On the 'Road' with Terry George

By Tom Clavin

Terry George has lived in the U.S. for over 20 years (presently in Sag Harbor) and he has been involved in six feature films, but it is only now, with “Reservation Road,” that he has filmed a story set in America, and small-town America at that. The movie, which offers an especially strong cast - Joaquin Phoenix, Jennifer Connelly, Mark Ruffalo, and Mira Sorvino - opened in theaters two weeks ago and has been generating Oscar buzz because of the powerful performances.

“Reservation Road” is certainly a departure from his last movie, “Hotel Rwanda,” yet like that film the new one is a story about tragedy, revenge, and redemption, aspects that the writer-director found irresistible.

“First there was the appeal of working with Joaquin again, he’s my friend and we were looking for something to work on together,” said George. “But beyond that it presented an opportunity for me to say something about revenge and creating a monster in your head that encourages you to commit violence, which made post-9/11 seemed like an especially worthwhile topic to investigate. This is not a message movie but it does have issues I very much wanted to explore.”

“Reservation Road” is based on the novel by John Burnham Schwartz. It is not an easy movie to watch, but it has wonderful ensemble acting and two of the cast members, Connelly and Sorvino, have already received Academy Awards in the Best Supporting Actress category. Ruffalo is a lawyer who with his son is driving home from a Red Sox game when his car strikes the young son of a college professor played by Phoenix.

The boy’s death sends both families into a tailspin. Ruffalo’s character flees the scene and makes one bad choice after another. Phoenix and Connelly are parents who grieve in different ways yet both understand that they will be haunted for the rest of their lives by their child’s death. They also worry about the impact on the daughter, who looked up to her older brother. As a reckoning between the Phoenix and Ruffalo characters nears, each is forced to make the most difficult decision of his life - one seeks revenge, the other forgiveness.

That the setting is in the U.S. does not limit the film’s themes. “This isn’t an American story, it is a universal one,” said George. “There is nothing worse than the death of a child, to have your child die before you. If a child dies in Baghdad or Beijing or New Delhi or in Litchfield, Connecticut, it’s the same.”

He added, however, that “it did occur to me that perhaps more so than in ‘Hotel Rwanda,’ people in America and Western Europe could more easily put themselves in the shoes of the characters - there but for the grace of God go I. It might have been harder for a western audience to empathize with the characters in ‘Hotel Rwanda’ because never in their wildest imaginations could they see themselves in that situation. The sudden loss of a child on a local road here can happen to anyone. But like ‘Hotel Rwanda,’ the new film also poses the question of can the human spirit overcome suffering.”

“Hotel Rwanda” was also a departure from his previous projects. When it was released in 2004, it received international acclaim for its portrayal of a hotel manager who goes beyond trying to protect his family to saving the lives of hundreds of people from the genocide in that country that claimed over a million lives in the mid-1990’s. There were several Academy Award nominations including one for the script that George wrote with Keir Pearson and for Don Cheadle and Sophie Okonedo in the acting categories.

Before “Hotel Rwanda,” his work for the big screen had been immersed in his and his fellow countrymen’s experiences in Northern Ireland. George was born in Belfast in December 1952 and as a young man was caught up in the “Troubles” there, literally: He spent six years in prison, and was still only 25 when he was released.

His first produced screenplay resulted in his first Oscar nomination, 1993’s “In the Name of the Father.” It was co-written and directed by Jim Sheridan and starred Daniel Day-Lewis as a man who is wrongfully imprisoned with his father by the British. He had the opportunity to direct his next script, and the result in 1996 was “Some Mother’s Son,” which was inspired by Bobby Sands and other prisoners who used hunger strikes as a protest against British rule. The following year Sheridan directed another George script set in Northern Ireland, “The Boxer,” also starring Day-Lewis.

It was across the pond for screen projects for George after that, but it wasn’t easy because of his criminal past. At 19, he had been arrested for suspicion of being a member of the Irish National Liberation Army, and in addition he was affiliated with the Irish Republican Socialist Party. He was convicted and served six years as a guest of the British. He was released in 1978, and three years later decided to give America a try.

He worked at various jobs and wrote plays. His first to be produced on a New York stage was “The Tunnel,” a drama based on his imprisonment in Belfast. Fellow Irishman Jim Sheridan directed and starred, and was the beginning of their collaboration which led to “In the Name of the Father” seven years later. For years, George faced deportation because of his criminal conviction in Ireland, but a campaign by actors and writers persuaded the U.S. government to drop the effort.

In Hollywood, he wrote the script for the Bruce Willis vehicle “Hart’s War” and he wrote and directed a film for television, “A Bright Shining Lie,” based on Neil Sheehan’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book about the Vietnam War. But much of his efforts were directed at a TV series titled “The District” about a police commissioner played by Craig T. Nelson. It ran for several years with George as executive producer, and he also wrote and directed some of the episodes. “Hotel Rwanda” was his return to feature filmmaking and, thanks to its success, he has had more freedom to choose his projects and to attract top actors.

“When Joaquin brought a draft of John’s script to me, I saw immediately that this was drama on a Greek tragedy level, and I could do it only if I had actors in whom I had total faith,” George said. “That is what happened with Mark, Jennifer, Mira, and of course Joaquin. And the kids were marvelous too; they are not just props in this story. I think Elle Fanning is going to be the Meryl Streep of the next generation.”

He spends as much time as possible in Sag Harbor. “This area reminds me of Ireland, only the fish seem to be bigger on this side of the ocean,” George said. “And it seems like half the population of Noyac Road is Irish, plus I’ve got Cromer’s Market right there for bangers and such.”

He and his wife also have a house in County Down, Northern Ireland. Tongue in cheek, George recounted how he has finally become famous in his homeland. Last February, along with another Belfast boy, Van Morrison, George was honored at the second annual “Oscar Wilde: Honoring Irish Writing in Film” event in Los Angeles.

“I was shocked that Van showed up because he’s notoriously shy, and he had a 12-piece band with him and proceeded to blow the hall away.” George recalled. “Word gets around back home and I’m hearing from my mother and brother and others back in Ireland telling me, ‘Terry, you’ve made it - you were on stage with Van Morrison!’”

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