A SPIELBERG FOOTNOTE TO DICKENS

In light of what I posted yesterday about Dickens on Film, it was synchronistic that today's Independent would feature an interview with Steven Spielberg (conducted in Paris, where Warhorse was opening) which made much of his child-like perspective, and noted the influence of his father's war stories on his film-making. James Mottram also noted how many Spielberg films, (like fairy tales and indeed, like Dickens) have absent fathers (and, in Dickens, substitute father figures). You can find the interview here.

I can attest to the truth of one part of the interview; the delight Spielberg showed in his newly-born Max (his son by Amy Irving) when I met him in Belsize Park many years ago. He politely asked what I did, and I politely asked what he did.

I did mention a friend of mine who had worked for him, but didn't mention the story she told of quitting rather than go on location for Raiders of the Lost Ark (in Tunisia, if I remember correctly). Her line was, 'how would YOU like to spend six months in the desert with an army of 200 drug addicts commanded by a 12 year old kid?' It was the 70s, after all.