Julian Fellowes, creator of Downton Abbey, says mini-series will tell previously ignored story of crew and second-class passengers
Julian Fellowes is planning to use his forthcoming television drama on the sinking of the Titanic to tell the stories of the "forgotten" people of the tragedy ? the second-class passengers and crew ignored in previous film portrayals.
Filming of the four-part mini-series, which will be shown on ITV, is due to begin on 9 May, with a cast including Linus Roache, Celia Imrie and Toby Jones. In an interview with the Observer, Fellowes declared that he intended to produce the most comprehensive view yet of life aboard the doomed liner.
"In all previous films, the emphasis has been on the first-class and steerage," he said. "We have a very strong storyline about second-class, the forgotten bit in the sandwich. We actually get to know some boilermen, Italian waiters and ordinary crewmen. On television, you've got space to develop them all."
Fellowes's television hit Downton Abbey opened with a reference to the sinking of the Titanic. His new project reflects an enduring fascination with Britain in the years leading up to 1914. Life on the ship will be presented, he says, as the "world before the first world war in miniature ? so secure, calm and proud. The Titanic was an extraordinary encapsulation of that world before the first world war ? that was about to hit the iceberg from which so much change would come. It seemed strange that, with such a perennially fascinating subject, nothing was being done to mark its centenary."
Fellowes's Titanic seems likely to resemble Downton Abbey transplanted on to a luxury liner. "We wanted to present a rounded version of life aboard ship and emphasise its parallel with the life being lived on dry land at that time."
The 1912 Titanic disaster, in which 1,500 people died, has been the subject of more than a dozen films. James Cameron's 1997 Titanic, with Leonardo DiCaprio as a steerage-class traveller and Kate Winslet as the privileged upper-class woman he falls in love with, won 11 Oscars and made a then record �1.12bn (Cameron's 2009 film Avatar subsequently outperformed it). An exhibition at the O2 in London, which runs until 31 July, has been seen by more than 22 million people worldwide in 17 years. Fellowes was inspired by some of the thousands of poignant possessions recovered from the seabed. "You suddenly get such a flash of real men, real women, real children, all [going across] the ocean for their different reasons. Looking at [these objects], their death is all the more moving."
The mini-series will not seek to equal Cameron's special effects, Fellowes said. "So it is a more human look at the picture. One of the great advantages of television is that you have much more time. You can develop these other characters that would probably be [condensed] ? and discarded if you were having to fit into the 100-minute format."
Bravery, courage and bad behaviour, he says, were demonstrated by members of each of the classes on board: "Some people are tremendously heroic and some people are not. That was as true in first as in second, as in steerage." But he added that the officers "were a pretty admirable bunch on the whole".
The first film of the disaster, Saved From the Titanic, was made within weeks of the sinking. It starred Dorothy Gibson, a film actress who was on board and lived to tell the tale. Fellowes has made Gibson a character in his film, played by Sophie Winkleman. Other figures include Charles Lightoller, the most senior officer to survive, and the Allison family, who have been the subject of controversial portrayals in the past. Their story formed part of a 1996 TV mini-series. One of the most notable Titanic films is A Night to Remember, directed by Roy Ward Baker in 1958 and starring Kenneth More as Lightoller. Fellowes says Baker's film is "essentially the story of the officers", while Cameron's film was primarily a love story between fictional characters. "He [Cameron] had some real people, but his principal narrative was the story of the love affair."
Will Fellowes's Titanic offer any lessons for the present? "It's about any period that thinks it's cock-of-the-walk and that there is nothing to challenge its civilisation," he said. "When you're talking of Rome or Stalinist Russia, pride cometh before a fall. So there's a permanent parallel."
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/apr/24/titanic-julian-fellowes-itv-miniseries
Spending review 2010 Financial crisis Paul Myners Fulham Twilight Snowboarding
No comments:
Post a Comment