Cannes, the co-producer Michael Hamlyn and I attempt to steer the conversation towards Rupert Everett, who has become very quiet, studying his possible co-star with what can only be described as anthropological curiosity. When a kind of noncommittal civility represents the zenith of their discussion rather than its nadir, it is manifestly going nowhere. Which, despite the oceans of wine lubricating its course, is precisely where it goes.
After midnight, I walk over to an empty Palais — which in the middle of the night resembles the shell of a Big Top afterthe circus has left town — for the ritual print rehearsal of Frauds, in preparation for its two screenings later that day. Stephan, Grant and I wait inside the stage door until the prosperous-looking entourage which accompanies Much Ado About Noth ing — the day’s main attraction with three screenings — has swished past us and out of the building.
My description of the dinner prompts in Stephan a passable impersonation of being perturbed, but tonight his mind, understandably, is on Frauds, and so for that matter is mine.
*
Thirty-six hours later, nobody is looking their best.
The shrill simulation of unerring self-confidence; the rooms full of colliding random atoms, desperate to be absorbed into a universe; the perpetual exposure to malicious egomaniacs, mean-spirited narcissists and calculator-toting gnomes; the no-taste hustlers who use their lack of imagination as a weapon, their solipsistic soundbites masquerading as conversation, their eyes turning cartwheels as their venal schemes take hold.
All this, particularly when reinforced by alcohol and sleep deprivation, has a corrosive effect on the spirit, but it is the face which shows the evidence. Mine has a light application of Nivea. (When asked how he had retained his youthful appearance over the years of ’70s debauchery, Rod Stewart admitted that after a night’s carousing and womanising he would always put Oil of Ulay on his face before retiring. The image of a drunken satyr in stack heels daintily covering himself with cold cream at bedtime has lingered with me ever since.)
We are recovering from the day of Frauds, which began with an early-morning photo call at a merry-go-round near the Palais and ended, for most, with an all-night party in nearby La Napoule, at which Jason Donovan, wearing a tuxedo and anexpression of total bewilderment, had his photograph taken with a very tall drag queen. (A believer in choosing the moment to end an evening, I decided to draw the curtain when a friend told me she had been approached to produce a thriller in which the villain is a microwave oven. As it was a co-production, she explained, it was considered important to have a bad guy everybody could recognise.)
By now, the word on Frauds is out: it has its supporters, but it is generally not liked by the press, many of whom are alienated by the unapologetic brashness of the direction, and confused by the fact that a film so brightly coloured could also be so black-hearted. Some ganged up against it early in the festival, and the effect on the party-line fence sitters could be felt in advance. Belittling the movie as a lightweight vehicle for its star, they disregarded a first-time director both in command of his medium and taking risks with it: someone they should be championing.
We agree that the walk up the steps of the Palais with the film’s star Phil Collins — the crowd shouting his name and the speaker system blaring Guy Gross’s perfectly deranged score — will remain one of life’s outstanding moments. When one of us says how comical it sounds to hear hundreds of French people screaming ‘ Pheel ! Pheel! ’, the Frenchman in our midst observes, quite rightly, that it is no funnier than hundreds of Americans all mispronouncing Gerard Depardieu’s name (Ge- rarrd! Ge -rarrd ! ) at the US premiere of 1492.
We travel in several taxis, each with its own idiosyncratic way of getting lost, to a
After midnight, I walk over to an empty Palais — which in the middle of the night resembles the shell of a Big Top afterthe circus has left town — for the ritual print rehearsal of Frauds, in preparation for its two screenings later that day. Stephan, Grant and I wait inside the stage door until the prosperous-looking entourage which accompanies Much Ado About Noth ing — the day’s main attraction with three screenings — has swished past us and out of the building.
My description of the dinner prompts in Stephan a passable impersonation of being perturbed, but tonight his mind, understandably, is on Frauds, and so for that matter is mine.
*
Thirty-six hours later, nobody is looking their best.
The shrill simulation of unerring self-confidence; the rooms full of colliding random atoms, desperate to be absorbed into a universe; the perpetual exposure to malicious egomaniacs, mean-spirited narcissists and calculator-toting gnomes; the no-taste hustlers who use their lack of imagination as a weapon, their solipsistic soundbites masquerading as conversation, their eyes turning cartwheels as their venal schemes take hold.
All this, particularly when reinforced by alcohol and sleep deprivation, has a corrosive effect on the spirit, but it is the face which shows the evidence. Mine has a light application of Nivea. (When asked how he had retained his youthful appearance over the years of ’70s debauchery, Rod Stewart admitted that after a night’s carousing and womanising he would always put Oil of Ulay on his face before retiring. The image of a drunken satyr in stack heels daintily covering himself with cold cream at bedtime has lingered with me ever since.)
We are recovering from the day of Frauds, which began with an early-morning photo call at a merry-go-round near the Palais and ended, for most, with an all-night party in nearby La Napoule, at which Jason Donovan, wearing a tuxedo and anexpression of total bewilderment, had his photograph taken with a very tall drag queen. (A believer in choosing the moment to end an evening, I decided to draw the curtain when a friend told me she had been approached to produce a thriller in which the villain is a microwave oven. As it was a co-production, she explained, it was considered important to have a bad guy everybody could recognise.)
By now, the word on Frauds is out: it has its supporters, but it is generally not liked by the press, many of whom are alienated by the unapologetic brashness of the direction, and confused by the fact that a film so brightly coloured could also be so black-hearted. Some ganged up against it early in the festival, and the effect on the party-line fence sitters could be felt in advance. Belittling the movie as a lightweight vehicle for its star, they disregarded a first-time director both in command of his medium and taking risks with it: someone they should be championing.
We agree that the walk up the steps of the Palais with the film’s star Phil Collins — the crowd shouting his name and the speaker system blaring Guy Gross’s perfectly deranged score — will remain one of life’s outstanding moments. When one of us says how comical it sounds to hear hundreds of French people screaming ‘ Pheel ! Pheel! ’, the Frenchman in our midst observes, quite rightly, that it is no funnier than hundreds of Americans all mispronouncing Gerard Depardieu’s name (Ge- rarrd! Ge -rarrd ! ) at the US premiere of 1492.
We travel in several taxis, each with its own idiosyncratic way of getting lost, to a
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