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John Fowles’s novel drew some of Hollywood’s finest for its adaptation, but even Meryl Streep couldn’t save it. Why?
John Fowles’s novel The French Lieutenant’s Woman has presented a unique challenge to film-makers since it came out in 1969. There’s the authorial figure who frequently interrupts his own text to rewrite key scenes. There’s the authorial figure of Fowles himself, who has a scene where he sits in a train carriage with a lead character. And, as Fowles put it in an essay from 1981, the book describes “all those aspects of life and modes of feeling that can never be represented visually”. The novel journeyed deep into “inner space” where cameras couldn’t follow.
In spite of such obstacles – or perhaps because of them – plenty of famous film-makers have attempted to get it on screen. Fred Zinnemann tried, with a Dennis Potter script. Mike Nichols briefly took the helm. Franklin Schaffner was also approached to direct. (Fowles once said: “A Hollywood screenwriter came over to do that one, I’m told he had a nervous breakdown after six weeks.”) John Frankenheimer was also offered the director’s chair, but concluded: “There is no way you can film the book. You can tell the same story in a movie, of course, but not in the same way. And how Fowles tells his story is what makes the book so good.” Continue reading...