The entry begins:
While writing Where the Light Falls, a novel set largely in the art world of nineteenth-century Paris, I looked at more period paintings than recent movies. A shock of recognition came for me when I saw Thomas Eakins’ painting, The Veteran. There was my leading male character, a troubled Civil-War veteran, Edward Murer, in all his complexity. If any actor could embody that portrait, it would be Jeremy Irons; but he is too old now for the part. Luckily, in real life Daniel Day-Lewis is closer to Edward in age; surely he can play a ravaged forty.Learn more about the book and author at Katherine Keenum's website and blog.
The central character, Jeanette Palmer, is much harder for me to cast. The first post in my blog about picturing the world of the novel shows a painting of three women artists by Alfred Stevens called In the Studio. A woman in black in that painting might be Jeanette. A painting by Manet, Woman Reading, illustrates the sophisticated Parisienne Jeanette aspires to become. Yet neither picture immediately suggests to me a particular actress. The novel begins at Vassar College in 1878, when sheltered, nineteen-year-old Jeanette is being expelled for helping her roommate elope. Determined to go her own way, she manages to get to Paris to study drawing and painting, which she does very seriously. In Paris, however, she is also introduced to Edward. In a screen version of the romance that follows, viewers would need to feel comfortable watching a young woman with an older man, something that used to be taken for granted but now can seem creepy. Someone in her mid-to-late twenties rather than a true ingénue could be the answer for casting Jeanette. Not so long ago, Amy...[read on]
Read--Coffee with a Canine: Katherine Keenum and Palmer.
The Page 69 Test: Where the Light Falls.
My Book, The Movie: Where the Light Falls.
--Marshal Zeringue
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