The Double

by Richard Ayoade, Avi Korine, Charlie Cobb (Illustrator)

Inspired by Dostoyevsky's novella, The Double tells the story of Simon, a timid man, scratching out an isolated existence in an indifferent world. He is overlooked at work, scorned by his mother, and ignored by the woman of his dreams. He feels powerless to change any of these things. The arrival of a new co-worker, James, serves to upset the balance. James is both Simon's exact physical double and his opposite - confident, charismatic and good with women. To Simon's horror, James slowly starts taking over his life.

Genres: Fiction, Film, Comedy, Humor

144 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2014

About the author

Richard Ellef Ayoade is a British comedian, film director, screenwriter, television presenter, actor, and author best known for his role as the socially awkward IT technician Maurice Moss in Channel 4 sitcom The IT Crowd, for which he won the 2014 BAFTA for Best Male Comedy Performance.

Reviews

[Not Well Read · Rating 5 out of 5]

(It should be pretty obvious that anyone who has seen and enjoyed the actual film will like this too, but I felt like I had a few thoughts to comprise a review anyway.) I am so glad to own this – now I just need Ayoade on Ayoade and my collection of Double-related-content will be complete (I think). There are also some black-and-white stills from the film included, and two pictures of the writers on set (which are great).

As is probably obvious from this review, I really love this film and have watched it over and over again, so having memorised the finished product made it easy to note all the differences in this script, and made it a lot of fun to read. Some details/changes from the film that stuck out to me include:


• Some of the best scenes from the film are not in here! I am thinking in particular of the shot of Simon in the elevator as he leaves work (about 20 minutes into the film) and the ending of the first scene in the photocopier room where there are a few lines shaved off.
• There are a few more world-building details (the newspaper in the first scene has a leading story about financial crisis that I don’t remember being in the film).
• The first scene between Simon and his mother is even more hilarious (I already loved the ‘I’m not going to die, ever’ line from her, and they build on that attitude). Also, I like that Simon calls her ‘mother’ on the phone to her, and not ‘mom’.
• Simon drinks milk in his apartment instead of water (obviously a very minor difference, but I thought it was a funny detail because it could still change your perception of the character).
• Simon seems a little crazier in the script (which, interestingly, draws the script’s characterisation closer to the original novella). He says goodbye to his room when he leaves (to be fair, I also do this, but only when going away for a very long time) and is way more insistent that he definitely didn’t move into his apartment to get closer to Hannah (in the film I actually wanted to believe him, but in the script the ‘I definitely didn’t move in recently’ line is twice as long at it makes it seem like he’s just a bad liar, which made me laugh).
• Perhaps connected to this, there are more hints that his doppelgänger is about to appear (the film retains some hints, like the dual mirror on the train in the very beginning, but there is a scene in the trailer where he checks that his reflection is still responding as it should, which is in this script but not in the actual film).
• Simon takes flowers with him to see Hannah (this made me really sad all over again, and I wish they had included it. Like this if you cry every time).
• There are no subtitles for the deleted scenes, so this helps with them. For the life of me I couldn’t figure out what Harris’ first line to Simon was in the coffee room deleted scene, so this cleared that up (and made me laugh at myself for not understanding).
• There are a few details that make more sense in the script (probably because the subtext is going to be there in black and white when film is a medium that allows for more subtlety, and the fact that you may not notice all of the director’s choices). This is probably most noticeable in the specifics of the directions the actors were given and the character descriptions (that make the writers’ intentions with the characters clear as separate from where actors take them) and the parentheses/brackets exchange between the investigators (which I always found an odd inclusion) that in the script is brought up again in the very last scene.
• The second scene with Simon and Hannah in the café was definitely built on (and also demonstrates how important the actors’ interpretation is to the scene). It is devastating in the film; in the script it’s only kind of sad.
• There are one or two minor aspects of some scenes that play out slightly differently, but I’ve covered everything that particularly occurred to me about changes.


I know this might seem a bit much, but I probably have more enthusiasm for this film than is healthy (and I don’t even usually watch films), so I can’t really help it. Needless to say, I would recommend this, but only after watching the film (preferably more than once).

[Erica Ross · Rating 5 out of 5]

"I like to think I'm pretty unique."

[Oscar Hinks · Rating 4 out of 5]

A script that makes the movie, without such wit and intrigue what was the film?

[Teddy]

ja is gwn screenplay, dus niet super bijzonder, maar wel heel cool om te zien hoe ze de originele double erin hebben verwerkt.

[oby · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought this book thinking it was a novel, opened it today surprised to see it’s a screenplay lol.
I read half of it then went the library to rent the film.
The film felt like a fever dream, honestly, but I liked it. I enjoyed seeing Chris O’Dowd cameo as a doctor haha.