Just a few of Phil's recent flights....

Monday 19th March - Whistle-stop tour of New Zealand

Phew, well that was a whistle-stop…New Zealand done and dusted.


At least on this trip (unlike my previous two) I got to see a little bit more than Auckland and Wellington. Straight from the plane to the first screening of Haydn and then pretty much non-stop for the next 3 days. I drove about two hours out of Auckland for a couple of small-town screenings. They have a lot of hundred-year-old cinemas that have to work hard to survive and often choose the option of dividing the cinema from one screen to 5 or 6. It’s obviously not as attractive but makes much more sense and offer far more choice to the local community. They obviously have a great love of movies – often the cinemas have dozens and dozens of old posters up – and they have to hope they continue to get good ones to drag people in from the street or away from their TVs.

I was lucky to have a lot of sun and both the towns and countryside were lovely but that didnt lend itself to getting massive crowds. Mind you, I can see why families get in their camper vans and take off. I’d always thought NZ was supposed to be very English – old-style England – but I didn’t really sense that. It seemed to have a sense of itself – not a pastiche of the UK or Australia. As for the screenings, well I conclude that neither I nor my distributor had done enough to publicise them. I’ve been endlessly hustling and emailing for six months but it still wasn’t enough. One or two key press interviewers weren’t contacted, no social media really happened to music groups, etc and there were one or two NZ acquaintances that I simply didn’t get time to contact. I did at least manage a short walk talking to a Kiwi telling me about local history and the Maori. Notably too, everyone half-jokes and half-worries that they are sitting on big volcanoes…..

Back to work, and half-full cinemas again…though the reaction was very strong and positive. Lots of people saying they are going to tell their friends – let’s see. You really can’t be half-hearted about putting a film in the cinema – it’s full on. The last night in Auckland we had a double-feature of The Boy who Plays and The Boy Mir. That was very well attended and the cinema decided on the spot to keep the Boy Mir film on for at least a week. We’ll actually open it across the country though in mid-May. That’s when we’ll target the press for.

Anyway, time flew…I have no idea what’s happening in the world although I did manage (via Skype and my wife’s iPad) to have dinner with my family and parents (on Mother’s day in the UK). I’m not sure my 90-year-old ma has ever talked to anyone over Skype before – my, the world has moved on.

And talking of moving on…I’m now on a plane for a 13-hour flight to Los Angeles.

Grand Rapids, Michigan

The problem with changing hotels in America every night…

• you forget your room number
• you forget where the bathroom is in the night
• you spend ages connecting to the wi-fi
• you waste time trying to find ONE DECENT programme on the TV
• you give up trying to follow world events
• you long for an Italian cappuccino
• you long for bread, butter, eggs, bacon, orange juice that taste natural
• you give up trying to open a window

BUT
• you sleep really well on big comfortable beds
• the staff are friendly
• there is free parking
• there are lots of towels, hangers, soaps, etc
• the wi-fi is free

Flying in America.

It is always ‘for Operational Reasons’ that has me bounding down endless corridors to get to a revised Gate in time. You book a flight, they cancel it – you run. I had 8 minutes today at Washington Dulles to get from check-in to Gate B73 – and that included passport, security, train ride and the 100 metre sprint… I guess Operational Reasons means they didn’t sell enough tickets. If I missed it, I had three hours to wait and I’d miss the start of tonight’s screening. Luckily I made it on board and it was fine though a shame I had to go via Dallas to get to Kansas. Makes for a long trip. But this country is huge and I do wonder if it really is worth having these screenings and doing these Q&As when I’ll only ever scratch the surface here. On the other hand, every day I get exciting emails with requests and offers so maybe there’s a rhyme to the reason. And the occasional jogs through airline terminals keep me a wee bit fitter…. LATER SAME DAY…OK, so I arrive in Dallas and wander through the very busy airport (lots of soldiers) and get to the gate only to be told the plane is undergoing a technical inspection…the delay is …three hours. Eventually we take off. The flight is note-worthy for being served the worst coffee ever. To cap things off, at Kansas airport, they tell me they have lost my bag! I have to wait (a short while) until the next plane. I finally get to the hotel and the electronics on the doors are bust so I can’t get into any of the rooms…Man-o-Man. One hour after the film has started, I arrive at the cinema. I’m very apologetic but the very nice manager is all smiles: ‘we are 100% full, not a spare seat. We’ve had some many phone calls we’re extending by five days’. Somehow that makes it all worthwhile….

On a voyage of Discovery

He started, so they say, from his garage. He mortgaged his house and then bought documentaries for $1000 /each. A ridiculously low figure 20 years ago – now so common. He felt that Americans wanted to know more about the roots – that, unlike their parents, the new generation was interested in the ‘old countries’. His name was John Hendricks and he started the Discovery Channel. Today, many years later, in a wet, miserable Silver Spring towards the end of the Washington DC Metro line, I stood at the doors of a huge office block holding the many Discovery Channel families. John I expect was enjoying his multi-million dollar wealth somewhere. I’ve made many films for them but that was back in the day when they wanted decent history shows rather than reality shows about deep sea fishermen, gold pan-handlers or whatever. TV has changed almost beyond recognition in two decades and Discovery has been a part of that – part the cause and part the effect. Like so many big institutions it has always come down to individuals. My friend there is one of the good guys – smart, hard-working, passionately interested in the world. Yet even he (a high up exec) feels the jelly under his feet of job insecurity. VPs and CEOs come and go – familiar names swop between Discovery, A&E, BBC and others. The impact, the value, of programmes become secondary to audience numbers. The audience wants blood, give them blood. Julius Caesar had this worked out two thousand years ago when he flooded arenas for sea battles, brought in wild animals from Africa to fight gladiators and so on. But you know what? No kid wants to go the theatre but take them to see Romeo and Juliet and they’ll want to go back. Take them to see Marriage of Figaro and they’ll want to see The Magic Flute. So, I say to my buddy at Discovery, hang in there, they need you!

An Incident

There were two doors – an In and an Out. They were clearly marked. The Out had that familiar red circle with a white line. I couldn’t miss it. Big official building on Capitol Hill, central Washington DC. Very Roman – all big walls and columns. Police cars and blocked-off roads. A city in fear of terrorist attack. Two doors and I was there for a TV interview about war in Afghanistan, poverty & education in Afghanistan, a young boy’s life in Afghanistan. Someone came out of the Out door and while it slowly closed I nipped in. ‘Other door, sir!’ A large man in a crisp blue shirt with official letters across the chest as well as keys and phones and maybe even a gun. ‘Other door’. ‘So sorry’, I said and started to walk to the desk. ‘Out of the Out door, and come back in the In door’. ‘You’re joking’, I said, knowing he wasn’t. ‘You want me to go out that door and come back in the one next to it?!’ ‘That, sir, is what you will do’. Another crisp blue shirt took up position behind me. And another gazed my way, aware of a slight disturbance and eager to somehow participate. Now some things wash over me; I don’t care. But this kind of petty nonsense always winds me up. ‘That, sir, is the height of stupid-ness!’ I decided in a split second not to say ‘stupidity’ as ‘stupid-ness’ sounded more appropriate. ‘That door sir is the way in’. I saw the producer of my interview plead with her eyes for me to swallow my indignation and retrace my clearly all-too-vital steps. I did, laughing out loud to show I had the moral high ground. The man who was there to provide security had, in his incredibly small way, done quite the opposite. Crisp blue shirts no longer suggest order and calm; they now say to me needlessly aggressive, short-sighted and stupid. Then I talked on TV about the war in Afghanistan.

DAY 12 SATURDAY 3rd OCTOBER, LOS ANGELES, USA

Busy day…an interview in the hotel with the biggest radio station in LA and apparently the biggest metropolitan radio station in the USA. I’d have tidied my hotel room if I’d have known that’s where he wanted to conduct the interview… Then rushed off for lunch with a local distributor. Mitchell Block is a stalwart of the documentary world and knows that world inside out. He’s been involved in many Oscar-winning docs but the world is changing, has changed, and it doesn’t get any easier for him. He distributes a series of mine called The Great Commanders, which I made almost 15 years ago, so I hope he continues to find success. I then went straight from lunch to a screening of the film at the George Lucas building at the University of Southern California. A new building that cost millions (did someone say $140m?) at & for the school of cinematic arts. Wow. Mind you I spoke to one student studying animation – her three year course would leave her $200,000 in debt! Anyway, a well-attended screening; half students and half opera-goers who regularly come to the cinema for Live from the Met screenings. Then a quick dash back to West Hollywood to meet a fine critic Jules Brenner. He used to be a camera operator and has some fine stories to tell of the old Hollywood – an Hollywood that is probably long-dead. Barely had time to finish eating before dashing to the cinema. Bit disappointed again that audience stubbornly sits at 50 or 60 – in a 250-seater. I can only hope for word-of-mouth but I’m not sure I have reason to be confident. The last show wasn’t any busier either – though, as always, the audience were extremely enthusiastic for the film. I’d rather that than a full house of slightly bored or disappointed punters.

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...

Latest Film: Escape from Luanda

4^th May 2007

With May only just beginning we have one production commencing, one coming to an end, one touring cinemas, another entering festivals and a couple seeking funding – what a busy month we have ahead!

Escape from Luanda – the end, or should I say beginning, is now in sight. Next week I will be travelling back and forth to London for the final online edit. Then it will be full steam ahead as we crack on with festival entries and the planning of our premiere, watch this space…

Tuesday 2^nd May we held a private screening of Heavy Water: a film for Chernobyl at the Tate Modern’s Starr Auditorium – a great venue for any of you who are yet to go there. Tim Marlow asked David Bickerstaff and I about our experiences of Chernobyl and future plans for the film. A thank you to all those that sacrificed half of the Chelsea – Liverpool match to join us; we even managed to catch the crucial penalties afterwards. David recently visited Gdansk in Poland for a similar screening, and on May 21^st we have a screening as part of the Brighton Festival, this time a chance to hear a Q & A afterwards with David, Mario the poet and myself – there are a few tickets left.

In Search of Mozart continues to be a big success in the USA & Canada, with cinemas booking extra dates to keep up with the demand – now covering at least 20 different cities and cinemas. Almost everyday I hear of a new screening or a new newspaper review, in fact just yesterday I was sent a link to a podcast from an interview I did with a journalist. Mozart (you really have to be careful what you say – as all of a sudden it’s on the internet as a podcast!)

Finally, the follow-up to The Boy is well under way with another trip to Afghanistan under our belt; we have now edited together a pilot with which we’re trying to pull together enough funds to enable the final shoot to happen and the expensive post-production stages. The Boy who Plays on the Buddhas of Bamiyan continues to be a success with DVDs selling well and new screenings being arranged all the time.