But the interesting thing is that, because I have it, I never sent it! (Both Laugh) Because if I had sent it, my life might have been totally different! (Both Laugh)
TO: Yeah.
AC: But I know why I didn’t send it when I think about it. I’m sure my husband said, ‘Don’t you dare send that letter!’ (Laughs) But, you know, I was so angry and we were negotiating and they were offering so little money. And typical me—to leap into that without stopping to think…
TO: But it was David Lean. Coming off of The Bridge on the River Kwai…
AC: Yes, but it’s funny. If I had of sent it, it wouldn’t have happened. So, I’m going to give it to the Academy museum.
TO: What a great story. (Both Laugh)
AC: Yeah and I just found it and remembered the story. I haven’t really told it before.
TO: Thanks for telling me. So much has been written about Lawrence that can be found in many books and documentaries. And because I didn’t want to ask you a question that you’ve probably answered hundreds of time, one of the things I’ve wanted to ask you is that when you look at this body of work that you have been involved with, what stands out?
AC: Well, I don’t know if there are moments that stand out—it’s the whole film. After David finished shooting it, we had 16 weeks before the Queen saw it. Which as you know, being an editor, 16 weeks to finish a film that’s three hours and forty minutes? I had the whole picture cut except for the last battle scene, which David was still shooting. He came off the battle scene and straight into the cutting room. And we were working day and night to get the film ready. Seven days a week, 16 to 17 hours a day. And sometimes I think that if we had more time we may have done some things differently. So, we finished the film and everybody’s consensus was that it was a great film, but it was too long. After we had shown it to the Queen, I went back with David and we cut out about 15 minutes from it. And I think I was even more upset than David was about that because I thought all the scenes were great and very beautiful.
TO: Was it overwhelming to get all that material?
AC: The difficulty was that I could make another film out of the outtakes! (Both Laugh) We had such beautiful stuff. The mirage work was amazing. In fact, we cut one of the mirage sequences out just before we finished it.
TO: Was that difficult?
AC: You know, David… I so admired him. He was so brave with taking stuff out. Much more than me and he taught me two or three things about editing that were invaluable. Things like holding shots and visualizing them with music and all sorts of things like that. Whereas I would have been chopping it down a bit more I think. He also taught me to have the courage of my conviction. He said, ‘If you think you’re right, say it! Work on it and show people what you think. And always follow your own truth and be truthful about what you do.’
TO: It’s interesting that when you watch documentaries about filmmaking almost always there is the clip of the match. I watched one the other day on the magic of film editing and of course it was right there. It has taken on such an iconic status in our little world of film editing.
AC: (Laughs) I know! I don’t know why. One of my children said to me the other day, ‘Mum, why is that cut so famous?’ (Laughs) I mean, I couldn’t explain why. Some journalist from Australia rang me up at three o’clock in the morning once to ask me what I was thinking when I did it! (Both Laugh) Ten years later!
TO: That’s hilarious.
AC: I can’t put my finger on the magic of that, really.
TO: A captured moment in a film full of them.
AC: I’ll tell you an interesting thing about it that I’ve thought about since that I didn’t at the time. I was cutting on a 35mm Cinemascope print and because the film was butted together and just had the crayon marks on it where the dissolve was going to be. And when we took it into the theatre, we saw the cut going from the match blowing to the sunrise.
TO: It was going to be a dissolve instead of that cut…
AC: Yes, and we would never have done that had it been on digital because we’d have done the dissolve in the machine, probably, and never really looked at it. But we saw—David and I—the potential of that. Because I had gotten David into direct cutting.
TO: What do you mean?
AC: I had gotten him to go see some of the French films before we started. They were doing all of this direct cutting and David loved it when he saw it. And I think we did it as well as anybody. But again, if we had been on digital, we might not have seen it. But on film, we saw it and we thought, ‘My God, it works as a cut’. And we rubbed the lines off and looked at it again. And he said to me, ‘It’s not quite right, Annie, take it away and take a few frames off and see if you can make it really perfect.’ And I literally took two frames off, took it back, and he said, ‘That’s it.’
TO: That’s a great story.
AC: Yeah (Laughs).
TO: Were you astonished about the awards it received and that you won an Academy Award?
AC: I was totally astonished that I won an award. I didn’t even know what a nomination was! I knew so little about the Academy Awards. They flew over Peter O’Toole and Omar and people like that.
Anne’s Oscar and BAFTA awards for Lawrence of Arabia
Photos by Tom Ohanian
TO: So how did you find out?
AC: David rang me in the morning and said, ‘Well, you won and then I knew we were going to do fairly well.’ Because he said that if editing won, that was a fairly good omen. But, no, I didn’t expect to win.
TO: What films are some of your favorites?
AC: Wuthering Heights is still my very favorite film, ever. I just think it was fantastic. Have you ever seen Les Enfants du Paradis?
TO: Sure. I know it as Children of Paradise, the English name.
AC: I love that film. I definitely have that on my top ten.
TO: What highlights stand out in this amazing career of yours?
AC: You know there was always something that Carol Reed once said to me that’s always been a highlight. He said, ‘I’ve worked with many really good editors, but you’re the one with the most heart.’ And I think that’s something that I really treasure. There have been so many ups and downs in life. You know, things I’ve been disappointed about. I mean I really wanted to cut A Man for all Seasons.
TO: What happened?
AC: They wanted me to do it. And they rang up who they thought was my agent. And he said, ‘She’s not free, she’s busy.’ And they hired somebody else. And by that time, I thought, ‘I’m going to ring up myself and ask Bill Graf (Executive Producer) if they were thinking of me. And he said, ‘Are you free? I thought you were busy! We just hired somebody yesterday. If you had rung up yesterday, it would have been yours.’
TO:
