Author Topic: Annie Proulx: "Way Out West"  (Read 2429 times)

Offline Shakesthecoffecan

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Annie Proulx: "Way Out West"
« on: December 04, 2008, 09:45:02 am »
Last night I got to catch all but the first five minutes of an hour long documentary of Annie Proulx on OvationTV, it was a BBC (I think) produced program in the Omnibus series. "Way Out West" was filmed primarily in 2000 as Proulx was researching That Old Ace In The Hole, and then writing it.

I would highly recommend people see it. It shows Proulx in her element, researching, she is happy and smiling and laughing. She interviews a knife maker and a fiddler and the look on her face is like that of the old maid school marm made good, finding her niche and blossoming.

She goes off to Newfoundland to write and it gets interupted, several times, but first she has to return to Wyoming to tend to the details of a movie contract. It is never said which movie it is, but the Shipping News was not released until 2001 so it could have been that. Unless it was in the first five minutes I missed Brokeback is never mentioned.

It is a wonderful portrait of Proulx, and one of my favorite lines she has in it: "Characters have to work, they have to carry part of the story, when they stop I kill them off." She also said she is not sentimental about her characters.
"It was only you in my life, and it will always be only you, Jack, I swear."

Offline SFEnnisSF

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Re: Annie Proulx: "Way Out West"
« Reply #1 on: December 09, 2008, 11:57:38 pm »
I wonder if this is on DVD for rental?