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How 'The King's Speech' humanizes a monarch
By Matthew Lynch |
January 23, 2011, Sunday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
AS the director of 2009's "The Damned United" and HBO's 2008 "John Adams" miniseries, Tom Hooper has made a quick name for himself as a go-to period-drama auteur. The London resident's latest, "The King's Speech," continues that effort apace. The film details the curious, class-crossing friendship between Britain's King George VI and Lionel Logue, the speech therapist who helped him overcome a crippling stammer on the eve of World War II.
The film has won early endorsements. Colin Firth, who plays George VI, won a Golden Globe award last week for best actor. The film garnered seven Golden Globes nominations, including best drama, best director, best supporting actor (Geoffrey Rush as Logue) and best supporting actress (Helena Bonham Carter as Queen Elizabeth). Hooper takes time out to discuss the film.
Q: Is King George VI's speech impediment something in the British textbooks or is this a historical primer for everybody?
A: I think the real revelation of the film is the (king's) relationship (with) the Australian speech therapist. The fact that the guy was saved by this wonderfully maverick Australian who wasn't a doctor, who was self-taught, who was this failed Shakespearean actor, who was such a maverick - that really wasn't well known. One of the things that brought it to life for us was this amazing discovery we made nine weeks before the shoot. My production designer, Eve Stewart, tracked down the grandson of Logue, who lived in London. Sitting in his aunt's attic was this handwritten diary account of the relationship between King George VI and Lionel Logue. Some of the best lines in the film were written by King George VI and Lionel Logue.
Q: Royals aren't always altogether sympathetic characters, which is how the king is portrayed. Was that a natural element in the story?
A: One of the interesting things about King George VI is, because he had this dreadful stammer, he did a huge amount to humanize the monarchy. The film, in the same way, I think, does a huge amount to humanize this figure. I'm not really interested in making a film about someone who's an icon and who's removed. People get sucked into it so quickly because it's heartbreaking to watch Colin play this man who has this basic inability to communicate.
Q: A few scenes ring really true to the bullied kid in all of us. Did you draw on anything personal there?
A: One of the key lines is Logue saying to the king, "You don't have to be afraid of the things you were afraid of when you were 5 years old." In other words, quite a few adults are still trapped in the kind of defensive crouch that they adopted because of their childhood and they have to understand that they aren't that kid anymore. I think it's a really insightful line, and actually that line came from my dad. He lost his father in the war when he was 3, so he was packed off to boarding school at age 5 as a result. It was a pretty brutal era of English boarding school. The breakthrough he had much later in life was to be told that, in a way, he was still caught by the effect of being that 5-year-old even as an adult and that he needed to kind of realize that his life was completely different.
Q: Why is the film really catching on?
A: Studios have been avoiding making dramas recently and maybe it's because dramas are sometimes kind of all one tone - they're very serious throughout. This is a drama that has a huge amount of comedy. I think the biggest surprise of the screenings in the film festivals has been the amount and the consistency of the laughter. I think there's something about that mixture of humor, but also gravitas and emotion that I think you find less often nowadays in films.
The film has won early endorsements. Colin Firth, who plays George VI, won a Golden Globe award last week for best actor. The film garnered seven Golden Globes nominations, including best drama, best director, best supporting actor (Geoffrey Rush as Logue) and best supporting actress (Helena Bonham Carter as Queen Elizabeth). Hooper takes time out to discuss the film.
Q: Is King George VI's speech impediment something in the British textbooks or is this a historical primer for everybody?
A: I think the real revelation of the film is the (king's) relationship (with) the Australian speech therapist. The fact that the guy was saved by this wonderfully maverick Australian who wasn't a doctor, who was self-taught, who was this failed Shakespearean actor, who was such a maverick - that really wasn't well known. One of the things that brought it to life for us was this amazing discovery we made nine weeks before the shoot. My production designer, Eve Stewart, tracked down the grandson of Logue, who lived in London. Sitting in his aunt's attic was this handwritten diary account of the relationship between King George VI and Lionel Logue. Some of the best lines in the film were written by King George VI and Lionel Logue.
Q: Royals aren't always altogether sympathetic characters, which is how the king is portrayed. Was that a natural element in the story?
A: One of the interesting things about King George VI is, because he had this dreadful stammer, he did a huge amount to humanize the monarchy. The film, in the same way, I think, does a huge amount to humanize this figure. I'm not really interested in making a film about someone who's an icon and who's removed. People get sucked into it so quickly because it's heartbreaking to watch Colin play this man who has this basic inability to communicate.
Q: A few scenes ring really true to the bullied kid in all of us. Did you draw on anything personal there?
A: One of the key lines is Logue saying to the king, "You don't have to be afraid of the things you were afraid of when you were 5 years old." In other words, quite a few adults are still trapped in the kind of defensive crouch that they adopted because of their childhood and they have to understand that they aren't that kid anymore. I think it's a really insightful line, and actually that line came from my dad. He lost his father in the war when he was 3, so he was packed off to boarding school at age 5 as a result. It was a pretty brutal era of English boarding school. The breakthrough he had much later in life was to be told that, in a way, he was still caught by the effect of being that 5-year-old even as an adult and that he needed to kind of realize that his life was completely different.
Q: Why is the film really catching on?
A: Studios have been avoiding making dramas recently and maybe it's because dramas are sometimes kind of all one tone - they're very serious throughout. This is a drama that has a huge amount of comedy. I think the biggest surprise of the screenings in the film festivals has been the amount and the consistency of the laughter. I think there's something about that mixture of humor, but also gravitas and emotion that I think you find less often nowadays in films.
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