Hairy Truman

Peter Weir tunes in

Peter Weir, renowned director of such films as Picnic at Hanging Rock, The Year of Living Dangerously, and Dead Poets Society, is leery of good reviews.

"It was the first really good review, and I knew we were sunk," he says of the response to his commercial flop/critical hit Fearless (1993), the story of survivors of a plane crash. "At the end it said, `By the way, if you have any fear of flying, do not go and see this movie.' Most people are terrified of flying, of course, and didn't go to see the film."

Given hindsight, of course, Weir would have made a movie about a sinking ocean liner. But the fate of Fearless didn't make him fearful; for his next project he searched for something even riskier. "After Fearless my feeling was not to become more conservative but to go further in my own exploration of themes and ideas. I wanted something that would be considered unsafe and difficult."

If people are afraid of flying, what would they make of a film exposing the even greater dangers posed by the media? By 1993 Andrew Niccol's script for The Truman Show, the tale of an average guy whose life, unbeknownst to him, is a TV show watched by a billion people, had been turned down many times. Weir, however, was swayed by the knowledge that Jim Carrey, already huge after his hits Dumb and Dumber and Ace Ventura, was interested.

"My hesitation to accept the movie was really because I couldn't see who could play the part. The individual had to be a star. Why otherwise did people watch this show for 30 years? It's because the guy was a naturally funny, if unwitting, star."

And those tuning in to The Truman Show expecting another funny Carrey film could be the unwitting viewers of something more serious. As with his work with Robin Williams in Dead Poets Society, Weir found himself the mentor of a madcap comic who wanted to be a serious actor.

"With both of them I said, `I don't want to inhibit your comic side.' I was afraid they would become so self-conscious about being serious that it would harm their performance. So I said, `Whenever we see a chance to let your comic side come in, then let's do it.' I like to feel that there's a chance for new ideas to emerge on the set."

One of the ideas behind The Truman Show, Weir acknowledges, is rather old. The notion of someone held in exile in a community created specifically for him was the premise behind Patrick McGoohan's '60s cult-favorite TV series, The Prisoner. "It's similar but with a big update. Instead of its being a secret, because the public would be outraged if they knew what was going on, as it is in The Prisoner, here the public are complicit. They are watching and enjoying his predicament.

"In The Truman Show we're exposing the blurring of the line between reality and un-reality. Are they all acting in the show? Are they all real people? Does anybody care? Does anyone remember that this is an exploitation of an individual? Only at the very end do they see how horrid the experience is, that this is a real human being who may die, and not an actor. It was rather like the buyers of the tabloids and the followers of Diana's life. They were horrified at the paparazzi who hounded her to her death, but those people were out getting stories for them."

-- PK

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