Food & Drink W
by Holly and David Jones An interview with Roger Deakins
e’ve have been friends with Roger Deakins and his wife James for several years now and we regularly meet up for supper or head off to the pub. We can also be the recipient of early
morning door knocks and random parcels of seabass, mackerel or pollock from Roger’s fishing trips in Torbay. To the cognoscenti of the film world however, he is the go-to cinematographer for their latest projects and he has worked with luminaries such as the Coen Brothers, Meryl Streep, George Clooney, Javier Bardem and Daniel craig. his film credits include The Shawshank Redemption, Skyfall, The Big Lebowski, A Beautiful Mind and True Grit amongst many. We love the tales of Hollywood he and James bring back to Kingswear and the 2 worlds seem a good distance apart. This year Roger received a CBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours for services to cinematography so we thought it would be worth an on the record chat about his parallel lives – with a bit of a foodie slant to satisfy our curiosity. Currently, Roger is in Los Angeles and scouting in Hawaii for his next project with Angelina Jolie (sorry - no more namedropping…or not much) so we caught up by email over the weekend -
MFD i know you love fishing Roger – tell us how that started and why you love it so much. RD Yes, I grew up in Torquay and I remember my father and grandfather taking me fishing when I was very young. As a family, we always had something that would get us out on the water and I still keep a small boat, an Atlantic Fisher 550, in the harbor there. I like to go out in the very early morning, before the bay fills up with traffic, and i will often stay out all day. i fish for bass in the summer but I am not so fanatical as I was when I was younger. I am still fanatical enough not to give away my favourite fishing spots though. Fishing for me now is more about the experience of being out on the sea, watching the birds, feeling the wind and the weather than it is about the dinner.
MFD You keep coming back to Kingswear between work projects. What is it that keeps you coming back? RD I have a home in Kingswear and I keep coming back because
it really is a home rather than just a refuge. Although I have lived in the US for 20 odd years and I love living there, I consider I have a home in Devon as well.
MFD What are your childhood memories of the area and how has it changed since you were growing up here? RD Like everywhere in the world, there are more people around, especially in the Torbay area, but Kingswear hasn’t changed so much. That’s part of its attraction but it’s also good that there are so many more facilities in the area now. There was no coastal path between Kingswear and Brixham when I was growing up and there was no Thai restaurant before Bristol. I was very lucky to have spent my childhood in such a wonderful location, fishing in the mornings before school and often long into the night to catch conger eels or bass off the rocks at Hope’s Nose, but not everything was so magical. Career opportunities seemed very limited and it was only because I rebelled somewhat, leaving Torquay
ReNOWNeD CINeMATOGRAPHeR AND KINGsWeAR ResIDeNT ROGeR DeAKINs
for Art School, that I discovered photography and eventually realised that I could actually make a living creating images.
MFD You’ve worked all over the world making films in some pretty exciting locations. Where did you have your best and worst food? RD Hunger has a lot to do with how ‘good’ your food is. After many months of eating ‘canteen’ food off the back of the caterers truck a Big Mac tastes very special. I particularly remember a Vietnamese meal my wife and I had in Casablanca after spending 4 or 5 months eating tagines in the interior of Morocco. The tagine was great but not for 5 months. Maybe the Vietnamese restaurant wasn’t so good either but to us! I once ate dog in a café in the Sudan. again i had been filming in a remote region and was starved of any real meat. One moment the dog was yapping at my feet whilst we ordered off the menu in a dusty café in Southern Sudan and the next there was a yelp from the kitchen. About
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140 |
Page 141 |
Page 142 |
Page 143 |
Page 144 |
Page 145 |
Page 146 |
Page 147 |
Page 148