SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
Kristin Scott Thomas, celebrated for roles in "The English Patient," "Gosford Park" and most recently, "Slow Horses," has directed and co-written a family comic drama starring marquee names like her own. But the premise at the heart is taken from her own life and given to three sisters, all accomplished adults, brought together for their mother's wedding - her third wedding.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "MY MOTHER'S WEDDING")
EMILY BEECHAM: (As Georgina) Mummy, tonight is your last night as a Munson.
SCARLETT JOHANSSON: (As Katherine) What? You're not going to change your name again.
KRISTIN SCOTT THOMAS: (As Diana) Of course I'm going to take Geoff's name.
SIENNA MILLER: (As Victoria) Mrs. Geoffrey Loveglove?
THOMAS: (As Diana) Well...
MILLER: (As Victoria) Are you serious? I mean, really?
THOMAS: (As Diana) Yes. Mrs. Frost, Mrs. Munson and now Mrs. Loveglove.
MILLER: (As Victoria) Loveglove?
THOMAS: (As Diana) It's a beautiful name. It's not his fault.
SIMON: "My Mother's Wedding" stars Scarlett Johansson, Sienna Miller, Emily Beecham and more. It is co-written with a promising young talent named John Micklethwait, to whom the director happens to be married. Kristin Scott Thomas and John Micklethwait join us now from New York. Thank you both very much for being with us.
THOMAS: Thank you.
JOHN MICKLETHWAIT: Thank you.
SIMON: Kristin Scott Thomas, let me begin by asking you to tell us about these sisters, each accomplished in their own way and each reflecting a different side, perhaps with their parents.
THOMAS: Well, the eldest sister is played by Scarlett Johansson. Her name is Katherine Frost. She has a collection of memories of her father that she guards preciously and so holds very dear to her heart and can't really escape from. She's also followed in her father's footsteps and has joined the Navy. The second sister is called Victoria, and she is a big movie star. And Victoria is the one perhaps most publicly having a difficult romantic life. And then the youngest sister is a girl who seems to have got everything right. She's got a serious job. She's a nurse. She's married. She has two perfect little girls. And then we meet them when they come home, as you mentioned, to witness their mother getting married for the third time, but to a man who they feel is not quite up to scratch because they remember their father and their stepfather as being these sort of demigods sent from above.
SIMON: And if I may, that is drawn from your own life experience, in a sense, isn't it?
THOMAS: It is, in a sense. And the memories that we see Katherine - Scarlett's character - inhabit are my own memories from my own childhood, of my father, of finding out how my stepfather was missing and then killed and various other memories.
SIMON: I'm afraid we probably need to explain. Both your father and stepfather were...
THOMAS: My father was a pilot in the Navy, and he was killed when I was almost six. My mother married one of his colleagues, who was also a pilot, who also had the same name, the same Christian name as him. They were both called Simon. But tragically, he was killed five years after they were married. So by the time I was 12, I'd lost both my father and my stepfather. So that was something that sort of appeared in every single profile that has ever been written about me.
There was always a little passage about my so-called tragic childhood. And after a while, it began to grate, as you can imagine, because I didn't actually see my childhood as being so tragic. Yes, there were tragic events that happened, but I was actually a very happy little child. So when I became a grown-up and have not only children but grandchildren, I decided it was time to take matters into my own hands and write my own story about these events.
SIMON: John Micklethwait, you have a very honored career in journalism as editor of The Economist and now Bloomberg News. But have you really always wanted to be a screenwriter?
MICKLETHWAIT: (Laughter) Somebody once told me that most journalists are kind of failed novelists, and I think there's an element of truth in there. I think every journalist at some time has thought about doing a novel. No, the truth is that we were - it was during COVID. We were sitting there. As you could imagine, my day job was fairly frantic. And then Kristin was thinking about producing something short, just really to show her siblings about what their father was actually like because she could remember more than they could. And then we started talking, and then we thought, well, maybe we can make a story about this if we cast it forward and, you know, imagine this completely sort of different story with the same themes underneath.
SIMON: John Micklethwait, do you think the fact that you were a journalist coming in from the outside, as we do, might have helped the director of this film note things about the story?
MICKLETHWAIT: You'd have to ask Kristin that. But - and basically, I think it'd be fair to say that I think if she was being nice, she would say, me, a bit like you, was quite good on structure. There's no doubt in my mind that she was much better at dialogue...
THOMAS: Yes.
MICKLETHWAIT: ...Just because...
THOMAS: I confirm (laughter).
MICKLETHWAIT: ...Kristin would have repeated, you know, that I would write something and then she'd say, nobody would ever say that.
(LAUGHTER)
MICKLETHWAIT: And I hear that repeatedly.
THOMAS: I found him very useful, as well, just being a sort of mind...
MICKLETHWAIT: What an endorsement.
THOMAS: ...Of information. Yes.
(LAUGHTER)
THOMAS: What an endorsement.
SIMON: Well...
THOMAS: He was very useful (laughter).
SIMON: ...It is in a marriage, in fact. Yes.
THOMAS: No, but it was great to be able to have somebody on hand who just sort of knew when the Bosnian War was at its peak and knew when so and so was doing this and so and so was doing that 'cause my history is all very vague and muddled.
MICKLETHWAIT: This project, not unlike marriage, you get very instant feedback.
THOMAS: (Laughter).
SIMON: Miss Thomas, you get, or I guess, maybe gave yourself a very moving speech. Your character has gathered with her daughters at the graves of the two departed husbands.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "MY MOTHER'S WEDDING")
THOMAS: (As Diana) I brought you up to be women, not just daughters. I scrimped and saved and pushed so that you could build lives in a way that a young, single mother with three little girls never could. Where did you get this idea that nobody is as good as your perfect fathers?
SIMON: That's very nice, 'cause she doesn't love her husbands any less, but she saw them clearly.
THOMAS: Yes. And I think she understands about children growing up and becoming adults, which is always a good thing when parents understand that. I think this speech was written - we need - I mean, it was a very sort of technical thing. We needed a kind of - not finale - but we needed a moment which was very strong, that united all the characters on the screen at the same time. And I was floundering somewhat. So I literally said to John, go away and write something profound and intelligent, and we'll have to put it into normal language later. So that's what he did, and I think it's a wonderful scene, and it's a wonderful kind of rant. And it's amazing how many women and men react to this speech, and I think it lands very well.
SIMON: Yeah. I think you might be the first couple I've interviewed who were both members of the Order of the British Empire.
MICKLETHWAIT: (Laughter).
THOMAS: Yes, it might be a first.
MICKLETHWAIT: I think she's higher up.
THOMAS: (Laughter).
MICKLETHWAIT: She's higher up than I am, rather annoyingly.
SIMON: She's a dame, right?
MICKLETHWAIT: She's a dame.
THOMAS: I'm a dame. Yup. Yup.
MICKLETHWAIT: I'm a commander.
THOMAS: I love saying that in America. I'm a dame (laughter).
SIMON: And, well, as we say, there is nothing like - well, you know.
THOMAS: A dame. Yeah.
SIMON: You can finish that joke. So any rivalry on that at home with each other?
THOMAS: Not that...
MICKLETHWAIT: Yes.
THOMAS: ...I'm aware.
(LAUGHTER)
MICKLETHWAIT: No, it's a dream from my end (laughter). No, we got invited the other day to a state dinner with Macron, where it became very obvious that I was the plus-one.
(LAUGHTER)
MICKLETHWAIT: That was - that was a slight return to form.
SIMON: Kristin Scott Thomas has directed and co-written with John Micklethwait the new film, "My Mother's Wedding." Thank you both so much for being with us.
THOMAS: Thank you for having us.
MICKLETHWAIT: Thank you so much for having us. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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