December 4th 2008

Fantastic: have just done the first narrative read-through with Juliet Stevenson for Beethoven. It's been a hectic few weeks - and scripting is all-consuming. But I'm very happy with how things stand. I also am still happy to have (bar one last interview) finished the filming now - finished off, as I mentioned in an earlier blog, in Vienna with Christian Gerhaher and Gerold Huber playing/singing Adelaide and An die ferne Geliebte. Beautiful music and the words (largely though not entirely by coincidence) resonate exactly with Beethoven's biography.

November 12th 2008

Things are going well - I have had meetings with the leading arthouse cinemas of LA, New York and Chicago and all are very excited by Beethoven. At a time when many films, and certainly that includes docs, are getting no cinema screenings at all, it's nice to feel wanted! And we're talking minimum 2, even 4, week runs. The dates are a little bit here and there - some wanting next May/June 09 - others March 2010. I've even been told to have a go at Oscar qualification (which means a minimum of one week in NY and LA) but that seems a little bit fanciful to me. I have also been talking to film & music journalists, music venues, etc, etc, and what is really great is how encouraging they all are. The fact that they know the Mozart film is really helping. Meanwhile, dusk & dawn, the emails fly between my editor in the UK and me. Snip, snip, snip we go and the film pulls ever tighter together. But it's hard now saying goodbye to an interviewee whose last piece may just have gone or even one or two music pieces. The first of the 9 symphonies is under threat - and guess which one? The second. I mentioned this last night to a very charming man from the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and he said 'it's always the second which gets squeezed out!' - and you know what!? That made me determined to keep it in! I am writing this at 4.35am in Chicago airport, en route to New York and a 10am meeting with the Lincoln Centre - so fingers crossed that goes well. (Last time we screened Mozart there, there was a fight outside the cinema because tickets were sold out! I remember thinking 'how awful' and 'great!' at the same time... Well, I've resisted the lure of the brick-sized muffins till now but I'd better eat something; American airlines seem not to serve food anymore. I bet Beethoven would have hated all this travelling.

November 4th 2008

Washington DC. I'm here sorting out the US Fall/Autumn 09 release of In Search of Beethoven and obviously a fascinating time to get here - Obama has been elected and every conversation you overhear is talking about it. I walked down to the White House and they are already constructing the Inauguration Stands - can't be much fun for Bush to look out of his window and see the preparations well under way for his successor. Very gracious speech from McCain in defeat though - something that I see from the press has been noted in countries around the world. In Kenya, for example, a young man was quoted as saying he was moved to see that those who lose an election can accept it with dignity rather than provoking riots. Meanwhile, I suspect getting elected is the easy part for Obama... As my head is so full of Beethoven one can imagine how Ludwig felt when the dashing, energetic Bonaparte took over the reins of France and how disappointed he was when Napoleon (as he renamed himself) crowned himself Emperor. Keep an eye on Obama in case he starts to wear a crown. Didn't Julius Caesar also make the same mistake? I think, though, that Michelle Obama will keep him firmly grounded. I'm also visiting LA, Chicago and New York - working all the time on the script. The first narrative read is in less than a month so every second counts. It's amazing actually how little errors can slip in or interviewees can make tiny mistakes which need to be weeded out - especially in dates. Only one more shoot to do - Bonn & Vienna. Vienna will be a nice end to over two years of filming - I'll be filming two pieces: 'Adelaide' and 'An die ferne Geliebte' - sung by Christian Gerhaher. Interestingly, it's believed 'Adelaide' was the last piece Beethoven performed in public as a pianist. Anyway, first meeting of the day awaits. Bis später....

In Search of Beethoven

A month into the editing now and the beast that is the film IN SEARCH OF BEETHOVEN makes slow but steady process. I remember the rough-cut of IN SEARCH OF MOZART once topped 11 hours - or maybe even more than that - and now Beethoven has hit double figures, edging over ten hours yesterday. It's not my fault! He just wrote so much great music which I have been fortunate enough, after a lot of hard work, to gain access to film - and I have also been lucky enough to have done 40 or 50 interviews with world experts on him and his music. So the challenge is whittling it down, and down again, until it is more like 2 or 3 hours. So far we've had no really tough decisions to make - except for cutting one world famous violinist who simply felt unnecessary. But I tremble at facing choices between symphonies or not being able to keep in all five piano concertos, etc. And I really don't want to only have 20 second clips - ah well, time will tell. It's Saturday today so the office is quiet and I can spend the day snipping away. I shouldn't take the great Michelangelo's name in vain but it feels like his wonderful unfinished slave sculpture- you know there is a work of art in there somewhere but it involves extraordinary precision in working through the marble until the form is fully realised. We'll see...Meanwhile, my days are accompanied by the performance of, among others, Helene Grimaud, Ronald Brautigam, Vadim Repin, Claudio Abbado, Paul Lewis - and so, so many more. Somebody asked me the other day what is my favourite piece and it's impossible to answer - it's the piece I'm working on at that moment. Yesterday we were editing the Missa Solemnis that I filmed in the Musikverrein in Vienna and we were laying the violin solo over an extract of interview from the conductor Fabio Luisi in which he was explaining how the violin playing over the orchestra was written by Beethoven like that to illustrate the Holy Ghost hanging over mankind. I love that kind of insight, explaining what I am seeing and what it means. The World Premiere is now set for 30th March in the Concert Hall in London's Barbican so I have a tight schedule to keep to now. US, Australian, Dutch theatrical releases are also being sorted out so one can feel the pressure ramping up. No-one has tried to make anything as comprehensive as this (just as no-one has made a film as comprehensive about Mozart as IN SEARCH OF MOZART) and I really feel a responsibility to do a good job not just for the screenings and broadcasts we'll have next year but the screenings and broadcasts we'll be having in 10 years. Mind you, one has to wonder what kind of media environment we'll be living in over the next decade: I went to a UK channel's Commissioning Briefing a few days ago and their Editor of Factual announced how delighted she was with a recent production (that had got just under 3 million viewers) - the title? 'The Woman with Giant Legs'. You can see why I can never raise the money to make films like Beethoven! I don't know what's worse - the broadcaster commissioning something like that or 3 million people deciding that was the best way they could spend an hour of their time. Or, indeed, the fact that, in a public forum, you would declare great pride in having shown such a film. Maybe it was ever thus: poor old Ludwig had to put up with the knowledge that the most popular symphony during his life time was his so-called Battle Symphony - all cannons and rousing patriotic tunes. Maybe human nature simply doesn't change and artists just have to deal with that fact and work around it. Anyway, my edit suite awaits - this morning, it's the fantastic Endellion String Quartet and the late quartets...