Patricia Clarkson takes the wheel

Ben Kingsley and Patricia Clarkson as Darwan and Wendy

Ben Kingsley and Patricia Clarkson star in Learning to Drive, a new film by Isabel Coixet

The veteran of stage and screen buckles up for a bumpy ride in Learning to Drive, a new film that puts the pedal to the metal of marriage breakdown with surprisingly comic results thanks to co-star Sir Ben Kingsley, and the gentle hand of director Isabel Coixet

By Katherine Monk

TORONTO – There’s something undeniably regal about Patricia Clarkson, even when she’s vomiting into a toilet and playing an entirely unlaced woman of letters. It’s an underlying strength that inhabits every bone in her sinewy body, and you can feel it in her relaxed presence.

 

She’s a woman who is comfortable in her own skin, and it shines through every freckle.

 

“I was fed perseverance as a child,” she says. “I have a very strong mother, and strong parents who were loving and gave me the confidence and ability to survive.”

 

Clarkson says she had to rely on that deep well of self-possession when she started Learning to Drive. A new film directed by Isabel Coixet (My Life Without Me) and based on a story by Katha Pollitt, Learning to Drive tells the story of Wendy, an academic and book critic who gets dumped by her husband in the opening scene and realizes she’ll have to navigate an entirely new reality – behind the wheel of her own life.

 

The metaphor is played out literally, to great comic effect, alongside Sir Ben Kingsley, who plays the sage-like driving instructor with his own dark past. “I loved this movie. I loved the short story that Katha wrote for The New Yorker. I loved this character. I thought she was singular, original, funny as hell and serendipitously, the script was sent to me.“

 

Clarkson signed on, but things stalled. “I have been attached to it for eight years. And after many circuitous turns it finally came to fruition last summer and here it is now, finally….”

 

Clarkson says it was worth the struggle.

 

“Finding good roles isn’t easy at any time, but to have such a poignant and funny combo for a woman my age, and to have all that rolled into one genuinely funny character, it was something you keep working at… You know, you get to play funny, but not funny. We get to have a lot of emotions, but really a powerful emotional life with rage? I just thought it was a beautiful portrait of a woman who had lived a deeply, intellectual life — and a powerful, meaningful work life. I wish I were smart enough to be a book critic.”

 

Clarkson says her connection to the work grew even deeper when she and director Coixet seduced Kingsley to the project, reuniting the team behind Elegy.

 

“I love these characters and their interactions. They are yin and yang. Opposites attract but at the end of the day what they have — which is very moving to me — is a truly profound friendship between two grown adults. They come to such a beautiful place in their lives. When you are my age, to have that level of love is rare—and it has nothing to do with sex. It has everything to do with understanding.”

 

 

“He plays a man in a whole different set of circumstances with his own grief. He’s an ordinary man who happens to be Sikh. And it was an honour to show the inside of the Sikh community in the New York. And of course, they were over the moon that Sir Ben was playing the role.”

 

Together, the two actors were given the freedom and the space to play two real adults facing real adult problems – such as learning to drive later in life.

 

“To be honest, the driving was frightening for me. I sort of lost my ability to drive, and so there was some life and art merging,”says Clarkson, who had to drive over bridges without the aid of a special process truck. “The fear in that scene was real.”

 

Fortunately, so is the connection between Clarkson and Kingsley, who create plenty of chemistry in their scenes, but never share a bedroom.

 

“I love these characters and their interactions. They are yin and yang. Opposites attract but at the end of the day what they have — which is very moving to me — is a truly profound friendship between two grown adults. They come to such a beautiful place in their lives. When you are my age, to have that level of love is rare—and it has nothing to do with sex. It has everything to do with understanding.”

 

Clarkson says since she and Kingsley and Coixet worked on Elegy together, they all share a quiet bond that let them find a working rhythm quite quickly, despite an abridged rehearsal period of just three days.

 

“I always felt the comedy in this was so well written, and so well drawn, and we are comedic actors, Sir Ben and I. We’re not called on it as often as we could be, but we like comedy. And there’s an intimacy to it, which is what Isabel is a master at: We remain in the centre and never drift too far. We remain at the nucleus of this film, regardless of the disparate worlds we inhabit, we remain one – and that’s Isabel. Fate smiled on us when she came onboard.”

 

Clarkson says the other beam of good fortune came in the form of investor and hedge fund millionaire Gabriel Hammond, one half of Broad Green Pictures, a relatively new US-based distribution company created by Hammond and his brother Daniel. Hammond wrote the hefty cheque that financed Learning to Drive. “He’s a young man, a young beautiful man, and he could have made a million movies in this world. And he chose a film about a middle-aged couple and I am forever thankful. He could have written a cheque for something a lot hipper, with beautiful people in thongs, but he chose us.”

 

Clarkson laughs, and you can hear a husky hint of fatigue. “I’ve reached a point at 54 where I am perpetually humbled. I am humbled that people come to me. I am humbled all the time by this journey. And there are still things I want to do, things I won’t give up on, like my Tallulah Bankhead movie. I won’t give up on that one either.”

 

Right now, she’s sitting back and drinking in the satisfaction of completion. “So far the reception has been fantastic. I’m gob-smacked. Gales of laughter… I think the comedy catches people by surprise. But I always knew it was there… it’s why I had faith.”

 

Learning to Drive opens August 28.

 

@katherinemonk

THE EX-PRESS.COM

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1 Reply to "Patricia Clarkson takes the wheel"

  • Dave Chesney August 27, 2015 (4:59 pm)

    The concept sounds very interesting, I can see why she waited all those years for the movie to be made. Thank you for flagging this movie