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Curtis Hanson to direct movie of Chabon's 'Wonder Boys'
Monday, January 11, 1999 By Ron Weiskind, Post-Gazette Movie Editor
The movie version of Michael Chabon's novel "Wonder Boys" starts production in Pittsburgh Feb. 1. Michael Douglas, Robert Downey Jr. and Frances McDormand will star in the film, which will be directed by Curtis Hanson, whose most recent film was "L.A. Confidential." He won an Academy Award for his screenwriting work on that film and got an Oscar nomination for directing it.
Shooting for nine weeks in locations including Downtown, Oakland, Shadyside, Sewickley and Beaver, "Wonder Boys" plans to take advantage of what Hanson, in a telephone interview, called Pittsburgh's "wealth of really photogenic neighborhoods, houses and buildings."
"Wonder Boys" was Chabon's second novel, following "The Mysteries of Pittsburgh." A native of Washington, D.C., Chabon attended the University of Pittsburgh and used the city as the setting for both books. Steve Kloves ("The Fabulous Baker Boys") wrote the screenplay for the movie.
Hanson said that once he scouted Pittsburgh as a possible location, he felt the movie had to be shot here.
"The city is so unique geographically," he said. "It has so much of the color of the neighborhoods that evokes the past of the city. That gives the city a wonderful personality. The city has managed to escape the blight of that horrible urban renewal that devastated and homogenized so many other cities.
"And Pittsburgh ties into the theme of the movie, which deals with what happens when someone has early success and the pressure that comes with it. How do you deal with it? How do you accept that the past is the past and move on? The city is an example of that. While its economic base has changed, it has maintained its integrity. Pittsburgh is a Wonder Boy."
Douglas will play the film's protagonist, Grady Tripp, a novelist and college professor whose life is in turmoil. His wife has left him, his mistress is pregnant and the novel he is working on is long overdue - it is 2,600 pages long and growing. Downey plays his editor, Terry Crabtree, who is about to lose his job. They are the Wonder Boys of the title, living on their past achievements. McDormand portrays the chancellor of the college where they work.
"Each of them is a very accomplished actor," Hanson said. "Compared to other stars on that stratospheric plateau, Michael has been significantly more adventurous in terms of mixing it up."
He cited such disparate roles as the angry geek in "Falling Down," the romantic action hero in "Romancing the Stone," the husband in the vicious divorce comedy "War of the Roses" and the cold businessman of his recent films, including "The Game" and "A Perfect Murder."
"He hasn't played it safe to maintain his star status," Hanson said, noting that in "Wonder Boys," he'll be playing "a much softer, fuzzier kind of character."
Hanson said he was drawn to "Wonder Boys" because he found the characters so interesting and because it gives him the opportunity to do a so-called serious comedy - the type of film that Billy Wilder and Preston Sturges used to make.
Pittsburghers will get the chance to meet Hanson on Wednesday when he will take questions from the audience at "A Conversation with Curtis Hanson." The program begins at 8:30 p.m. at the University of Pittsburgh's Frick Fine Arts Auditorium in Oakland. Admission is free.
"I look forward to it," Hanson said. "Since I got to Pittsburgh, I've been doing my best to absorb the city. I'm a storyteller who deals in a commercial medium. To have some kind of interaction with the audience is fun."
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