Some Notes On Polanski

During my initial research on Roman Polanski and his approach to working with actors, I spent some time reading Roman Polanski by F.X Feeney and Paul Duncan. It gave a very detailed insight into the life of Polanski, and in particular an insight into the films that he has directed over his lengthy career. Although I still need to read the entirety of the book, the areas that I read were informative and gave me a bit of an initial idea as to what he is like with the actors on his set.

As I have spoken about in an earlier post, during the production of Chinatown, Polanski and Faye Dunaway had a very tense relationship. As I have highlighted on the scan that I took of the particular section I read, I learnt that there was in fact huge friction between director and actress resulting in them being incredibly vocal about it. As the highlights also show, this could be seen as a result of Polanski's involvement with the character of Evelyn Mulwray, and the perfect ideal that he had of her in his head.

In this sense I have a lot of respect for Polanski and his dedication to the portrayal of Evelyn that he desired and the fact he was willing to allow such friction to happen on set in order for this to be achieved.

It could also be worth noting that he cast Faye Dunaway because of her 'retro beauty' and the fact that she reminded him of his late mother in her younger days. Because of this, I get the distinct feeling that he perhaps cast her based primarily on her appearance, rather than her actual portrayal of the character. This itself may have been one of the main contributions to the animosity which occurred during the production of the film.

I find the scan above especially interesting. Here you can see a photograph of Polanski demonstrating to an actor exactly how to walk with the crutch during a scene. If I remember correctly, during this scene in Chinatown, the character with the crutch is a very minor part, and it is this attention to detail that Polanski enforces in his productions that I strongly admire. It can be seen that he has a very hands on approach to the performances his cast, and seems to want to get the very best out of every single person on set, even the very minor roles.

It is also worthy to note that Polanski himself has done a fair amount of acting, such as starring in his own film The Tenant. Because of his first hand experience at acting in front of a camera, in both major and minor roles, it seems much more credible that he is in a position to show his actors exactly how to behave in front of the camera.

This is something I will take note of whilst directing my own films - pay attention to every detail possible, including very minor details of minor characters in order to achieve something that is all round excellent.

The photo and caption above that I found is that of Polanski talking through a scene with the lead actor of Chinatown, Jack Nicholson. The caption states that Nicholson was allowed to improvise lines within the style of the character Jake Gittes. I think that allowing an actor to improvise lines is a good way of going about things at times, as it can be used to create a more natural flow, with natural conversation and action being a key factor. Whether or not Polanski does this with all his actors I'm not sure of yet at the moment. Maybe he just put his trust into Jack Nicholson, afterall he is without a doubt a brilliant actor.

I've also, out of interest, highlighted that Polanski had a very heated battle with the screenplay writer Robert Towne. It seemed that whilst working on Chinatown, Polanski had quite strained relationships with a lot of the cast and crew, because of the clear final product that he wanted to create. He and Towne argued over the ending of the film, as the original script had a happy ending with Evelyn Mulwray living. Polanski wanted a very hard hitting ending with a the 'good guys' losing out, and eventually got his way. After time, Towne agreed that it is a better ending.

From this I have learnt that determination to get a perfect plot, regardless of how you must go about it, will be worth it in long run. Chinatown afterall, is now widely considered to be one of the best films of all time, and there is no doubt that Polanski had to fight strongly for his vision to be carried through to the end.

Whilst reading the book, I learnt that leading up to the shoot of the Pianist, lead actor Adrien Brody, was asked by Polanski to use method acting to get into to the role of the Holocaust survivor Wladyslaw Szpilman. As a result of this he was put onto a very feeble diet and lost a considerable amount of weight, and also gave up his home and his car to get into the mindset of something with absolutely nothing.

Very dedicated, I must say.