By Christina Radish
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Ben Affleck at the premiere of "Gone Baby Gone" held at the Mann Bruin Theater in Westwood, Calif. on October 9, 2007.
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Adapted from Dennis Lehane’s best-selling novel, the Miramax film Gone Baby Gone follows the case of a little girl who has gone missing in the Boston neighborhood of Dorchester. In a town where the gritty, working-class streets are lined with the wreckage of broken families and dreams, 4-year-old Amanda McCready has gone missing without a trace. Because the police have failed to turn up even the narrowest of leads, Amanda’s desperate Aunt (Amy Madigan) and Uncle (Titus Welliver) turn to local private investigators Patrick Kenzie (Casey Affleck) and Angie Genarro (Michelle Monaghan) to take the case.
Initially hesitant, Patrick and Angie know the neighborhood, and they also know the truth about Amanda’s drug-addicted mother Helene (Amy Ryan), so they begin to dig into her story. Finding themselves on a trail that winds through a chain of drug-dealers, ex-cons and child abusers, they join forces with detective Remy Bressant (Ed Harris) and police captain Jack Doyle (Morgan Freeman). As Patrick finds himself in a seemingly never-ending web of lies and violence, the shocking secret that hid the truth leaves him facing a moral dilemma that will force him to question what he believes is right.
A Boston native with an undying passion for the city, Ben Affleck was instantly hooked upon reading the Lehane novel, and set out to acquire the rights for the book series. Working with his long-time friend Aaron Stockard, with whom he had gone to high school in Boston, the Academy Award-winning screenwriter worked on the script for a couple of years, during which time he became a parent himself, making the story resonate even deeper for him.
“The adaptation was extremely challenging, and I had the benefit of a gifted partner, who worked on it with me,” the Daredevil star tells MediaBlvd Magazine. “It was challenging for a number of reasons, and chief among them was that, simply on a basic plot level, it was extremely complicated just trying to get all of the basic, fundamental plot twists, and seeding enough of the elements that you buy the reveals that happen at the end. Understanding the basic, factual elements of the story was really tough, considering that you have to distill the book into an hour and 54-minute movie. That’s hard because you don’t want to lose all the wonderful nuances, texture, dialog and ambiance. I picked the book foolishly, because I really liked it, and because I’m not that good at writing plot. I didn’t really want to write an original story. I wanted to find something that had a story architecture that I could fall back on, set in a world I could understand, so that I could just work on character and dialogue, which I feel more confident about. It just turned out that I set myself up for the most difficult job possible.”
{quote_top}Even though it’s a natural assumption that Ben wrote the role with his brother, Casey Affleck, in mind, the 35-year-old says that that was not the case. “The character in the book, and the character in the original adaptation, was between 35 and 40,” explains Ben. “I was at the point where the script was completed, and I was looking for an actor because I wasn’t really happy with how I was feeling about this whole story arc. I couldn’t find an actor, so I thought, ‘What if I make him younger, around 29 or 30?,’ which gave him more to lose and somewhere to go, but didn’t really change the story, fundamentally. With the character being 10 years younger, it put a fork in the road of his life. Then, I thought, ‘This lets me cast this great actor who knows Boston, who I can get, and who I can also afford.’”
Originally, when he first optioned the book, Ben admits that he initially thought he would adapt it and then find a director, so that he could act in it. Then, as he got more involved in it, that became less of a priority for him. “At first, I didn’t think it worked as a screenplay, but we just hadn’t done a very good job. Then, I thought we did a mediocre job. And then, I thought we had done an okay job. And then, I thought maybe I should direct, but I knew I couldn’t direct and act in it. So, it just shifted because I was terrified of acting and directing. The thought was completely daunting. The idea of directing, alone, was terrifying. I don’t know how in the world Clint Eastwood managed to do Unforgiven, or Kevin Costner did Dances with Wolves, when you’re in every shot, and you’re directing. It just seems incredibly difficult.”
{quote_middle}A father himself, Casey became involved with the project while his brother was still writing it, but because he was also working on The Assassination of Jesse James at the time, they didn’t really start to work together on it until the script was finished. “He gave me the script and asked me if I wanted to do it, and then we were shooting about six months later,” Casey tells MediaBlvd Magazine. “During those six months, there was a fair bit of back and forth because Ben is really comfortable with that. I don’t think he felt insecure about saying, ‘What do you think of this?,’ or hearing and taking my ideas, and putting them into the script. There are a lot of people who might feel territorial, like ‘Man, if I take this guy’s idea and put it in the script, or if he doesn’t like what I suggest to him, what does that say about me, as a director or writer?’ He’s won an Oscar. He’s had a lot of success. He’s a confident person. I think that enables him to be as collaborative as he was, which was great.”
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Casey Affleck at the premiere of "Gone Baby Gone" held at the Mann Bruin Theater in Westwood, Calif. on October 9, 2007.
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Once they finally got on set together, Casey reveals that taking direction from his brother was easy, and not all that unlike working with any other director. “We just spoke the same language. We were very comfortable saying to one another, ‘I think that’s a terrible idea,’ or ‘That’s a great idea, but what if we did it this way?’ We could build on one another’s excitement. We also had a short-hand with each other. Those kinds of things are really helpful because there’s not a lot of time, when you’re doing a movie. There were a lot of things that made working with him great, but more than anything, I have to say that it was not that special. It wasn’t something that changed our relationship. The experience wasn’t a huge difference from the way that I relate to any other director. I would just say that he did it very well. He articulated what he wanted. He was also very inclusive, collaborative and patient, and he would listen to me. That attitude always made me, the other actors, the cinematographer, and everyone else, feel like they were included in the process, and that their ideas were on the line as well. That brings everyone together and makes everyone feel like they all want the movie to be good because it’s their ideas that are out there.”
Now that he’s directed his brother, Ben says that he has really gotten to see how talented Casey is. “I was really struck by that, and impressed by that. He was brave. And, I got to see that he had a fearlessness that I really admired. I was just so satisfied, and personally rewarded, by the fact that he is really good in this movie. It just makes me so happy. I know, on some level, there are people who thought, ‘Oh, he’s just casting his brother,’ and those people are going to see the movie and see that they were wrong.”
{quote_bottom}Although they didn’t always agree on creative decisions, Ben says that Casey’s input made both the movie and his performance better. “You’re not doing the right thing, if you’re always agreeing,” says Ben. “The worst mistakes I’ve made, creatively, have been when I’ve just agreed. With this, we made a lot of stuff a lot better, just talking things over. Sometimes, we talked ourselves in circles, but that’s the nature of the creative process. Casey is a very smart guy, and he always focuses on making the scene, and the movie, better. He’s the guy you want doing a movie with you because you know he’s a really good actor. He’s authentically thinking, living, surprising and engaging throughout, giving you a wide array of stuff to use. He also challenges you to make sure that you know what you’re doing, and you have an answer for those questions, while you’re making the movie.”
