American literary history as told by an all-star cast.
Genius is a film about the titan of American literature, Thomas Wolfe (Jude Law). Genius is also about another titan of American literature, the Scribner’s editor Maxwell Perkins (Colin Firth), a man who edited and published Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Wolfe. Perkins, on the other hand, was an important figure who worked behind the scenes, as editors do. The cast is rounded out by Laura Linney and Nicole Kidman, who play Louise Perkins and Aline Bernstein, respectively.
The meat of the plot of Genius is the relationship between Wolfe and Perkins from the moment that Perkins is first presented with Wolfe’s manuscript for his novel Look Homeward, Angel, originally titled ‘O Lost’, to Wolfe’s untimely death in 1938. Considering that the film is mostly about the very technical process of book editing and the relationship between author and editor, it would have been easy for director Michael Grandage and screenwriter John Logan to end up with a very non-dramatic film. Instead, Logan and Grandage rose to the challenge and chose to do everything they could to highlight and shade extra dramas into the lives of Perkins and Wolfe. A side consequence of this dramatization of book editing is a sense that several scenes feel a little overdramatic. Some moments feel as though they’ve been exaggerated a little too much.
However, the superb screenplay by John Logan, based on Scott Berg’s autobiography, and the absolutely stellar performances of the four leads salvage the film and make it into something impressive. One of the stronger scenes is one in which Perkins and Wolfe stand on the roof of Wolfe’s former apartment building, and Wolfe worries that his writing is frivolous in the tragedy of the Great Depression. Perkins responds by telling him he is not frivolous, and that in fact, people need writing more than ever so that they will be reminded that they are not alone in the dark and that they shouldn’t be afraid. Firth delivers this line with such flawless emotional candor and subtlety that nothing about the moment feels overwrought, despite the sentimentality of the words themselves. There are other scenes like this, scenes in which the bare bones of the script by itself have the potential to be overly sentimental or melodramatic, but the scene ends up coming off with the utmost sincerity due to the beauty of the performances. Every scene in which Nicole Kidman appears is like this. Kidman becomes the unlikely star of the film, and one cannot help walking away and feeling that they would’ve like to see more of her.
Genius is directed by Michael Grandage and written by John Logan. It stars Colin Firth, Jude Law, Nicole Kidman, and Laura Linney.
We screened the film at the New York premiere at MoMA. It was presented by Johnnie Walker. A party followed at Monkey Bar.
Read what Grandage and Linney told us on the red carpet:
How much of Thomas Wolfe’s work did you read?
Michael Grandage: Oh, all of it! But it’s only two novels, remember. It’s two novels, but it’s like fifty novels because it’s huge! I read both his huge novels and he wrote some short stories, but I felt I couldn’t really do it without reading the lot.
How much of that material did you pull on to make the film?
Grandage: Logan hasn’t pulled any specifically in there from either of the books because he’s created his own Wolfe work in the books. But what is in – the letters, which is the best bit of reference for us. The way the personalities write to each other and how much is available for understanding them. So actually it was the letters in the end that helped me and the actors create the roles.
I heard you talk about the process of dramatizing book editing, a very non-dramatic process. Can you talk more about how you and John Logan did that?
Grandage: Well he does something on the page for us, but we have to make editing a book exciting somehow. Or at least watchable and believable. And I think there is something in there that Logan does help with, which is he does it through the personalities. So from that point of view it’s about getting to know the men first rather than the action.
How close do you think these characters in the film are to the actual historic Max Perkins and Thomas Wolfe?
Grandage: God knows, ‘cause I never met them! We’ve got plenty of photographic evidence and they look a bit like them, but I’ve no idea how close they are. Although interestingly enough, some of the grandchildren of Perkins are around. They didn’t know him either because he was dead before they grew up. I’ve no idea, but we’ve tried hard to be true to what we know of them through print.
What was it like directing your first film?
Grandage: Scary at times. Awesome. Also very, very exciting because I was very out of my comfort zone, and I think that’s a wonderful thing to be. I say to everybody, ‘you should get out of your comfort zone a little more often, it’s a really interesting place to be!’
Was it a different experience to direct some of these same actors in a film?
Grandage: No, getting the performance out is roughly the same. That’s the same skill, I think, between actor and director.
I heard you talking about how you enjoyed dipping into a literary world. Do you have particular American authors whom you admire?
Laura Linney: Steinbeck. I love John Steinbeck. And Thomas Wolfe, and Fitzgerald, and all the writers Maxwell Perkins represented actually.
Is that a love that you had before coming to this film?
Linney: It is. My father is a playwright so I grew up in a literary household, and I was in school for a very long time, so I do enjoy reading.
Did that help you with your character?
Linney: Oh I’m sure it did. And also, the character that I played reminded me a great deal of my grandmother. A typical woman of the time who had great talent but wasn’t able to, you know, because of mores of the time, wasn’t allowed to explore them.
Was it difficult trying to put your mindset back into a time period that was more conservative for women?
Linney: No, because I’m old enough to remember it. Someone from my generation had role models who lived through all of that. We’re right in the middle. My age group is kind of right in the middle now.
How closely did you work with the historical material? How much were you able to find?
Linney: Well the whole movie is based on an autobiography by Scott Berg, who’s here actually, about Maxwell Perkins. So that was our primary reference and resource.
And how much was in there about his wife?
Linney: A little bit. And then you try and find whatever you can. There’s not an enormous amount on her, but there’s some things.
I bet there’s not as much, maybe, as you would have liked.
Linney: No, probably not. And then you just take your cue. I mean, it is a movie, so you have to fulfill the obligations that the script is sort of laying out for you, so there’s always also that.
Do you have anything else that you’re working on right now?
Linney: Nocturnal Animals is coming out soon, Sully is coming out soon. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles came out this weekend! And then there are a few other things, but I’m not quite at the point that I can talk about them.
Photo credits: Variety.