Director Douglas McGrath started out as a writer on the US TV series LA Law. He would later co-write Melanie Griffiths' romantic comedy "Born Yesterday" and Woody Allen's "Bullets Over Broadway". He assumed megaphone duties for the first time on "Emma", his adaptation of the Jane Austen classic, which also propelled Gwyneth Paltrow to stardom. He now tackles yet another of Britain's treasured novels, Charles Dickens' sprawling epic "Nicholas Nickleby".
You've said you were completely enamoured with an RSC (Royal Shakespeare Company) adaptation of "Nicholas Nickleby". Was that the impetus for taking on this project?
Yes. The RSC production is the most amazing thing I've ever seen. You're in the theatre for the entire day - they only let you out for 60 minutes to eat. And so, you get totally inside the novel. After that I couldn't get it out of my head, so I read the book. For years I thought about it, and I thought, There's a way to sensibly compress it and tell the story of this young man and his journey, which involves some compressions and some omissions, but if you follow Nicholas' journey you can tell that story.
Wasn't it painful though - having to condense such a sprawling work into a couple of hours of screen time?
Yes, it was painful. But going into it, I knew that was the job. So, it was painful but I accepted it. And it's not as painful as if I had written the novel! But funnily enough, once I had made the decision to follow the Nicholas storyline, and the Nicholas/Ralph struggle, it clarified very quickly what the map would be. It was: becoming friends with Smike, rescuing Smike, leaving the Crummles, saving the sister, and finding the girlfriend. So, it followed through very nicely. And though I missed certain characters very much, like the Mantalinis, I always knew that the film could never replace the book, nor would I want it to. It can only serve as a walking, talking supplement to the book. It's something I hope, if it's pleasing on its own terms, would interest people who haven't read the book to explore all the other richness that we couldn't bring to the screen.
Isn't this adaptation really a love story centred on Nicholas and Smike, more than it is about the romance between Nicholas and Madeline?
Well, not more than that. But everything that happens to Nicholas is only able to happen because of the friendship he develops with Smike. Their relationship is very deep, open and caring, but really what it is... it's almost a father-son relationship. They're very close in age so it doesn't appear that way, but what happens is, at the beginning of the film, Nicholas is a boy dependent on his father. Then, he loses his father and he feels more of a child than ever, and he says that at one point in the film. But then he acquires a dependent of his own - this young boy who needs his help. And in caring for Smike, he becomes in many ways a father himself. So, it's that kind of love - that kind of unquestioning, unconditional love that a parent has for a child.
What is it about Charlie Hunnam that made you think he was right for the part of Nicholas?
Charlie came and met me in New York and we spent a long time together. He had a dynamic quality that was mixed with - what we only now know to be! - a superficially innocent looking quality. Also, he had a look that I wanted for Nicholas. This is the first time I've seen a "Nicholas Nickleby" where Nicholas is very close to the age that he is in the book, and I thought that was very important to the poignancy of the situation. Also, we needed someone strong to guide us through all these wild characters, and Charlie seems to have a sincerity and a sweetness that was really important.
