What an exciting week at the start of 2017
for the society! As a result of the generosity of Mr & Mrs Voice, we had the
privilege of an interview with their Pett Level week-end neighbour, Matt
Charman, a young and very successful screen-writer who came to
significant public notice as the writer of the
very successful 2015 film “Bridge of Spies” directed
by Steven Spielberg and starring Tom Hanks & Mark Rylance, with its BAFTA
and Oscar nominations and awards in 2016. Matt had asked if he
could be interviewed (rather than just giving a straight talk): Gill Southgate
was prepared for that but not for the acute chest infection which overcame her
two days earlier. Bill Doherty stepped up to the post and
enthusiastically led Matt and the audience into the history of the film. Whilst
researching ‘The Unfinished Life’ (of J.F.Kennedy) Matt came across a footnote
in a book of that title which reported that a US lawyer, James
Donaldson, had travelled to Cuba to negotiate with Castro the release of
1,500 US marines captured at their invasion of ‘The Bay of Pigs’. Following this
up
led to his discovery
that earlier, Mr Donaldson had travelled to East Berlin to effect the spy-swap
of Gary Powers (a captured US U2 pilot) with Rudolf Abel (a
Russian spy who Donovan had earlier defended in the US Courts). Matt was sure
that all this must have been documented in a movie by someone else ..... but, NO
it had not. He then wrote a 15 minute ‘pitch’ of the Spy Exchange story to offer
to film producers in Los Angeles. His agent fixed him up with seven or eight
daily meetings in a week – which provoked little interest to start but on the
last day he met the producers of “DreamWorld” who said they wanted it and they
would show it to Spielberg. Matt flew home with his head spinning a bit after
this quick encounter of a great number of film executives! First came a message
on his phone that “Steven Spielberg had called expressing great interest and
wanting to talk” – this was just before Christmas and after he had returned
Spielberg’s call he flew back to LA to meet him. “I like it and I want Tom
Hanks to play Donaldson: how long will it take you to write it? I have other
possible projects but I would like to do this next – can you write it by the end
of January? We’ll have to show it to the Coen brothers because they are used to
working with Tom BUT IT’S YOUR STORY”. Matt tells us that he wrote his 15
minute pitch into a script in 5 weeks !! Then he told us some of the
excitements of his complete involvement in making of the film, getting to know
the Coens, the actors – especially Tom Hanks and Mark Rylance in rehearsals and
then sitting beside Spielberg at the
filming.
Of course he had known Mark Rylance on the
London stage. After studying English at U.C. London, he had written a play for a
competition for new Playwrights which, out of seventy entries, he won the prize
and the play was staged at the Soho theatre. That led him to a meeting with
Nicholas Hytner at the National Theatre where for three years he became
‘Playwright-in-Residence’; the three plays he wrote were staged; these and the
complete experience with actors, plays AND audiences was invaluable for learning
his craft (in all a ten-year project). Bill then took Matt back
to discussion of an earlier film script for “Suite Francaise”
: which was shared with the Director,
Saul Dibb. Then questions came quickly from
the members’ audience which helped us to understand this disciplined and
determined (‘driven’ ?) young man and father. Since having two children
he is keen whenever possible to sharing bedtime with them. At home he works for
the morning on one project, has lunch and a short walk before writing for a
different one in the afternoon before the kids’ bath-time. Several scripts are
in hand but especially a film with Spielberg about the American commentator,
Walter Cronkite and his campaign against the Vietnam
War.
As a result of this fascinating evening I
have managed to share the DVD of “Bridge of Spies”
with my wife (first seen last year at the Kino) and two friends:
it has an excellent 15 minute summary of the Cold War which for many young folk
can be unknown territory. I have watched a couple of Matt Charman’s YouTube
interviews – as we now know, this is a format of presentation in which he
excels. Always he marvels with gratitude at the opportunities which his
discovery of a hitherto unknown American Lawyer, James
Donaldson, has given him. In writing the script it came to life
when he met Donaldson’s son, sitting in a New York diner, to talk about and hear
about his father. The Donaldson family came to the New York premiere of the film
– so appreciative that the story about the man they loved had now been
told.
Two days before this superb evening, the
Society’s reading group had met to discuss a recent Winchelsea crime novel:
“Murder on the Strike of Five” by M.P.
Peacock. Maddy Coelho and her brother, Paul Youlten came to explain to
us their joint writing of this story as a novel for Kindle
publication – without agents or orthodox publishers. It was
another surprising meeting and this account of some varied, often unpleasant,
Russians trapped on the Trans-Siberian Railway at the start of the Revolution in
1917 is well worth a read and can be easily obtained from the Rye Bookshop (if
you don’t have a Kindle).
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