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Conversations With Filmmakers Series
Blake Edwards: Interviews
Blake Edwards (1922-2010) was a multitalented, versatile director constantly exploring who he was, not only in filmmaking but also in life. Often typecast as a comedy director, he also created westerns, thrillers, musicals, and heart-wrenching dramas. His strength as a filmmaker came from his ability to be a triple threat--writer, director, and producer--allowing him full control of his films, especially when the studio system failed him.
Blake Edwards: Interviews highlights how the filmmaker created the hugely successful Pink Panther franchise; his long partnership with award-winning composer Henry Mancini; his principles of comedy as influenced by the comic greats of film history, especially silent comedies; his decades-long marriage and film collaborations with Julie Andrews; and his unique philosophy of life. Continually testing his abilities as a writer, which he considered himself to be above all other professions, Edwards did not hesitate to strip comedy from films that clearly and purposefully explored other genres with sharp, dramatic insight. He created thrilling suspense (Experiment in Terror); rugged westerns (Wild Rovers); riveting drama (Days of Wine and Roses); and bittersweet romance (Breakfast at Tiffany's). He also created musicals, namely Darling Lili and Victor/Victoria, showcasing the talents of Andrews. In fact, many of these films have been considered some of Edwards's finest in his appreciable career.
Reinventing himself throughout his sixty-year career, Edwards found new outlets of expression that fueled his creativity to the very end. This long-overdue collection of published interviews explores the up and downs--and ups again--of a sometimes flawed but always gifted and often surprising filmmaker.
Blake Edwards: Interviews highlights how the filmmaker created the hugely successful Pink Panther franchise; his long partnership with award-winning composer Henry Mancini; his principles of comedy as influenced by the comic greats of film history, especially silent comedies; his decades-long marriage and film collaborations with Julie Andrews; and his unique philosophy of life. Continually testing his abilities as a writer, which he considered himself to be above all other professions, Edwards did not hesitate to strip comedy from films that clearly and purposefully explored other genres with sharp, dramatic insight. He created thrilling suspense (Experiment in Terror); rugged westerns (Wild Rovers); riveting drama (Days of Wine and Roses); and bittersweet romance (Breakfast at Tiffany's). He also created musicals, namely Darling Lili and Victor/Victoria, showcasing the talents of Andrews. In fact, many of these films have been considered some of Edwards's finest in his appreciable career.
Reinventing himself throughout his sixty-year career, Edwards found new outlets of expression that fueled his creativity to the very end. This long-overdue collection of published interviews explores the up and downs--and ups again--of a sometimes flawed but always gifted and often surprising filmmaker.
192 pages, ebook
Published December 12, 2017
17 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
July 4, 2020
An interesting book.
In a lot of ways, Edwards' career was marked by disruption and discontinuity. This book reflects that, paying surprisingly little attention to Edwards' films of the early Sixties. "Darling Lili" looms like Everest over this book, as the catastrophe that nearly ruined Edwards career. (I had to think of the book of Peckinpah interviews and how Peckinpah never got over being fired from "The Cincinnati Kid." The difference, I guess, is that Edwards' marriage to Julie Andrews stabilized his life.) Even "Victor/Victoria," perhaps Edwards' most popular movie today, is little noted when it is made but looms larger as the years pass.
Toward the end of the book "Thou Shalt Not Give Up" is mentioned as a saying important to Clouseau and Edwards, and by that time, the reader realizes that such a motto was important to Edwards' life.
In a lot of ways, Edwards' career was marked by disruption and discontinuity. This book reflects that, paying surprisingly little attention to Edwards' films of the early Sixties. "Darling Lili" looms like Everest over this book, as the catastrophe that nearly ruined Edwards career. (I had to think of the book of Peckinpah interviews and how Peckinpah never got over being fired from "The Cincinnati Kid." The difference, I guess, is that Edwards' marriage to Julie Andrews stabilized his life.) Even "Victor/Victoria," perhaps Edwards' most popular movie today, is little noted when it is made but looms larger as the years pass.
Toward the end of the book "Thou Shalt Not Give Up" is mentioned as a saying important to Clouseau and Edwards, and by that time, the reader realizes that such a motto was important to Edwards' life.
May 19, 2022
Blake Edwards wasn't particularly big on self-promotions so there are relatively few lengthy interviews in which he discusses his impressive filmography. This collection collects up a fair number of articles on Edwards spanning a period of nearly fifty years. There's a little repetition and occasional signs of reluctance to indulge in self-congratulation, but all in all this is about as close a picture of Edwards as we're likely to see - outside of his great and frequently autobiographical films.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews