Lauren Ambrose & Nicholas Sparks – Deliverance Creek

By starrymag | September 8, 2014

Q) Nicholas, how hands on were you with the performances and the look of this movie?

Nicholas: Oh, a lot of my work is primary done on the front end with really script development.  I’ve been around film long enough to know that when you’re working with someone like Lauren who is a consummate professional, she knows how to do it and you work with (Jon Errs) my best role is to kind of stand back and let them work together to bring the characters to life because in the end it is Lauren who is going to bring Belle to life.  So I’m there but I generally don’t involve myself and “ let me give Lauren some tips on acting.” Because what on earth did I offer her, right?  I mean this is not something that I generally do.  At the same time I don’t do that with the director but when you’re talking about the themes, the kind of movement, what general emotions are we trying to build throughout the script.  A lot of that work is done upfront with the writer and the director and so that’s generally how we do it and then you sit back and let them bring it to life.  It’s just something that I have learned over time that works fast is the whole theory of too many cooks in the kitchen can spoil the broth.  And I don’t want to be that cook.

Q) Lauren, Belle has a lot of grit and passion.  Was there anything you’d like to the role that wasn’t originally scripted for you?

Lauren: I don’t know. When you start flushing things out everybody’s ideas go in.  So I don’t know – I don’t know exactly what it ended up being but I live out in the woods myself.  So I was able to bring my pioneer spirit.  And, yes, I don’t know.  Drop on a lot of personal things of course but of course, what made me want to do this part, so much was the script being so beautiful and this character such as wonderful, lovely, flawed, strong complicated woman.  So I mean I really I just revert to the script.

Q) Nicholas, this is your first ever project for TV. With that said, what challenges did you encounter versus working on a movie?

Nicholas: Well like working on a novel is very solitary and I get to be the boss.  I’m the dictator.  So I win every battle.  So in that sense novels are easier because you don’t have to answer to any one.  And then you go into something like film there is more cooks in the kitchen so to speak.  You have the studio.  You have directors and so television is a little bit more like film.  So I’ve got a number of films.  I’ve been around this. I think the biggest challenge is just getting the script right, the way that you want this script to be.  It’s really capture the complexity of emotions, to create the kind of characters that people will want to watch every week and then of course the next part is you have to find actors who have the ability to display a wide range of emotion effectively and then it’s so much harder than it seems and that’s why we were so thrilled to get Lauren on board because she showed this fabulous range whether somewhat angry or in love or sad or in deep mourning or frustrated or angry. She was able to bring all of these emotions to life.  So you try to get the script right, you try to get the director who also shares that vision and then you try to find the actress and each one of those parts has their own specific challenge because you deal with different people and they all have different ideas.  So the challenge is different than writing a novel.  It’s just different.  It’s not I haven’t necessarily gone through before.

Q) Lauren, I enjoyed so much by your character that she is a strong woman taking care of her family. Is that something that attracted you to develop her strong independent nature?

Lauren: Absolutely.  Absolutely. When I read this script, I really couldn’t believe the complexity of the character and just what I would get to do playing this part and what she does, this journey she goes on and she is easily flawed.  She is a very complicated.  She is devoted to her family.  She can hold back into this – into – she can’t quite escape her past that she’s sort of into caught between these two lives that she lived and living and no, I think it’s a comparable for any working mother really.  I’m just trying to keep it all together.

Q) The movie leaves us hanging.  I’m wondering when like we see Belle again?

Nicholas: Well, that’s a great question, isn’t it?  I’m hopeful, sooner rather than later.  We did that purposefully with the script because there are – when we sit down to design or when I work with – when I work to develop a script and I work with writers to develop a script.  What we want to do is to develop multiple story lines that are – that are strong enough and interesting enough on each of their own separate levels to enable to show, to have a relatively long run and a lot of work went into the script early on to make sure that every character in there has his or her own unique role and purpose and then you set it all, get it all into the script and you hope that the audience really appreciate it.

Q) Well is it all dependent then on the ratings for the movie – then what happens next?

Nicholas: Yes.  I would think in the end some of it will come down to that, no question.  I think some of that will come down to how, it comes down to how it shows picked up and renewed.  And ratings are certainly a critical part of that.  You can have spending executive fall in love with the show as a member of executive fall with love with the show as a number of executives that Lifetime has and then of course it’s beneficial as well but in the end television is about building an audience, building an audience who wants to find out what happens next to these characters because they’re drawn in by the characters. And so we hope you do well enough to bring Belle back and that would be very exciting for me because you put a lot of thought into exactly where the show will go from here.

Q) Lauren, would anything stand in the way of you doing this as a series?

Lauren: No.  I can’t imagine.  What would?  I am all for it.  I mean I really hope people watch and like it as much as I do, I just had absolutely love playing this character bringing this fierce, gritty, tough lady, who is flawed and passionate and have a lot on her plate to life and I am – I really hope that we get the chance to go back to Texas and make more.  I love playing my character but I also find the other characters – are so full and then there is the whole, the whole the small town living aspect of it.  So you have the all of the dynamics and the storyline in this small town which is like this little pressure cooker in this era.  And I can’t wait to find out what happens and I really hope we get to make more.

Q) Lauren, I’m going to put you on the spot given that he’s on the line with us now, but how familiar are you with Nicholas Sparks’ books before this job came along for you?

Lauren: Well I’m familiar with his work.  I’m familiar with his film and I certainly know the pedigree and the reputation that comes with his work and I’m just so grateful that he wanted to shepherd this project along because I love playing this character.

Q) Nicholas, does it blow your mind to look at the incredible numbers of books that you sold or that you moved in your lifetime, millions and millions.  Is that – what were your expectations when you started writing books and has this  met or surpassed?

Nicholas: Well I’m going to be the first to day that I have a very fortunate run and I’ve been blessed with work but a lot of great people.  I don’t know that you can set out to have a specific expectation of the number of books sold when you first start out and at the same time I don’t know that I ever really think about it except when I’m asked about it.  The general rule that my life is focused is on the present and very little to past.  If anything – they’re a little bit more focused toward the future. So right now for instance I’m writing another novel and I’m going to thinking about anything I’ve done before.  The only thing that matters is this particular novel that I’m working on and this particular – and Deliverance Creek at the present time.  That’s really all I’m thinking about and ideally, we want to get some wonderful scripts written next for Deliverance Creek in the hopes that they – that Lifetime does eventually, does pick it up and yes, of course, surpassed my expectations would be at career or whatever but that’s just the thought that I don’t – I don’t know that I was just hoping that somehow make a living writing novels and as I said I’ve just been very fortunate.

Q) Does working on movies like this get in the way of writing books?

Nicholas: Not at all.

Q) Is it more difficult to find the time to keep it scheduled?

Nicholas: No, it doesn’t.  To me, I tend to be pretty efficient with my time and I work on a novel, four to five hours a day and then the rest of my day is spent doing other things whether it’s spending time with my family or going through and making notes on the script for Deliverance Creek or marketing for Deliverance Creek.  So, it’s just a matter of scheduling.  I can say that I don’t have a lot of leisure time, just sitting around doing absolutely nothing but it’s OK.

Q) You’ve written some great love stories over the years, do you think our culture is understanding of love has become more self absorbed in recent years because of social media?

Nicholas: No.  I don’t.  I think when it comes down to it, emotions and it’s a lesson that I drew whether it was the same lesson I drew when trying to work with Melissa in drafting Deliverance Creek and that is that emotions change much less than the world at large.  They change much, much less quickly if they change at all. In other words, when Belle loses her son in Deliverance Creek, her anguish is real, the pain she would feel today is the same pain – is the pain she would feel in 1863.  The emotion itself hasn’t changed.  So the emotion of love hasn’t changed, the way people communicate, granted, that may have changed and without question from people are self absorbed and I think that the mass ability of communication now probably allow individuals to meet more self absorbed individuals. And it has certainly changed the way that people meet and yet I think that when Belle was in love, it’s the same as Noah and Allie in love and it was kind of the same as one my wife and I fell in love.  It’s love.  The emotion is what it is and it kind of feels the same for everybody and it has for a long time.

Q) Lauren, can you give us some insight on what you did to prepare for your character?

Lauren: I’m not related to any wrestlers that I know of, I’ll do that one first.  Well, I read about (Belle Scarpe) who is the awesome outlaw lady who this character is maybe a little bit based on, in some ways.  I learned how to ride a horse.  In fact they even sent me a cowboy to my house to teach me how to – how to ride western a little bit. And, yes, it was amazing.  I live in New England and he showed up with a belt buckled like the size of a plasma screen TV and an enormous hat and he was like, “Let’s do this.”  And so I learned that – I learned from him.  Jason, Jason Cowboy who was then of course he was the animal – he was the team of animals wranglers on the set.  We had – we had amazing animals and cowboys working with us on this movie.  It was so much fun. I just – it was just such a dream to make a western and I mean just to speak to what you were saying before about it being old fashioned, I mean to me it was certainly we’re in the civil war era but it was so like sexy and fun and (these guys) or he is like this badass wish whackers.  There are these crazy outlaws and I mean it was – there is just there is nothing dated about it other than the era of which I think is actually really super fun to play in.  So, yes, and plus I live in out in the woods.  So, I’m (need) to – I have a – I have pioneer’s spirit.  So I drew up on that.

Q) I was really drawn in by how (I mean I wasn’t around in the 1860s to how accurate) beautifully shot the movie was and I was just curious what drew you guys to doing a period piece?

Nicholas: Well for me of course people who are familiar with my work know that most of them take place in North Carolina, in fact all of them, same thing with the films and it’s coastal and it tends to be from at least a 1950s on for the most part with a couple of small exceptions and yet that those aren’t the only kind of stories that I like to write and they’re not the only kind of stories that I like to read about like many people who live in the south, I’m drawn to the history on the civil war and little by little this story of Deliverance Creek came together and it was very exciting for me because in some way it was new.  It was different.  It was a different period as you’ve noted. It was of a historical period and whenever you’re trying to do a film in a genuine historical period, you do have to make sure that you get as much historically accurate as you possibly can because there are thousands of people who are wildly interested in the civil war in this country.  If we get anything wrong, there is no doubt that we’re going to hear from them.  So I just wanted to make sure that we got everything as accurate as we possibly could.  And all of those elements made it interesting. I was able to, for me, explore a lot of different themes or to work with Melissa to explore a lot of different themes, everything from betrayal and love and frustration and revenge and these are elements that don’t typically take place in my novel.  So again it was just a wonderful experience to expand the various themes and to expand the period.  It keeps the process of storytelling interesting.  And that’s it from me.

Q) Lauren, I am just curious like what drew you to putting such a strong female role that’s also taking place in a time that I’m not sure how familiar you are with, the Civil War era?

Lauren: Well I’m actually a civil war expert.  No.  I’m becoming one.  Look, it’s been my dream to be in a western, to be able to wear all that (claw) and have a big gun and a big hat and a big horse and like these take no prisoner (house) lady in the civil war era locking it down, keeping that ranch at close.  I mean when I read that script I was just blown away by this character and by the art of the story and I just want to know what happens next. I want to make sure of these.  So I got to do more and I just – it’s super fun characters to inhabit and so many opportunities for big emotions and really fun scenes play and it’s just great costumes, all of it.

Q) Nicholas, do you have any ideas of where you would like to see Belle go from here. We were lock on a bit of a cliffhanger.  So do you have any driving forces of where you would to see her go?

Nicholas: Of course.  Without question, that detailed many hours of conversation with Melissa and behind the scenes, we’re pretty clear on where Belle’s character goes all the way through season four and its weekly filled with a lot of twists and turns that people will not likely expect.

Q) Lauren, you said that you really have always wanted to do a western, but there’s got to be challenges other than like getting in the dirt and riding horses.  What were some of the ones that you found as production went on that you were kind of surprised to see?

Lauren: When you have animals and stunt, all that stuff takes time.  I happen to love, love doing that because I just haven’t had a lot of opportunities to explore that kind of work in my (career).  I’m really – this is a new experience for me to do – to do a western and I don’t know, typical thing was hot.  We’re in Texas and it’s extremely hot and you wrangle a lot of (cloth). And, oh, and then freezing of course.  You think of Todd, I know would be freezing and you’re doing a love scene in the hay and it’s like 20 degrees but I love Texas.  Don’t get me wrong.  I absolutely loved being there.  I don’t know.

Q) Nicholas, I know that you’ll be coming in as an executive producer, but were you able to go down and be there for the entire length of filming or what sort of part did you take as production that was in actual production?

Nicholas: Yes.  As a general rule I am not on set as much as other executive producers are while filming is going.  Much of my work is done prior and then much of my work has been answered.  And that’s the same pattern that I’ve followed throughout the films as well and it’s simply due to lack of time I guess enough for starters and then it is – there is different producers I suppose.  Well the best way is different producers bring different feel to any production. So some producers love, love, love numbers and budgets.  I don’t want to be on the phone talking numbers and budget.  I want to be up creating in a world.  I want to come up with Belle’s new story line.  Right?  This is what I, this is really why I got involved (in formation) in the first place.  So generally when we put together in executive producers everyone has their role to play. So my role is largely in, OK, let’s make sure that they kind of show, what are the themes we’re going to do.  How do we make it?  Let’s find the great director.  Let’s get the perfect cast and then let’s make sure that everyone is kind of on the same page and where we want to show to go from here and then of course afterwards as you’re getting the show into production into the editing room I become involved with (that).

Q) I want to go back to something you were saying about the future of this project.  Would it work either as a regular TV series or a series of movies?  Does it matter to you which, could be next?

Nicholas: For me, I would prefer a series.  I would prefer a series, a really well done series and 10 to 12 really high quality episodes per year but of course we work with Lifetime on what they think is best as well but this is originally designed to go forward as a series.

 

*CONFERENCE CALL*