User:Bradley0110/sandbox

For any new page watchers who wonder why I am editing in another editors sandbox please see this item User talk:MarnetteD#Question on my talk page as it contains Bradley0110's okay for this. Thanks MarnetteD | Talk 20:00, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

The Deal DVD commentaries and interview

Hi Bradley0110. So here is the info that I gleaned from the Peter Morgan and Christine Langan commentaries and the Frears interview. I think that you already have most of this in the article but I will post it anyway in case it turns out to be helpful. Thank goodness it was a male and female doing the commentaries since the difference in the voices made it easy to let you know who said what.

One thing I found interesting is that these commentaries were made in '08 and they refer several times to Brown finally having become PM. I wonder what they would say if they had been commenting in '10 after the election?

Writing the script

• Both Frears and Morgan mention Naughties book The Rivals. Morgan says he picked it up at an airport store.
• Frears comments that Morgan enjoys writing the scenes where there isn't an historical record to adhere to so that he and he can guess what went on. He says that the first meeting between Blair and the Queen in The Queen is one of these.
  • Morgan, in a sense, confirms this when he mentions that the scene on Waterloo Bridge where Smith and Brown are eating hot dogs is fabrication and he likes the freedom that writing that kind of scene gives him.
• Morgan says that the sequence (about 15 min into the film) where there is a bit of a montage of how Brown and Blair made a name for themselves was painful to write and he still isn't entirely happy with it.
• Morgan mentions that the film was written and made in the months leading up to the Iraq invasion and that colored his writing about Blair. He states that he would smooth things a bit if he were writing it today.
• Morgan mentions speaking with David Cornwell (John le Carré) who had just reread his book Tinker, Tailor.... Cornwell said that it left him with two distinct and not quite nice feelings. 1)How on earth did I ever write anything like that - It's awful. 2)I'll never write anything as good as that again. Morgan feels that way about this script.
• Frears mentions how impressed Blair had been with the Clinton presidential campaign and that he brought some of those tactics to the Labour Party

Getting Frears to direct

Langan & Morgan say that they talked with several TV directors but didn't find anyone suitable. Langan sent a "Santa wish letter" to Frears and was delighted when he responded that he liked the script. They also mention that Frears was pushing to have the film made in black and white but they talked him out of it.

Michael Sheen

All three mention that he was the actor that they wanted to play Blair. He was appearing in Caligula at the time so they were going to have to wait to start filming. The producers balked at this since he was unknown to them (which just shows that they must not get out much - I had seen him as Robbie Ross in Wilde six years before and thought him a brilliant actor) but they talked them round. Langan also mentions that his Caligula contract restricted them from making any style changes to his hair which is why there are scenes that he does not look as much like Blair as they would have wished. They also mention the day filming so that he could return to The Donmar to perform in the evenings. Morgan & Langan discuss the fact that there was some criticism over the height difference between Sheen and Blair - as though having a short man play the role was a slight to Blair.

David Morrisey

Morgan and Langan state that the producers wanted to cast a Scot. They also state that Morrisey fought for the role and that he showed his commitment by beginning to put on weight even before he was cast. They say that they heard that Brown didn't think that he was as heavy as he was portrayed. Frears states that he heard that Brown was a bit upset with the portrayal of one of his girlfriends.

Production

• All three mention how tight the budget was. They put several of the historical inaccuracies down to the fact that they just didn't have the time or the money to do more. They point out that several of the mistakes in the Granita were down to the fact that the restaurant had new owners who weren't up for changes for filming even if they'd had the money. They also mention that the location isn't even a restaurant anymore.
• Frears mentions that he and the cameramen were impressed with Michal Mann's film The Insider and that they worked to capture the feel and look of that film.
• All three give glowing praise to Adam Curtis for his work with the archival material. They state that he was an invaluable resource in putting together the real news footage that they used. I noticed that his work on The Deal isn't mentioned on his wikipage. If you get a chance you might want to add something about it there.
• They also mention the change of the last title card for the DVD release to allow for Brown having finally become PM (though I didn't know that it was only for the US DVD)

Closing

Well this was fun. I enjoy doing this kind of research. As I said I think that you already have virtually all of this in the article so I don't know if I've been any help. I also worry that you would have pulled something out of these DVD extras that went right by me but there isn't much that can be done about that :-)

One last thing. Now you told me that Susan Tully was the person who was actually in Granitas at the real meeting. In rewatching the film I thought the lady that we see looked marginally (very marginally I grant you) like Patsy Palmer (Bianca Jackson) who made her first appearance in late '93. That sort of fits the films timeline. I guess that we will never know if this was just a generic or specific bit of casting. Cheers and thanks again for letting me be a part of this. MarnetteD | Talk 20:00, 16 August 2010 (UTC)