CraveOnline: Were you hoping to get another crack at a Harry Potter movie before David Yates took over the last four films?
Mike Newell: [Laughs] Wonderfully direct question. Yes. Okay? There’s a wonderfully direct answer, yes.
Was there ever talk at any point that you could have done one of the later films?
No, there wasn’t and I’ll tell you why. It was because the one that I did, number four, was so huge and it took us such a long time. Aside from shooting for months upon months upon months, nearly a year’s shooting, we then had an equally extended post-production period because of all the CG work, because of all the electronic work. By that time, David was actually making the next one. That was the only way that they could keep the whole thing on track, because what they wanted to do was I think they wanted to release one every 12-15 months. If I was to go on, they couldn’t do that. There had to be a gap or they had to bring me back again afterwards and I think by that time, they were rightly very happy with David.
About Time is out now and Richard Curtis has really become a brand. That all stems back to Four Weddings and a Funeral. Did you imagine what sort of a brand his kind of romantic comedy would become?
I think when we started to see the effect it had on the audience, I think it was absolutely possible, yes. I don’t think you can predict that it would be where it is and what it has become, but there was certainly a possibility there. You knew talking to people with what tremendous affection they held the first film, but then it went on from there. My daughter’s favorite film is Love Actually where Hugh plays a prime minister. They became sort of warm, feel good objects, those films. People watched them and each time they watched them, they felt better. It’s the same with Four Weddings.
Four Weddings is actually not about one guy gets one girl, I don’t think. I think Four Weddings is a huge celebration of friendship. No matter who you are, no matter how hopeless you may feel you are personally and your life is, nonetheless you do have friends. Everybody has got at least one friend and this is a film that celebrates the wonder and the joy of friendship. I think that that’s really the nerve that it touched.
Donnie Brasco was a great Johnny Depp performance before he became the worldwide star he is now. What was your experience with him and Al on that movie? I say Al as if I know him personally. And did you see that he had the potential to become the star he is now?
I don’t think you ever know that that is going to be the case because his great transfigure of course was Captain Sparrow, Pirates of the Caribbean. That’s the thing that shifted him. What I knew when I cast him was, I knew two things. One was that Ed Wood made me laugh immoderately. Johnny’s a mimic. He finds somebody who has a series of characteristics that he thinks is suitable for a particular character and he starts to play with those and add them together. It’s like an erector set for him. He found somebody like that and while we were rehearsing, I was pretty convinced that he was going to be terrific. But just as influential was Al when I met him and was talking to him about was I a nice person to make a film with and stuff like that. One of Al’s people said, “Who’s this Johnny Depp?” And Al had no truck with that whatsoever and said immediately and forcefully, “He’s a star.” I took that very much to heart.
Were you hopeful that Prince of Persia could be a sort of Pirates of the Caribbean franchise?
[Laughs] You’re a little sod.
I’m going to leave it in that you called me that.
That’s okay, I don’t mind. It was said affectionately.
I know. I love it.
The answer is yes, of course. You always think at the beginning of these huge madnesses or adventures or whatever that you go through, you always think that this is the one. It’s only at the end of the working life that you look back and you see the ones that were the one. We had a lot of terrific times with Prince of Persia and I longed for it to have that kind of high romantic thrill that great big adventure romances traditionally used to have. You watch these things and you watch them with affection and you say to yourself, “Well, no matter who else, I like that and I like that bit and that bit and that bit.” That’s exactly how I feel about Prince of Persia. It didn’t do badly but as one of my representatives said, “No, it didn’t do badly but it’s not what they wanted.” That’s a straight commercial judgment which is undeniable.
Is your next film the Reagan/Gorbachev summit?
No, I wish it were. No, it’s not. That fell out because of all sorts of things, because of money, because of actor availability, because we were in the middle of a rewrite. These are tiny amount of money. Gobachev/Reagan was going to cost about $16 million and during the rewrite we became aware that it was going to cost about another $1.5 and people did not think that that was viable. So we stopped production and we then simply never started it again. It just went by the wayside. I’m sure that it will get set up. It’s a timeless subject and Michael Douglas was born to play Reagan and Christoph Waltz was born to play Gorbachev, and I’m sure that they will, but sadly not with me.
Do you have your next film?
I know what I’d like. We’re trying to cast it at the moment and when you try and cast a movie, what you’re actually doing is giving the producer ammunition to raise the money. That’s the stage that I am at right now, even this morning, sending e-mails to actors saying, “It would be marvelous if you would be in my film.”
Has that project been announced yet?
No, and I can’t. I’m really sorry. I plain old can’t. I wish I could. It would be good for me if I could but I can’t.
Fred Topel is a staff writer at CraveOnline and the man behind Best Episode Ever and Shelf Space Weekly. Follow him on Twitter at @FredTopel.
