Written Interview: Sofia Coppola (“Somewhere”)
Today’s written interview is with screenwriter-director Sofia Coppola. Her writing credits include The Virgin Suicides, Lost in Translation, and Marie Antoinette. Her latest movie is Somewhere. The interview is part of The Craft series on WGA.org:
Loneliness and luxury are elements for which Sofia Coppola has a keen knack. Lost in Translation, Marie Antoinette, and her new film Somewhere all deal in different ways with characters in gilded cages. Whether a lonely aging movie star, an under-tended new bride holed up in a posh Tokyo hotel, or a teen queen trapped in the splendor and isolation of Versailles, Coppola seems to know of what she speaks.
Somewhere rests on a portrait of Johnny Marco [Stephen Dorff], a fictitious present-day movie star nestled decadently, but emptily at the Chateau Marmont until his 11-year-old daughter, heretofore cared for mostly by her mother, shows up unexpectedly. Somewhere paints a familiar, knowing portrait of a parallel and ultra exclusive Los Angeles that only the likes of a Coppola have ever memorized. While the story of a movie star is not related, the rest — even issues of parenthood which Coppola herself is now fully engaged — feel deeply personal to the modern movie heiress.
Some excerpts:
Though it is about a male movie star, this seems almost autobiographical. What do you think about that?
I feel like it’s a personal film, and I put a lot of myself into it, but I wouldn’t say autobiographical because my life and childhood were so different than this story. But it is personal, and I’ve put a lot of things I’ve seen and been around and imagined in there.
What makes it personal for you?
The life is so different but I feel like it’s a world that I’m familiar with and that I’ve been around. I was trying to [deal] with what I was thinking about. I just had a baby so I was thinking about how being a parent changes your perspective. I imagined how that would be for this kind of a guy. I try to put myself into the character’s point of view even though my life isn’t like theirs.
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When and where do you write now?
I used to stay up late at night and write all night because there were no distractions, no phone… I have little kids, so I can’t stay up anymore. With this, I would just kind of write in the afternoons when my daughter would go off to the park. I have a little office at home.
I’m not a morning person. My dad gets up really early and writes and I just can’t.
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In a lot of your films and particularly in this one, there’s this enticing, beautiful portrait of a place — in this case L.A. — but then there’s also this isolation, coldness, and loneliness. Is this an intentional theme you try to get at or does it just manifest itself in your films?
It just comes out. I don’t sit down intending to do that. I like stories about when people change. A lot of times in movies, it’s more [about] big dramatic things like being held hostage or war that make people change and I wanted to do something more like in life where something little that doesn’t seem like a big deal can really bring you to look at yourself and change.
For more of the interview, go here.