STEPHAN ELLIOTT INTERVIEW | EASY VIRTUE | FOR ART'S SAKE | DONNE TEMPO
Easy Virture - Director Stephan Elliott
By Christian TotoReworking a classic play on screen, let alone one by the legendary Noel Coward, would seem a daunting task for any filmmaker.
Director Stephan Elliott did it all the same, transforming Coward’s 1924 play “Easy Virtue” into a forward-thinking romp starring Jessica Biel.
But Coward, who was in his early 20s when he wrote “Virtue,” likely wouldn’t mind the tweaks Elliott and co-screenwriter Sheridan Jobbins added to the text.
“He said he didn’t want his work to be museum pieces. That was my license,” Elliott says
That’s putting it mildly, giving actress Kristin Scott Thomas some meaty moments as Barnes’ tut-tutting mum.
Elliott (”The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert”) says Coward may not have been “Coward” at the time he wrote “Virtue,” but it still took him and Jobbins three years to “match the stuff” while keeping roughly 30 percent of his original zingers.
“You can’t show fear in the face of that,” adds Jobbins.
And “Easy Virtue” is hardly a work of cowardice. The film boasts a bouncy soundtrack peppered by reworked versions of “Car Wash” and “Sex Bomb.”
“It’s a gamble. I’m not gonna lie,” Elliott says. His production team originally created a more traditional soundtrack, sticking to Cole Porter classics, but he felt something was lacking.
“We wanted to rock ‘n’ roll it up a little bit. We know you’re grandma will want to see this. I want to tell my kids to see this,” he says.
“We wanted to be shocking,” Jobbins says.
Elliott scored an early hit with "Priscilla" back in 1994.
The movie business hasn’t been kind to him since then. His 1999 film “Eye of the Beholder” “bankrupted” him, he says.
But that was nothing compared to the 2004 skiing accident which nearly killed him.
The brush with death put his film woes in perspective.
“After learning how to walk again I said, ‘I can get through anything,“ Elliott says. “Now, I have a real sense of urgency. I move very, very fast. I‘m not frightened of cracking the whip now.”
“Easy Virtue,” his first film made since the accident, found him in familiar territory. Promises were made - and not kept, he says.
“We had no time, no money,” he says, adding all the actors didn’t arrive on the set until the ninth day of shooting. “Here we go again.”
But the joy of making movies made up for the usual complications. He recalls shooting the film‘s fox hunt scene, he says, “and a little smile crept over my face. This is really cool.”
The struggle to make films today extends to the marketing of the finished product.
Jobbins says they had little control over how the film was disseminated.
“The blurb, the taglines. It’s different in every country,” Jobbins says. “Easy Virtue” ended up with 19 separate posters meant to lure audiences into theaters to see it.
Elliott and Jobbins hope younger audiences give “Easy Virtue” a chance, in part because they did all they could to shake up the creakiest of genres - the period picture.
And, Jobbins argues, the film has plenty to say to modern audiences despite its ‘20s era setting.
“It’s about being true to yourself and true to your own nature,” she says.
