THE ENGLISH BIG PICTURE
PRODUCTION
FOR THE BBC AND PRIME VIDEO’S THE ENGLISH, HUGO BLICK TOOK THE CLASSIC WESTERN AND ADDED IN SOME 21ST CENTURY SENSIBILITIES TOO. JON CREAMER REPORTS
DETAILS
Broadcaster BBC and Amazon Prime Video Production co Drama Republic Writer, Director, Executive Producer Hugo Blick Executive Producer Emily Blunt Executive Producer Greg Brenman Producer Colin Wratten Production Designer Chris Roope DoP Arnau Valls Colomer Costume Designer Phoebe de Gaye Hair & Make Up Designer Leslie Lamont-Fisher Casting Sam Jones Composer Federico Jusid Editing Ben Yeates/ Andy Morrison Horse Master Hernán Ortiz Cast Emily Blunt Chaske Spencer Stephen Rea Valerie Pachner Rafe Spall Tom Hughes Ciarán Hinds Toby Jones William Belleau Gary Farmer Kimberly Guerrero Malcolm Storry Forrest Goodluck
of the BBC and Prime Video’s upcoming epic take on the genre, The English. The Western is also a form that stretches
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back into the history of filmmaking. And the roots of the idea for The English go back a long way too. “I was sent to Montana at eighteen as a stabilising influence,” says Blick about the genesis of the idea. While in Montana being taught the outdoors life by a family friend, he made “a hunting buddy I called Chief. He wasn’t a chief. He called me English. We were easy with this casual racism, but pretty soon I got to see it was a one-way street - with all the heavy traffic heading his way. Then one day he took off. I never knew his real name, nor he mine. I regretted that. This was a kernel for The English.” Fast forward to 2019, and Blick was showing
his script to Drama Republic executive producer Greg Brenman, “I suggested to him that given that the budget would need to be ambitious to realise this series, we were going to need a significant partner,” says Brenman. “And for that significant partner to come on board, I suggested we try to get some major talent attached.” Piers Wenger, then head of BBC Drama, and
think it was Jimmy Stewart who said the Western is filmmaking at its most pure.” So says Hugo Blick, writer and director
off on a pitching trip to LA to secure a US partner to go along with the BBC on the UK end. But at that point, says Brenman, “No one knew
about it. The only person who’d read it outside of me and Hugo was Emily.” Possible US partners were hastily sent scripts before the flight. “I said to them ‘let’s just pencil meetings and, if having read the script, you think it could be for you let’s meet and if not, let’s not.” Those answers were filtering through to Brenman on the flight to LA. “By the time we got off the plane, that journey had been a really useful filtering system, because westerns are a very strong flavour. And you either want them on your channel or you don’t.” And some very much did, “they all loved
the script. And obviously, they all loved the idea of Hugo and Emily,” says Brenman. “Our first meeting was with Amazon” and despite offers from other channels, “Amazon, as they say, boarded in the room.”
“THERE’S RARELY ANYTHING TO SEE WITH MORE
CINEMATIC BEAUTY THAN A MID-TWENTIETH CENTURY TECHNICOLOR WESTERN”
FLESHING IT OUT That was in June 2019. From there Blick began to build the series. But while the show pays homage to the classic Western, in both its look and many of its themes,
Blick’s first port of call for a commission, had also given him “the gentle challenge of attaching a star of a calibre to match its ambitions,” says Blick.
FINDING THE STAR That next step was surprisingly quick. “I’d written with Emily Blunt in mind and
sent it to her,” says Blick. “Fortunately, she’s a quick reader and got back within a couple of days to say she was in. I like a person who takes that kind of leap, especially with 5/6ths of the story still to be written and it spoke directly to exactly the kind of character I was writing.” Within the week, Blick flew out to New York
to meet with Blunt at the New York office she shares with husband John Krasinski. After that meeting, the project moved at an even greater pace. With just a short window of opportunity open before Blunt would be immersed in her next project. Blick, Blunt and Brenman headed
a Western made in 2022 had to also engage with themes that were ignored in the early days of the genre, and in particular, race. Blick sent his completed scripts to IllumiNative, a Native led racial and social justice organisation. IllumiNative introduced him to representatives of the Pawnee and Cheyenne Nations “each of whom are specialists in the cultural and military history of their respective Nations” As Blick says “we were not making a
documentary. Nonetheless, because of the leading position of Eli Whipp (played by Chaske Spencer) within the story and the many historical influences upon him, the precise nature of his fictional story had to carry the weight of historical authenticity.” And while The English is a revenge thriller and love story, “it couldn’t star a Native American playing a Native American if it didn’t engage, to some degree, with the genre’s historical relationship to race.”
WIDE OPEN SPACES Authenticity also required the perfect location
Autumn 2022
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