Author says she ‘fought hard’ for her fans
Fifty Shades of Grey devotees, know this: Whether you end up loving or hating the new movie, author EL James had your back.
“I was thinking about the readers,” James says about the sometimes fraught process of adapting her steamy book to the screen — a process that reportedly involved creative differences, to put it gently, with director Sam Taylor-Johnson.
The R-rated film, starring Dakota Johnson and Jamie Dornan, topped North American box office for second time on the Oscar weekend.
“I understand what it’s like to be in fandom,” she says.
“I had to fight for a lot of things really hard. And I did.’’
James, 51, who wrote the erotic trilogy for her own enjoyment and ended up launching a global phenomenon, chats about the new film and the fans whose devotion has brought her such stunning commercial success.
What was the hardest thing about adapting your book?
My biggest concern was making sure that the sex was really classy and tasteful. It’s very coyly written in the books. Women don’t like salacious slang. So that was really important to me, to keep it tasteful.
Making the film, were you thinking about your readers, or about a new audience that perhaps hasn’t read the book?
I was thinking about the readers. There are enough of them! I mean hopefully we’ll bring other people to it as well, of course; there are people who don’t read at all. But my readers are the people I’ve always had in my mind. I understand the disappointment when key scenes are forgotten, or missing, so I was an advocate for them.
Was it a difficult process for the actors?
I think it was very difficult. But all the really intimate stuff happened at the end of the shoot, which meant that Jamie and Dakota got to know each other, and were far more comfortable with each other. That helped.
This isn’t the first movie to have intimate sex scenes.
Absolutely! But you guys, the media, are all about the sex. The fact is, it’s a love story, and women respond to the love story. The fact that there’s a little bit of kinky sex in there is sort of like an added bonus. It’s just become sensationalized, because it’s like ... Oh my God, women like sex. Yes we do, thank you very much!