I had finished my first American film, The Grifters, and was looking for another job. I liked a script called Gloucester Waterfront, which Columbia owned and didn't want to make. Some friends of mine at Paramount wanted to make it. Columbia changed its mind. I decided to stick by my friends. From a cottage in Somerset I tried to make sense of the transatlantic phone calls. I have on occasion bought a Sunday paper in Crewkerne and had dinner that night on Rodeo Drive.

LRB 20 December 1990 | PDF Download