The Remains of the Day (1993) is a Merchant Ivory Film adapted by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala from the novel by Kazuo Ishiguro. It was directed by James Ivory, produced by Ismail Merchant, and starred Anthony Hopkins as Stevens and Emma Thompson as Miss Kenton, with James Fox, Christopher Reeve, Hugh Grant, and Ben Chaplin. The film was nominated for eight Academy Awards.
Synopsis
In 1950s England, Mr. Stevens (Anthony Hopkins), the emotionally-repressed butler of Darlington Hall, receives a letter from Miss Kenton (Emma Thompson), who worked with him as housekeeper during the years prior to the Second World War. Twenty years later, Lord Darlington (James Fox) has died, and his stately country manor has been sold to a retired American Congressman, Mr. Lewis (Christopher Reeve). Kenton reveals that her marriage has failed and that she is nostalgic for the days when she worked at the house. Stevens (who is now one of the few servants from Darlington's era left) goes to visit Miss Kenton, ostensibly to persuade her to return to service.
The film flashes back to Kenton's arrival as housekeeper. At the time, Darlington Hall was frequented by many politicians of the interwar period, men who decided important affairs of state while there. Stevens, loyal and perfectionistic, calm and efficient, had to manage the household so that the servants seemed almost invisible, and he took great pride in his skills and his profession. He clashed with Miss Kenton, his equal in the household hierarchy, but displayed only understated irritation with her and others. Indeed, his utter focus and emotional repression were most fully displayed when his own father, also an employee, was dying; Stevens continued his duties without pause.
Miss Kenton was equally efficient and strong-willed but warmer and less repressed. Relations between the two eventually warmed, and Kenton even teased Stevens. It becomes clear that she had fallen in love with him, and perhaps he with her, though his feelings are left ambiguous. She tried to break through the wall, but Stevens' coldness was too formidable. When she cried in frustration, the only response he could muster was to call her attention to a domestic task. Finally, she struck up a relationship with another man and married him, leaving the house just before the outbreak of World War II. Before her departure, she insulted Stevens, clearly out of distress that he had never expressed any emotional interest in her, but he still refused to be moved.
Lord Darlington used his influence to broker the policy of appeasement towards Nazi Germany. He irritated Congressman Lewis, one of the dignitaries at a conference, who argued in favour of the Realpolitik of professionals, rather than that of "honourable amateurs". After reading the work of Houston Stewart Chamberlain, Lord Darlington commanded that two German-Jewish maids should be dismissed, considering their employment inappropriate. Stevens, typically, carried out the order without reflection, but Miss Kenton almost resigned in protest, fearing that the girls would have to return to Germany; her own need for employment caused her to avoid making this gesture. Darlington later regretted his decision and asked Stevens to reinstate the maids, but they could not be located.
Darlington died a broken man, his reputation destroyed after his role in appeasement had been exposed in the Daily Mail. Subsequently, Stevens admits to being the butler at Darlington Hall but initially denies having served or even met Darlington. He now recognizes his former master's failings and indicates that he has regrets about his own life, as does Miss Kenton (now Mrs. Benn). However, Kenton declines Stevens' offer to return to Darlington Hall, announcing instead that she wants to remain with her husband, since their daughter is soon to present them with a grandchild. After the meeting, Stevens departs for Darlington Hall in a downpour of rain. Kenton cries, while Stevens, still unable to demonstrate any feeling, simply raises his hat.
The film's final scene shows Stevens making the final preparations to Darlington Hall in preparation for the arrival of Congressman Lewis' family. As the two men enter the banquet hall, where a ping-pong table now lies, Congressman Lewis reflects on the banquet that he attended in this room in 1935 and admits embarrassment over his comments. He asks Stevens if he remembers the comments, to which Stevens replies that he was too busy serving. Symbolically, a pigeon then flies into the room through the fireplace and becomes trapped in the hall. The two men eventually coax it out a window and it flees to freedom, leaving Stevens and Darlington Hall behind.
Cast
Background and production notes
A film adaptation of the novel was originally to be directed by Mike Nichols, from a script by Harold Pinter; some of Pinter's script was used in the film, but, while Pinter was paid for his work, he asked to have his name removed from the credits, in keeping with his contract.[1] Christopher C. Hudgins observes: "During our 1994 interview, Pinter told [Steven H.] Gale and me that he had learned his lesson after the revisions imposed on his script for The Handmaid's Tale, which he has decided not to publish. When his script for Remains of the Day was radically revised by the James Ivory–Ismail Merchant partnership, he refused to allow his name to be listed in the credits" (125).[2][3][4]
Though no longer the director, Nichols remained associated with the project as one of the producers of the Merchant Ivory film.
Settings
A number of English country house estates were used as locations for the film, partly owing to the persuasive power of Ismail Merchant, who was able to cajole permission for the production to borrow various houses not normally open to the public. Among them was Dyrham Park for the exterior of the house and the driveway, Powderham Castle (staircase, hall, music room), the interior of which was used for the aqua-turquoise stairway scenes, Corsham Court (library and dining room), and Badminton House (servants' quarters). Luciana Arrighi, the production designer, scouted most of these locations. Scenes were also shot in Weston-super-Mare.
Music
- For details, see The Remains of the Day (soundtrack).
Awards
The film was nominated for eight Academy Awards:
Notes
- ^ "In November 1994 Pinter wrote that 'I've just heard that they are bringing another writer into the "Lolita" film. It doesn't surprise me.' … Pinter's contract contained a clause to the effect that the film company could bring in another writer, but that in such a case he could withdraw his name (which is exactly the case with [the film] The Remains of the Day—he had insisted on this clause since the bad experience with revisions made to his Handmaid's Tale script); he has never been given any reason as to why another writer was brought in" (Gale 352).
- ^ Hudgins adds: "We did not see Pinter's name up in lights when Lyne's Lolita finally made its appearance in 1998. Pinter goes on in the March 13 [1995] letter [to Hudgins] to state that 'I have never been given any reason at all as to why the film company brought in another writer,' again quite similar to the equally ungracious treatment that he received in the Remains of the Day situation" (125).
- ^ Cf. the essay on the film The Remains of the Day published in Gale's collection by Edward T. Jones: "Pinter gave me a copy of his typescript for his screenplay, which he revised January 24, 1991, during an interview that I conducted with him in London about his screenplay in May 1992, part of which appeared in 'Harold Pinter: A Conversation' in Literature/Film Quarterly, XXI (1993): 2–9. In that interview, Pinter mentioned that Ishiguro liked the screenplay that he had scripted for a proposed film version of the novel. All references to Pinter's screenplay in the text [of Jones's essay] are to this unpublished manuscript" (107n1).
- ^ In his 2008 essay published in The Pinter Review, Hudgins discusses further details about why "Pinter elected not to publish three of his completed filmscripts, The Handmaid's Tale, The Remains of the Day, and Lolita," all of which Hudgins considers "masterful filmscripts" of "demonstrable superiority to the shooting scripts that were eventually used to make the films"; fortunately ("We can thank our various lucky stars"), he says, "these Pinter filmscripts are now available not only in private collections but also in the Pinter Archive at the British Library"; in this essay, which he first presented as a paper at the 10th Europe Theatre Prize symposium, Pinter: Passion, Poetry, Politics, held in Turin, Italy, in March 2006, Hudgins "examin[es] all three unpublished filmscripts in conjunction with one another" and "provides several interesting insights about Pinter's adaptation process" (132).
Works cited
Gale, Steven H. Sharp Cut: Harold Pinter's Screenplays and the Artistic Process. Lexington, KY: The UP of Kentucky, 2003. ISBN 0813122449 (10). ISBN 9780813122441 (13). Print.
–––, ed. The Films of Harold Pinter. Albany: SUNY P, 2003. ISBN 0791449327. ISBN 9780791449325. Print.
Hudgins, Christopher C. "Harold Pinter's Lolita: 'My Sin, My Soul'." 123–46 in Gale, The Films of Harold Pinter.
–––. "Three Unpublished Harold Pinter Filmscripts: The Handmaid's Tale, The Remains of the Day, Lolita." The Pinter Review: Nobel Prize / Europe Theatre Prize Volume: 2005 – 2008. Ed. Francis Gillen with Steven H. Gale. Tampa: U of Tampa P, 2008. 132–39. ISBN 9781879852198 (hardcover). ISBN 9781879852204 (softcover). ISSN 08959706. Print.
Jones, Edward T. "On The Remains of the Day: Harold Pinter Remaindered." 99–107 in Gale, The Films of Harold Pinter.
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