved in any way. And if you can keep it
secret, you don't have to pay. You know. it's public domain. So that's a good thing. So I was reading
Jane Austen again. And it's because I stupidly
read Northanger Abbey first when I was a
sophomore in college and hated it, and would tell
everyone, I hate Jane Austen. She's overrated. She's ter-- how can
people like her? How can they like her? And then my smart,
elder sister convinced me to read something else. So I read Sense and
Sensibility, and loved it, and read everything
else, and loved it. And when I was writing
Metropolitan, just sort of pause from the
sausage factory of trying to write the
script, I'd actually just read pages of Pride and
Prejudice to clear the palette, or cleanse the
brain, or whatever. So I was reading this
omnibus, Jane Austen. And I ran into all these
strange things, all these strange, little
things I didn't know about. So I got a big, big Jane
Austen idea and then a trivial, pathetic, sad,
ridiculous Jane Austen idea. And the big, big, cool
Jane Austen idea, I immediately got a producer
who wanted to do it. I took it to one of the
big commercial studios in England that does all
big, romantic, you know, Bridget Jones, Notting
Hill, all these big things. And I went to them. And they said, Oh, we don't like
to do anything but the biggest novel of an author. We'll only do the biggest novel. Guess what novel they did? Anyway. And they did they did two
of those, both, anyway. [LAUGHTER] So, I had this very slight
idea, this strange manuscript, Jane Austen, left untitled,
about widowed, Lady Susan, De Courcy, and her quest
for wealthy husband for herself and her daughter. It was in the epistolary style. It was really hard
to read through. There's like a perfunctory
wrapping up at the end, not a real conclusion. But what gave me hope was that
I knew two British actresses who were beautiful and brilliant at
comedy, Elizabeth Hurley, who through Hugh Grant was sort of
part of the Castle Rock Group. And I knew she she was a really
smart producer and really clever. And so, Elizabeth Hurley was
the right age then for the part. And also, she was at the top of
her Austin Powers popularity. There was one time-- there's one point in time
when Elizabeth Hurley was the favorite actress
of 14-year-old boys-- [LAUGHTER] --which means a lot
in the film business. [LAUGHTER] And Kate Beckinsale,
Kate Beckinsale, I knew would be great as Lady Susan. But she was too young then. Because this was like 10 years
before I got the script ready. And from The Last Days of
Disco, she went on to make-- to become a Gothic,
action-film star. And anyway, but the idea
that an actress can do it makes a thing more interesting. So I'm curiously--
I was in London and happen to have cocktails
with a group of young people. And a writer for City
Journal and her boyfriend, was a really nice theatrical
producer, very small scale, running a tiny
theatre in London, he was sort of a
Scottish, awkward, nicer version of Hugh Grant. [LAUGHTER] And I told him this idea, this
strange idea, of Lady Susan. And he said he'd read it. And he read it,
and he thought you know this could be interesting. So I said why not do it as a
little play to test it out, try out the material. And then we could
make it maybe-- make it definitely into a movie
later, that would be the plan. And so he gave me like
a tiny amount of money that I could well afford to pay
back, a very loose contract, and I started working on it. And adapting this
with the letters you sort of take the letters
from Alicia to Lady Susan, and put several
letters together, and try to make it a scene,
a conversational scene. You've got these essentially,
monologue, and monologue, and monologue, and
monologue, and monologue. And you tried to get it to work. And then you had to
De Courcey's, trying to deal with this shark
coming into their world and their letters to each
other, and you sort of start getting something. And what was strange is that
normally a script, before you finished it-- even
when you finished it, is just terrible
for people to read. Like normal people cannot
enjoy a film script. It's broken up in the
interior, exterior, and night, day, all the nonsense. And in this case it
was really strange because I was really far away
from finishing the script. But it's really fun to read. Because a lot of the
stuff I had to do is cut out funny
Jane Austen stuff. But it was there,
and so my daughter could read it and like it. And other friends could like it. And I tweeted that I was
thinking of doing a novel. And someone actually,
miraculously tweeted back saying they'd like to
see it, a publisher. And I sent them
this script I had. I hadn't finished. And they loved it and
said, oh, we'll do a novel. And so I had a contract to do
the derivative, knock-off novel before I had any backing for
the film or a finished script. And Trevor, the
play producer, he would always be saying,
well, what about Frederica? What about Frederica? Because there wasn't much
about Frederica in the letters, and he thought that Frederica
had to be the heart of the film and had to be the
heart and soul. And I couldn't think of
anything for Frederica really. What about Frederica? And anyway, in the novel,
if you ever read it, there's a lot, what
about Frederica? And we have a lot more about
Frederica in the novel. Anyway, so, Trevor went on to
do natural-resources investing. [LAUGHS] And I decided that I
hated the theater, play format because cinema is so brilliant. And I hate when
people talk about how a great, 10-minute shot--
because the great thing in cinema is to be able
to jump from one place to another, to cut, to get
closer, to get farther away, to do all these things that
are so wonderful in cinema. And theater doesn't have that. And I do want to do plays
and things like that someday. But in this case, it
was very frustrating, the idea of adapting it for a
play to later do a movie, no. Why not do the movie directly? So I started doing the
movie script directly. Anyway, there was
one, key letter. And it was Catherine Vernon. And Austen scholars
write about this letter. Because they say this is
the letter where she's fighting the epistolary style. She's trying to write
modern, novel scenes. So it's a very, long letter. And in it, Catherine Vernon
describes this silly, city man, Sir James Martin, coming to. And Lady Susan's manipulating
him to marry Frederica. And Frederica doesn't want to. And he just laughs,
laughs, laughs. [IMITATES LAUGHING SOUND] And it
was all about how silly he was. But there was
actually no matter. There was actually no scene. And so, it was very hard to
try to come up with something. And I came up with something. And it was pretty lame. And in auditions, I just got
so sick of this lame scene that I wrote another scene. And it's a little better. But it's still pretty
lame, you know, Church and Hill, Churchhill,
and all, you know, lame, lame stuff. Then a guy comes in
to audition for it. There are actually three guys
who came in to audition for it, and they're all pretty good. One guy was kind of a genius. And he was so funny
with this lame scene. I couldn't believe it. And we finally got
the-- oh, there's another thing that
happened that will interest the
investors, upstairs, and in the restaurant. [LAUGHTER] A Christian investor wanted to
back my Jamaican Church film. But I wasn't ready to do that. I was trying to do
this Jane Austen film. But he had his son
working for him who said that my script
didn't have Christian mission. And I said, OK, what can I do? How do I get the
Christianity in it? [LAUGHTER] So, I thought Commandments,
honor their father and mother. [LAUGHTER] Honor their father and mother
is my favorite commandment because I'm a father. [LAUGHTER] And I used to have one. I think sort of all
philosophy can come out of that which I
mistakenly thought was the fourth commandment. [LAUGHS] [LAUGHTER] Anyway, meanwhile, the
other important commandment is the ninth commandment, which
we really need these days. And so, it was
putting a lot of this. And now I had Frederica
scenes because they could talk about the Commandments. And Federico's coming into it. And then I said, well, I've
always wanted to do a sermon. I want to do a
sermon on aesthetics. So we'll have a
church and a curate. And Frederica can go
to pray in the church. And the curate can come
and give his little sermon and talk about the fourth
and fifth Commandments. And so, suddenly all this
new material is coming in. And this story that was just
sort of locked into this bitchy dialogues between
the two characters, suddenly it started
broadening and become bigger. And then a real Eureka moment
was in the terrible read through. So, before you shoot
a film, you do a read through of all the
actors you have on set. And we're going through,
and it's just, just painful. The material
doesn't sound great. And we just had this
laptop just sitting there. And at one point the
laptop started acting. And it was Sir James Martin. And he was incredibly funny. And he was Skyping in
from Brighton, England. We were in Dublin. And he was hilarious. And suddenly this disastrous
read through didn't seem bad. And I started thinking,
I've got to write a lot more material for this guy. And also-- I mean
Chloe Sevigny had come with a beautiful, English
accent she'd worked hard on. It was beautiful. But I'd been through
three films where there were accent
problems, where you worry about the accent. No matter how good
it is, there's someone who will say--
you know, they'll know the actor is
not from that place. And they'll say that. So we went through this with
a fake accent in Damsels in Distress. A woman consciously
had a fake accent. And still people
would see the trailer and would say, oh, it was
a fake accent in this film. Yeah, there is a fake accent. It's intentional. [LAUGHTER] So, I just hated that accent. And the assistant
director, who is English, he took me aside for a pint
of stout Guinness in Dublin. It was the best
paint I've ever had. Because he said why not
make Alicia American? And I was in the
midst of just reading about the War of Independence
and the poor Tories, who were in exile to Nova
Scotia and back to London. And there are these American
families, the Delanceys who are just so English. They went to Eaton. And they read law at
the Inns of Court. And they were just so English. And they came to
the United States. And they were thrown out,
as they should have been. [LAUGHTER] And they went back to
London and struggled. And there's some
beautiful artists, Benjamin West did a beautiful,
a beautiful painting of Britannia, welcoming
the loyalists back. And it's just striking, striking
painting, the ingrate, traitor. [LAUGHS] [LAUGHTER] And anyway, so I had all this
material I knew from my film-- I'm about to end. I better end. I knew from my film,
Barcelona, that people both in the United States
and Europe love characters snobbing Americans. [LAUGHTER] Everyone thinks that's funny. [LAUGHTER] And so, having all these
English people making comments about her
being American, right? I knew that this is comic gold. And instead of being exiled-- so in the Jane Austen, she's--
the threat Mr. Johnson gives, is to be exiled to
an English village. In this case she'll be
exiled to Connecticut, to Hartford, Connecticut. [LAUGHTER] And I knew Connecticut's
going to be a big laugh line. And anyway, I'd better
wind down, I guess. I could keep talking. But I think they want-- [APPLAUSE] Anyway, thank you. [APPLAUSE] Thank you. [APPLAUSE] MODERATOR: Thank
you, Mr. Stillman. We now have some
time for questions. So if you have a question,
please come to a microphone. AUDIENCE: Hello, first
off, I just want to say, I really love your work. It's such an honor
to hear you talk. Thank you so much. One of the things you mentioned
is how most modern Jane Austen adaptations focus
on the romance. And one of the reasons I
think Love and Friendship, I like it so much, is that it's
very much a comedy of manners. Is that part of the reason you
were drawn to it do you think? And would you consider ever
doing another Jane Austen adaptation? WHIT STILLMAN: Thanks
very much for that. There are a lot
of things that are really exciting about
realizing how good it was. So, I'd always had
real reluctance of taking one of the great
ones and chopping it down to a classic, comic book movie. Oh, I know people have done
beautiful jobs with them, and a beautiful job can be done. But there are just
so many aspects of the Lady Susan material. It seemed so
unlikely, originally. It's really her
funniest material. It's really funny. That humor is kind of buried
in this awkward format. I love the fact that there
is no real title to it. And I thought I should take
another Austenian title and use that. And that was probably a mistake. So I took Love and Friendship
from her earlier juvenilia and put it on this. But I felt it's authentic
Jane Austen title. It didn't have a
Jane Austen title. And I felt there was a
lot of things we could do. There's a lot that
had to be added. It was not subtraction. It was additions. And to conclude the thing
with Sir James Martin-- so we had the conversations
between Lady Susan and her daughter about
the Commandments. And in the production
then one afternoon, the charming, Irish
producer, Katy Hawley, happened to mention
the 12 Commandments. [LAUGHTER] And I said, [LAUGHS]
Katy, you made the film-- [LAUGHTER] --through James Martin,
the 12 Commandments. And then the thing, when
I was thinking about that, the idea that-- someone corrected me
and said it's only 10. And I said, there are
two you get to take off. [LAUGHS] [LAUGHTER] That was my favorite part. [LAUGHTER] And so, I got in the habit. I did something with
a pilot with Amazon called, The Cosmopolitans. And they kept asking
me to write new scenes. So, Chloe is here. Couldn't you have
another scene with Chloe? And so I'd write a new scene
like 4 o'clock in the morning. And so, I realized, you
can write new scenes. So I kept writing new scenes. So I wrote that like at four AM. And he got it in
the makeup chair. And he kept telling the makeup
people, take a long time, take a long time. And it was just amazing he could
do that scene because he had so little time with the script. And he just took his
time, and did it. And whenever he'd
come to set I'd try to think of a
new scene for him. [LAUGHTER] AUDIENCE: Hello, I just wanted
to ask how important you think it is to be faithful to
a novel and a film adaptation? WHIT STILLMAN: Can
I hear that again? AUDIENCE: I just wanted
to ask how important you think it is to be faithful to
a novel in a film adaptation? WHIT STILLMAN: I mean,
I agree with all sides. Is that a courageous stance? [LAUGHTER] WHIT STILLMAN: So I think
it's really electrifying, the university's loyal,
children's version. You owe nothing to it. I mean, the important thing
is that it's a good film. And I had a kind of an
argument with a film critic. He was a really good critic,
who was working for a newspaper. And he was about to
see a film and was rushing to read the novel. And I said to him, oh,
please don't do that. That's just the worst
thing to do to a movie, to read the novel right
before you see it. And so I said-- and I said, why do you do that? It's like this homework,
to be a good student they have to do that research. And he said the editors tell
us that we have to do that. We have to know the novel
so we can tell readers if it's faithful or not. So a lot of readers of
the newspapers who've read the books want to if
the adaptation is faithful. So it's kind of a market
thing I guess, partly. And I said why not
read it after-- I guess they have deadlines,
and they don't have time. But why not read it
after you see the movie. Let the movie that you're
reviewing be the prime thing, and then read the book after it. So, I think with
Jane Austen, it's dangerous changing too much. But it's what people say. I mean, you can be
faithful to the spirit totally in [INAUDIBLE]. One of the really outrageous
adaptations I've seen is the film version of the
Evelyn Waugh, the sentimental, Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead, yeah. So, it was a beautiful,
absolutely beautiful mini series with Jeremy Irons. And they redid it as a film. I don't know why. And they completely reversed
everything about it. And why do that? I mean, it's imposing
whatever your own little angle is on to material. Do different material. Don't do something that
you're going to traduce. So, thank you for that question. It's great. MODERATOR: Question
to speaker's left. AUDIENCE: You, sir,
so much for your talk. My question is, you talked
a lot about how we have so much material with Jane Austen. And we have so many
adaptations of it, and we might grow tired of it. And then a few years ago
there was an adaptation of Pride and Prejudice
that took liberties by adding zombies into the mix. And so, my question
is do you think that is an indication
of the fact that we're tired of Jane
Austen and we need things to make it more entertaining? Or is it an example of
something that people are being super creative
with Jane Austen's material? WHIT STILLMAN: I know the
director of that film. In fact, he was an
actor in the third film we did, The Last Days of Disco. He played the door Nazi, not
letting people in the disco. It's a great guy. And he said he wanted
to take the part so he could study indie film. And he has done
really, really well. Maybe that isn't
the best one of-- and he cast three of
our actresses in it. It was a little frustrating
because, Morfydd Clark, who I think is a brilliant actress,
who was the first person cast in the film, who
plays Frederica-- and is going on to big things. She's going on to the big
Tolkien TV series and things. And she's already
done tremendous work. And so we cast her for
her first film offer. But we weren't ready to film
because we were still looking. We hadn't found the
Hillsdale investors. [LAUGHTER] Everyone made tons of
money, I have to say. [LAUGHTER] And, sorry. [LAUGHTER] And so, she was in that
film before our film, and she's just
doing tons of stuff. Was that the question? I mean-- [LAUGHTER] I've got a lot more I could say. AUDIENCE: So you
mentioned film adap-- I mean obviously,
film adaptations, what this talk was about. But Sense and Sensibility
specifically, I believe, was what you said
was your favorite or the one you
respected the most. And I was just curious as
to why you consider that the best Austen Adaptation? WHIT STILLMAN: I mean I
haven't seen every Austen adaptation because some I
just can't bear to watch them. But maybe they get really good
after the first three minutes. [LAUGHTER] But I think that they're
aided there by the fact that it's the lesser of
the five great novels. And that it was a
great novel for me to read first because
I was sort of coming from the world of nonfiction,
of reading literary criticism, and not the novels. And it's the most essay-ish,
most like an essay. And I think that allowed them
to sort of take that and-- I mean there are just so
many beautiful elements in that film. I'm not really a critic,
so I can't really say. But, I don't know. I think it's generally-- I think that's the general view. I think it's generally the
best regarded adaptation. And to get back to
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, if I didn't
finish that, I think it'd be great if there was
just sort of a fallow period and like not so
much of Jane Austen, or Brigerton's,
or whatever it is, and that we just allowed to come
back in a decade or five years and try to do really great
versions of all the others that haven't been done,
as great versions. And I think it really would be
great to think about someone like Trollope and how
a feature film could be made of Trollope novels. Because a lot of
the same dynamic that people
appreciated-- there's a lot of morality, really the
kind of exquisite morality and humor in Trollope. It's not works of art at the
same level of Jane Austen. But there's no need
to compare and say one's better than
another and all that. It's just I'm just so excited
to find all these great Trollope novels that I'm reading. AUDIENCE: You briefly
mentioned The Cosmopolitans. So is there an update on that? WHIT STILLMAN: Well, I
think it might be going in sort of two directions. I hope to take
some elements of it and put it into a
different kind of series. So, I think things will
come out of Cosmopolitans. But it probably won't
be directly continuing exactly that. And if anyone needs a link,
I can get links to people. [LAUGHTER] AUDIENCE: So, thank you so
much for your excellent film and your explanation
of it to us tonight. I'm curious, especially
after her poignant portrayal in your film, could
you perhaps offer a summary of your
vindication for Lady Susan? WHIT STILLMAN: Well,
[CLEARS THROAT] funny you ask. [LAUGHTER] How many minutes do I have? OK, I'll quickly read this. OK, this is the opening. So, this novel-- So, Sir James Martin, Tom
Bennett, that comic performance really inspired me and also
a very kind of comical memoir of Jane Austen by her nephew. So I thought, what if Lady
Susan and Sir James Martin had a nephew who wanted to do
a defense of his aunt the way her nephew did a
defense of his aunt? So, anyway, this fellow
turns everything around. Let me just read as
much of this as I can. It's the opening of Love and
Friendship, Jane Austen's Lady Susan Vernon
Entirely Vindicated. That's the novel. Because by the time
I've done a film, I don't want the
novel to be the film. I want the novel to be
something else again. And so, this is sort of-- anyway, a true narrative
of false witness. They who bear false
witness against the innocent and blameless
are rightly condemned. What though of they who bear
false witness against those whose histories
are not spotless? To commit one sin
or indiscretion is not to commit every
sin or indiscretion. Yet many speak as if it were. Such was the case of
the DeCourcy family of Parkland's
Kent, who disguised their prideful arrogance,
indefensible in our faith under the cloak of moral
nicety and correction. As so often with
our aristocracy, the DeCourcy's these did not
conduct their soiling vendettas themselves. But the truth is sycophants and
hangers-on on in their circle, in this case, the
spinster authoress, notorious for her
poisen-pen fictions hidden under their
lambskin of anonymity. [LAUGHTER] That other less prominent
character assassinations later joined the cruel fray does
not lessen that lady's singular culpability. Having myself been the
target of such slanders, I well know the
near impossibility of cleansing one's good
name from their aspersions. And if one's name
is not so good, that near impossibility
becomes even nearer. Whatever one answers,
no matter how true and well evidence the
defense or explanation, one is forever besmirched,
even irrefutable denials. This applies to a
lot of my friends, who've been in the film
business and got called out for various things. [LAUGHS] [LAUGHTER] Anyway, serve only
to further circulate the original slanders. If defending one's
reputation is difficult when one is still of this world
surrounded by one's papers, correspondence, calendars,
diaries and overdicture of every kind,
with memories still lively to marshal in one's
own defense, how much harder after one has departed it? Lady Susan Grey
Vernon was my aunt, and the kindest, most
delightful woman anyone could know, a shining ornament
to our society and nation. I am convinced that the
insinuations and accusations made against her are
nearly, entirely false. [LAUGHTER] I have taken as my
sacred obligation the task of convincing
the world of this also. Sir Arthur Helps,
the great biographer of Prince Henry, the
Navigator, heroic initiator of the Age of Discovery,
has described that prince's not-uncommon motive. A man sees something
that ought to be done, knows of no one that
will do it but himself, and so is driven
to the enterprise. Anyway, I think that's
done with all our time. [APPLAUSE] Thank you. [APPLAUSE] Thank you. May you all be driven to the
right enterprises and not the wrong ones. MODERATOR: Thank
you, Mr. Stillman. Thank you. [APPLAUSE]
