When British actor Peter Howitt (In the Name of the Father)
decided to write and direct his first film, he started off on
the right foot--penning a highly original romantic fantasy and
landing fresh-face-of-the-day Gwyneth Paltrow for the lead role.
Paltrow plays Helen, a British advertising exec, who leaves her
hectic job one day for home. In a seemingly meaningless but crucial
turn of fate, Helen misses her subway train. But what if she hadn't
missed her train? Sliding Doors posits the question and
explores the possibilities with two different, contiguous storylines--one
in which Helen made her train, one in which she missed it. From
this unique premise develops two romantic comedies. In the first,
Helen remains with her philandering boyfriend (John Lynch). In
the second, she leaves him to explore the romantic possibilities
of a kindly stranger (John Hannah). Weekly Alibi recently
had the opportunity to chat with Howitt following his film's successful
debut at the Sundance Film Festival.
This is a very original concept for a film. How did you fall
into the idea?
The idea came to me one day about six years ago. I was walking
down the street in London on my way home. There was a phone call
I needed to make, and I was going to do it when I got home. As
I was walking down toward the tube station, I saw a phone booth
on the other side of the road. I just thought, maybe I should
make my phone call now. ... Then I thought, no, no, no, I'll be
OK. I'll phone him when I get home. ... (I went) back and forth,
back and forth. Suddenly I decided, yeah, the hell with it, I'll
call him now. I walked out into the road to cross to the phone
box, and I nearly got hit by a car! The guy was looking where
he was going thankfully and didn't hit me, but I suddenly thought,
what if it had hit me? And something fatal had happened to me
simply because I decided to make a phone call now rather than
later? It really scared me. ... If I'd have decided to carry on
walking home, I could be OK, but just by deciding to cross the
street now, I could be dead. ... I thought, well what is the domino
effect? What's the difference to my day going to be? ... I already
don't know what happened to the version of me, if you like,
that decided to go home and make my phone call. Where is he? Is
he down at the train? Or did he fall under the train? Maybe I
got saved because somebody would have pushed me under the train.
Maybe I'd be dead there. I don't know. ... What about the people
who miss trains or buses, or just catch them, every day of their
lives and don't know what the domino effect of it going the other
way would be? You know, if I hadn't walked out in the street six
years ago in London, I wouldn't be talking to you on the phone
now. I don't know where I'd be. I wouldn't have had the idea for
the film and been to the Sundance Film Festival.
Was it difficult juggling two different storylines at the same
time while shooting the film?
It actually wasn't, funny enough. I think probably the reason
why it wasn't is because it took three years to get the script
right--about 20 drafts. By the time we started shooting it, we
felt pretty confident that the story was working. So when we got
on the set, we just dealt with each scene as it was, what was
happening in that scene, and didn't start thinking about how this
scene fit into the next scene, into this storyline, into that
storyline.
You mentioned that it took several years to get this project
underway. Was it a real turning point when Sydney Pollock (Out
of Africa, Tootsie) came on board as producer?
Only a bit. (Chuckles.) Just a tiny, tiny turning point,
yeah. No, it was the turning point. We'd pretty much given
up hope of ever getting the money. So many people read it in London
and said, "You know, it's obviously a very fascinating idea,
good script, funny and all that. But we're just not gonna take
the risk. How are you going to pull it off? You've never made
a film before." And I kind of didn't have an answer. "Well,
obviously not with you, I'm not, 'cause you're not gonna give
me the money." I thought, maybe it's just too complicated;
people won't take the quantum leap of faith. And Sydney seemed
quite happy to do that.
About half the cast is British and half is American. Was that
a conscious decision?
It's just the way it turned out, I think. I didn't make any of
those decisions for any particular reason. I thought it would
be an interesting, eclectic mix. They were all meant to be British
characters. But when Gwyneth read it and said she wanted to be
in it, that sort of took care of that--because you don't turn
Gwyneth Paltrow down if she says she likes your script! I knew
she did a great English accent, because I'd seen Emma.
So I thought she was a great asset. Jeanne Tripplehorn I'd met
in Los Angeles, socially, and we got on really well. I just picked
up the phone one day and said, "... How do you feel about
playing Lydia in the film?" She didn't hesitate, she said,
"Love to! Can I do it in English?" We had a discussion
about that, thought maybe it'd be better not to have two Americans
doing English accents. We agreed it would be better to make her
an American character. So I adapted the role slightly. ... John
Hanna had actually been attached to the project for two or three
years. And John Lynch, we sent him the script, and he responded
to it. And off we went. So we've actually got two Americans, two
Irish and one Scottish. So it really is like the Englishman, the
Irishman and the Scotsman; it's like an old joke.
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