Tuesday Minute
No. 33 | February 16, 2010

Women Behind the Camera I

Our theme this week
Women directors of notable films from 2009

Featured this week
Monday         —   Lone Scherfig

Nora Ephron

The essentials
Notable 2009 film:  Julie & Julia; nominated for 1 Oscar; worldwide box office, $118 million.

Julie is Julie Powell, a blogger.  Yes, they made a film about a blogger!  (Insert your own joke here.)  Julie had an idea for a blog and eight years and $118 million later, somebody may well be thanking her on Oscar night.  Who’d a thunk it?  I’m partial to the idea of Hollywood turning the stories of blog writers into multimillion-dollar productions (please contact my agent if interested), but the real appeal of the movie, I must admit, is the cookbook author.  I’d guess that cookbook authors, in general, are not a whole lot more fascinating than bloggers, but when the cookbook author is Julia Child, you’ve got a movie—and when she’s played by Meryl Streep, you’ve got a good one.  There’s not much to say about Meryl Streep that hasn’t been said before.  She’s a great actress and gives one of the most entertaining performances of the year.

Great acting doesn’t come out of nowhere.  Credit Nora Ephron for not only directing the movie but for writing the screenplay too.  She knows about writing.  She grew up in Hollywood, the daughter of screenwriting team Henry and Phoebe Ephron (There’s No Business Like Show Business).  She started as a journalist working in print media, then wrote scripts for the movies.  Silkwood (1983) and When Harry Met Sally… (1989) were both big successes.  She also adapted her own novel for Heartburn (1986), drawn from her marriage to journalist Carl Bernstein.  In the ’90s, Ephron had her first chance to direct.  Sleepless in Seattle (1993) and You’ve Got Mail (1998) were both hit romantic comedies starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan.  She’s collaborated several times with her sister, Delia, splitting writing and producing credit.  Three times Ephron has been nominated for an Oscar, each of them for original screenplay.

Beyond the final credits
While married to Bernstein, Ephron apparently had guessed the identity of her husband’s source for Watergate stories, Deep Throat.  Bernstein referred to him as “My Friend” and used the initials “M.F.,” which Ephron guessed—and the world would later learn—was Mark Felt, associate director at the FBI in the Nixon years.

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Julie & Julia
Nora Ephron and Meryl Streep, on Charlie Rose
Interview, Trailer

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Nora Ephron, on Meryl Streep
AFI Life Achievement Tribute

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Point of View
“Men have built the cities, made and defined the culture, interpreted the world.  At no time in recorded history have women been culture-makers….Movies are arguably the most influential, important medium in the world.  Because women are now making movies, then women’s ideas, philosophy, point of view will seep into that culture.  And that’s never happened in history.  We can’t even see the impact of that yet.”
— Producer Laura Ziskin

…58…59…60.