Bedside reading

Woody Harrelson at the BFI

Before Woody Harrelson came on stage for his live interview at the BFI London Film Festival an official reminded the audience not to take their own photos. I respectfully complied while everyone around me snapped pictures on their smartphones and cameras for the next 90 minutes. Some of them even used flash.

It's always interesting to see movie and TV actors in the flesh. Harrelson looks and sounds exactly has he does on screen: crooked smile, Texas drawl (he was raised in Texas and Ohio). It's interesting that such a distinctive actor has had such a varied filmography. He called his career sketchy but it could be compared to Michael Caine's: the same presence tuned to different intensities.

The interview presentation leaned to the political. Harrelson was queried about his roles in The People vs Larry Flynt and Natural Born Killers in terms of their political and social "impact" and the actor responded in kind, saying he had "learned things" from every role and that "we don't have free speech in my country." But the tilt of the questions implied a right and a wrong answer, resulting in some awkward silences. It's only acting, after all, and off someone else's script.

Harrelson majored in theater arts and English at college before moving to New York and landing no parts for two years. His breakthrough role in Cheers came a few months after he landed an agent whom he credited more than once for his success.

He talked about Oliver Stone's "gentle quality" and mimicked Milos Forman's fatalistic gruffness. He cited Marlon Brando's quote that acting is not an art and said now that his kids are at school, "school always wins out" against career decisions. He dropped a good-natured hint (not picked up) about drinking with Jeff Bridges and Sandra Bullock and is still friends with Larry Flynt. When Harrelson and his wife "were having some trouble" in the past Flynt "helped out" by appealing the actor's wife on his behalf. We don't know what the trouble was or what the publisher of Hustler said to her that helped. Cue another awkward silence.

The best question of the night came from the floor, about working on The Thin Red Line. Harrelson said Terence Malick was an interesting man and "kind of a savant" before raising his voice to a childlike whine and imitating the director standing with his head tilted, pointing at a field of grass saying, I kinda like the way the light falls; let's film that.

Harrelson was at the London Film Festival to promote his new film Rampart, which is based on a James Ellroy story. The clip looked good. Harrelson said the dramatisation differs from the source not least of all because director Oren Moverman has been "making a lot of changes in post," his emphasis implying changes beyond traditional editing. In the clip that was shown Harrelson's crooked smile appeared to tilt the other way and I wondered if the footage had been flipped: the opposite of the man we saw on stage.

Hey Jupiter

The Moon and Jupiter, 2150hrs.

"I spent most of my life trying to humour people"

Hunter S. Thompson talks about The Rum Diaries.

Departure Lounge on air

Someone's just told me that National Radio are re-broadcasting their dramatised reading of Departure Lounge all this week, afternoons at 2:30pm. Not sure if it's available as a podcast. Happy if it was. The radio version is abridged, read by Jed Brophy and features a Fripp & Eno track.

As a child I was introduced to many stories via the radio version. I particularly remember a dramatisation of The Black Cloud by Fred Hoyle: it was scary and atmospheric.

Anyway, Departure Lounge is on, or was by the time you've read this. If you're quick you can still catch the ending.

The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie

I reviewed Midnight in Paris in 1985 when it came out as The Purple Rose of Cairo; before that it was, broadly, Play It Again Sam. Paris is Woody in his magical mode, better than its predecessors but not as flip as, say, Scoop, or as sexy as Match Point, and it's not the fizzy slam-dunk of Vicky Cristina Barcelona... but it's still a delight, and a relief. I wish more movies were made this way. The camera is about the lens and the takes are long because he worked out that that way, he can spend less time in the editing suite. The script flows in his own voice; when "Hemingway" talks it jars but when Brody comes on as Dali things lift off.

By setting his late-period movies in Europe Allen has become the great chronicler of the Comfortable American – a five-star Continent of hotels, shopping, tourist strolls – without being seduced by it. Gil (Owen Wilson) is likewise bored. Spirited back to the 1920s, the American writer tells Bunuel about a great idea for a movie about a dinner party. Bunuel doesn't get it ('Why don't they just leave?'); Gil can't stop to explain. Midnight in Paris is an old man's movie: short on time, not fussing over the details.

He churns them out. That's what I like most about Woody Allen. He just goes out and does it, making two a year sometimes, and lets them stand or fall. He's sentimental but doesn't look back; sour but not bitter; captivated by youth, but casts them in great parts. It's a story of magic: it's just another piece of work.

Find Your Ancestors: The Avengers girl

The Cathy Gale role was originally written for a male. When the makers decided to recast the role for a female the studio was too cheap to commission rewrites so Honor Blackman was given the first eight scripts as they were written, dialogue and fight scenes included. Thus the "Avengers girl" was born.

BRIAN CLEMENS: I didn't do Diana a very good service. It made her an international star but I think I could have done more for her as far as the script was concerned. She was rather a stooge to Patrick Macnee's Steed.

JULIE NEWMAR: This is what I get from people when they talk to me about the original Catwoman and compare it to the latter ones. I think people prefer the more humorous one, the lighter one. People seem to complain that the recent ones are too dark in spirit. But that's what reflects what's going on... It was a heck of a lot more fun when Adam West and I did it.

BOB RINGWOOD: We had to justify the catsuit. Where did the Selina character get it? Black, shiny fetish clothing can very easily slip into the sleaze/porn world and this, after all, was a film for family viewing.

Q: How much information did you have on the Catwoman issues before drawing the covers?

ADAM HUGHES: Sometimes I'll get one of Will Pfeiffer's scripts, and sometimes I'll get a synopsis because Will is still writing the script. And then sometimes I'll say, "Can I draw Selina in a pool?" And they'll say, okay.

ALAN MARTIN: During the mid-eighties I was in a band with the then unknown Philip Bond. One of our favourite songs was a track we had written called 'Rocket Girl.' I was studying at Worthing at this time, which is where we met up with Jamie Hewlett. He and Philip hit it off straight away. I was a little put off by Jamie's habit of drawing huge penises on any paper that he came across.

Jamie had drawn a grotty looking girl brandishing an unfeasible firearm. One of our friends was working on a project to design a pair of headphones and was basing his design on the type used by World War II tank driver. His studio was littered with loads of photocopies of combat vehicles. I pinched one of the images and gave it to Jamie who then stuck it behind his grotty girl illustrations and then added a logo which read 'Tank Girl'.

DR: Where you surprised at how popular she became?

AM: It didn't really come as a shock to us.

STIEG LARSSON: I considered Pippi Longstocking. What would she be like today? What would she be like as an adult? What would you call a person like that, a sociopath? Hyperactive? Wrong. She simply sees society in a different light. I'll make her 25 years old and an outcast. She has no friends and is deficient in social skills. That was my original thought.