Hello everyone... Nina here to present another installment of "Across the Pond," Dominique Taylor's semi-regular column focusing on the UK entertainment scene. This week, Dominique is fresh from the preview of The History Boys, where she had a chance to meet the director and the titular "boys".
A+ for The History Boys
By Dominique Taylor
The momentum created by Alan Bennett’s production, The History Boys, doesn’t seem to have stopped since its West End and Broadway success and has sky-rocketed since the release date of the film version draws ever closer. Prince Charles attended the premiere last week and since then, it has received rave reviews from every publication going. I was lucky enough to attend a preview of the film and a Q&A session with director Nicholas Hytner and the eight history boys, who were involved in both the stage production and the film, and I have to say, I could not help but join the ride.
Made on a budget of just £2million, the film is set to a backdrop of 80’s Thatcherite Britain and focuses on eight Yorkshire grammar school boys as they prepare for Oxbridge entrance exams. This enables Bennett to raise hot topics such as homosexuality, education, social equality and the old chestnut, coming of age, but also to focus more readily on the issue of identity, an area in which teachers and students alike appear to struggle. And all this is done with a splattering of wit and a sort of sad, sympathetic humour. As Nicholas Hytner said when asked about his reasons for making a film version: “People actually become interested in the lives of these characters. The writing is so good, you want to know them.”
And I have to agree. While watching, I could not help but care for every character on screen, a feeling largely helped not only by the writing, but by the performances of the boys who clearly knew their characters inside and out. James Corden, who plays Timms (one of the eight boys), hints that this was not just good acting: “Some of the boys’ parts just had boy one, boy two, boy three next to them and Alan [Bennett] just went away and filled in the parts and made characters that were exactly like us when we were at school after just having a two minute conversation with us. It was great”
There are also a couple of film veterans that add to the performance, Frances De La Tour (of Harry Potter Fame) and Richard Griffiths, play teachers Mrs. Lintott and Hector with ease, making the film not just about the eight boys in its title, but also the struggles and strains of their educators. Knowing eyebrows will be raised by teachers throughout the cinema at Hector bemoaning wasting his life in this ‘shithole’.
The thing is, there are so many experiences we can sympathise with in this film. First off, we’ve all been to school. Then, if anyone has attempted to enter a swish university, you’ll know what a bugger that is. Then there’s the whole virginity-losing thing, and the list could go on. Yet again Bennett has managed to hit on our shared consciousness with precision, creating laughs and shrieks and leaving his audience with warm satisfaction.
Finally, a few words on the music. Opening with New Order, swiftly moving to The Smiths and including The Clash, I was not disappointed. This is the 80’s without the hairspray (well, apart from Morrisey), it’s got grime, it’s got dreariness and it’s steeped in reality. Nicholas Hytner set out to make a movie that was true, not glossy and he’s achieved just that.
Release dates.
UK: 13 October.
US: 21 November.
Go and see it. This is screenwriting at its best.
