One of my favorite films might never have made it
to the screen were it not for a happy bit of happenstance. As actress Anne
Bancroft recalled in her introduction to the 1995 edition of 84, Charing Cross
Road, “Some years ago, as I was sitting on the beach on Fire Island, a man
strolling by approached me. I didn’t know the fellow, so his exclamation―’I’ve
just read something that would be perfect for you!’―took me by surprise.”
She went on to say that he returned the following
day with a copy of Helen Hanff’s best-seller. “His enthusiasm seemed
so sincere,” she wrote, “I couldn’t help but be intrigued.”
It was kismet: a case of the right people being at
the right place at the right time. Bancroft read and fell in love with the slim
volume, which is nothing more or less than a thirty-year collection of letters
between an American writer and British antiquarian bookseller.
Knowing how much Hanff’s book had come to mean to
her, Bancroft’s husband―writer/ producer/actor Mel Brooks, bought the screen
rights for her as an anniversary gift, and together they, along with an
exceptional team of movie-making pros, would create what I can only describe as
a love letter to friendship, the nearly lost art of letter writing, books, and the
people who love them.
The film begins in the late 1940s, when television
was new and based in Manhattan, where script writers like Helene Hanff eked
out a living. When we meet her she is middle-aged single gal, living
in a walk-up studio apartment in a Manhattan brownstone. Small though it may
be, it is filled with the things that make her happy: photographs of loved
ones, rows and rows of books, a cozy chair to curl up in, and a black manual
typewriter, where we presume, she toils away reading and writing scripts for Ellery
Queen and other now-vintage drama series, magazine articles and letters: lots and lots
of letters.
If she longs for a bigger place, we wouldn’t know
it. When asked by perspective neighbors how many rooms her apartment has, she replies
cheerily, “I have a work room, a sitting room, a dining room and a kitchen.” And
with that she opens the door for the big reveal. “―And her it is!”
Despite the financial uncertainty of life as a
freelance writer (and a woman freelance writer at that), Ms. Hanff appears to
be quite content, earning enough to pay the bills, buy a few small but
thoughtful gifts for friends, and ‘good clean used copies’ of books she has
read and loved for herself―if and when, she can find them.
And therein lies the rub. It seems that even in 1947
Manhattan, where small independent bookshops could be found on nearly every
corner, finding the books on her wish list, is no easy task. Decades before the
Internet and mega bookstores with their latte cafes and endless inventories,
her only hope of finding these classics lies in an ad placed in the Saturday
Review of Literature by Marks and Co., a small British antiquarian bookstore
located on London’s Charing Cross Road.
With high hopes and a modest budget, Ms. Hanff writes
the first of what will be many letters to the shop, asking if they can help
her.
A dusty, throwback of a place even then, the shop
at 84 Charing Cross Road is a study in understated earnestness, with stacks of
books and prints unapologetically piled on large tables, and seemingly endless rows
of gently used books lining its floor-to-ceiling shelves.
Frank Doel, answers Hanff’s letter, in a veddy
British, impersonal tone that will warm over time as he, his co-workers and family
slowly but surely become an important part of Hanff’s life, and she of theirs. Formal salutations give way to more informal
greetings, as bits and pieces of their lives are shared along with book requests
and confirmations.
As the stranger on the beach predicted, Bancroft
was perfectly cast in the role of the slightly eccentric Ms. Hanff. Directed by David Jones, Produced by Mr.
Brooks, and captured on film by David West, it boasts a stellar cast, music either
written or conducted by George Fenton, and the look, feel and charm of a bygone
era of movie-making.
I love the way this 1987 film is laid out; from
the role the letters play, to the sets and bits and pieces of everyday living
that give the viewer a real sense of the times. I love the simplicity of the
dialogue and West’s cinematography: no quick cuts, no special effects, no four-letter
words or hidden agendas: proof positive that good things do indeed come in
small packages.
As previously noted, Anne Bancroft does a fine job
of capturing Hanff’s gently sarcastic wit, genuine kindness and unabashed enthusiasm
not only for British literature, but life itself. Anthony Hopkins, as Frank
Doel, similarly fits comfortably into the role of the proper but genuinely
decent British bookstore seller.
One of the joys of watching this 1987 film some
twenty-eight years after its release is in seeing well-loved and
long-established actors in small supporting roles. There’s Mercedes Ruehl as
Helene’s actress friend, Veronica, a pre-Dame Judi Dench as Frank Doel’s wife,
Nora, and a dark-haired, somewhat lighter version of Ian McNeice, cast as the
bookshop’s cataloguer. Doc Martin fans know him as the series’ fumbling but
good-natured plumber-turned-restaurateur, Bert Large.
One of my favorite scenes in the film features
McNeice, as he and his great aunt (played with glee by the marvelous Gwen
Nelson) enjoy a bit of tinned beef courtesy of Ms. Hanff. A holiday treat in
post-war Britain, it’s part of a ‘CARE’ package of hard-to-get food stuffs the
writer has sent to the shop’s employees. It is such small, well-written and
acted moments that make the film a joy to watch.
As for the book that started it all; no one was
more surprised at its success than Hanff herself. Published some two years
after Frank Doel’s unexpected death in 1971, it would be developed into a
small, two-person off-Broadway play before moving on to the “great white way”
and the London stage in 1981. It was only when the book was turned into a film
that the cast, sets, scenes and storyline were expanded, filling in the blanks
with bits of conversation, charming us with on-location shots of New York and
London, and taking us into the apartments, neighborhoods and cubbies of Hanff’s
beloved bookshop.'
I was lucky enough to interview Helen Hanff a year
or so before she passed away in 1997. I was hosting a radio talk show at the
time, and had scheduled a one-hour interview with the author. Some twenty
minutes in, a visiting nurse arrived at her bedside, cutting the conversation
short. But in
the time we had, she told of how the book had impacted her life, and noted that
while the film may hint of an unfulfilled romance between the letter writers,
there was none. What there was, was a real affection for not only Mr. Doel, but
his family and the people who were the heart of the now long-gone bookshop.
Should you travel to Charing Cross Road―as I did
some years ago, you’ll find a plaque where Marks & Co once stood, its words
marking the fact that the shop truly existed, forever remembered in print, on
stage, and film thanks to the late Ms. Hanff. It is a tribute the author, that, after reading
the book and seeing the movie, people tend to head for the nearest used book
shop, where they, like Hanff, look for good clean copies of books they read and
loved, or meant to read.
“I love the inscriptions on the leaves and notes
in the margins, and reading passages someone long gone has called to my
attention” Hanff wrote. A sentiment that is at the very heart of this film.
