By Andrew Amelinckx
Appeared in The Register-Star, November 5, 2007
“The projects come from many sources,” said James Ivory, a veteran filmmaker whose work spans 46 years and has received six Academy Awards, describing the genesis of the more than 30 films he’s directed.
“Sometimes they are without a story, merely an idea — “Jefferson in Paris” (1995), for instance, started with an idea and then a script was created,” he said as he sat in a chair in the front room of his early 19th century manor house in Claverack, his two dogs asleep at his feet, the afternoon sun slanting in through the windows. He wore a tan jacket, the lining of which had a riotous pattern and color scheme that had a late 19th Century look about it and gave him the air of a British country gentleman from that era.
Ivory will be speaking about his career at Time and Space Limited, a cultural center in Hudson, on Saturday as part of the Columbia County Historical Society's distinguished author series. He will be interviewed by film director Chris Terrio, who directed the film “Heights” (2004), which was produced by Merchant Ivory Productions.
Ismail Merchant, who was Ivory’s partner in both work and life, formed Merchant Ivory Productions with Ivory in 1961. The screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala wrote most of the scripts for their films.
Merchant passed away in 2005.
Ivory said that many of his films came about after reading a novel, and “often by accident.” Someone would recommend a book or he would pick one up and fall in love with it. “I would read it and like it and think that would make a very good film,” he said. More than 20 of his films have been based on either novels or short stories, including the works of British novelist E.M. Forster and the American writer Henry James.
Another source of inspiration for his films has come from “a sense of place.” He mentioned the film “Bombay Talkie” (1970), which he co-wrote with Jhabvala. He said the film was inspired by a large old hotel in Bombay — “I was inspired to make a film there.” Merchant was born in India and Merchant Ivory Productions began life making English language films there.
The film “A Room with a View” (1985), based on a Forster novel, which partly takes place in Florence, Italy, contains myriad shots of the city giving the film a palpable sense of place, which according to Ivory, did not come from an intimacy with the city but involved “learning about it” because although he had spent a lot of time in Italy — his first film was a short documentary of Venice called “Venice: Theme and Variations” (1957) — he never spent any time in Florence.
“I went back and forth between Rome and Venice and never got off the train [in Florence],” he laughed. The film was nominated for eight Academy Awards.
His newest film, “The City of Your Final Destination” (2008), which is slated for release “sometime after the first of the year,” he said, had such a beginning. “Someone came up to me at TSL ... and kind of slipped this book into my pocket,” he said. The novel, by American author Peter Cameron, is set in Uruguay and involves a subject that Merchant Ivory Productions has tackled before —“expats living in some place either happily or unhappily,” said Ivory.
According to Ivory, Merchant was heavily engaged in the pre-production of the newest film. “He was involved in the planning of locations. He optioned the book. He was very much involved in the planning,” he said.
The film, which was shot in Argentina — “They have a well-developed film industry there,” said Ivory — stars Anthony Hopkins, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Laura Linney, Omar Metwally and Hiroyuki Sanada.
Ivory has worked with some of the greatest actors in the movie business during his long career, and said there were few that weren’t up to the challenge but that he thought Ralph Fiennes was “exceptional” in “The White Countess” (2005), a film that was shot in China. “That was one of the most difficult shoots,” he said because it was “long and grueling” and because of the location. Ivory stated that there were five different Chinese dialects spoken on the set, along with English and French. “There was a language problem ... the script had to be translated and retranslated,” said Ivory.
Other actors he considered great in his films include Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward in “Mr. and Mrs. Bridge” (1990), Vanessa Redgrave in the “Bostonians” — “She’s out of this world,” he said — and Emma Thomson and Anthony Hopkins in “The Remains of the Day” (1993).
Ivory was born in Berkeley, Calif., but grew up in Oregon, where he went to school as an undergraduate at the University of Oregon. He later went to the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts where he made the Venice documentary in lieu of a written thesis. The 28- minute film was critically acclaimed.
He purchased the house in Claverack in 1975 after the state of California bought some commercial property he had inherited in San Diego. “They were putting a freeway right across it,” he said. He was paid for the land and in order to avoid paying a capitol gains tax he had to re-invest the money in another commercial property within two years. A friend suggested looking in Columbia County. They bought the house, which was considered commercial property because it had been broken up into apartments. “We lived upstairs,” he said, until they were able to remodel and slowly took over the entire house.
Ivory, who is on the cusp of his 80th year, doesn’t show any sign of flagging energies. “I’m working on several different things,” he said. He has plans for a film in Texas based on a Horton Foote play entitled “The Widow Claire”, as well as a film based on William Shakespeare’s Richard II, “Not Richard III” he pointed out.
Concerning Saturday’s event, he said that he “tweaked the format” and got Terrio to do the interview. “I thought it would be more interesting to have a director, a young director, that we had worked with instead of a film critic or film historian,” said Ivory, adding that film clips of his work would be shown. “It’s up to Chris to decide, but ideally it would be one from our American Period, one from our Indian period, one from our French period and one from our English period,” said the prodigious director.