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Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, May 2004

On the Cover: EQMM Featured in Johnny Depp Movie!

EQMM: Tell us about how you came across "Secret Window, Secret Garden."
KOEPP: It was easy! It showed up. There is an executive from Comumbia who has optioned the story from Stephen King, and called me and said "This might be up your alley, why don't you take a look." So i did. And liked it very much. There we have it.
EQMM: As with The Trigger Effect and Stir of Echoes, you were the screenwriter as well as the director. how is it directing a fil in which you've had a major hand in the screenplay?
KOEPP: Well, it's the third time I've done it, so I'm getting used to it. What's wonderful is you get to see your idea all the way through from beginning to end. When you write and hand it off to someone else to direct, their job is to interpret your work, so it's going to come out different then you expect. It may come out better. I've been fortunate enough to work with some really brilliant directors. But it always comes out differant. So you're always left to wonder what it would have benn like if you had carried it through all the way the way you saw it initially. So it's better because you get a chance to see it all the way through. It's more creatively satisfying. What's not great about it is that you lose a valuable collaborator. A writer is really important to a director because that's the only person who has the same creative stake in the project as you do. And sometimes when it's late at night, and you're shooting, and you're confused about something, it's great to have that other person there who's been involved as long as you have.
EQMM: Was Stephen King involved in the screenwriting process?
KOEPP: Not really. I mean, he read the draft and gave comments which was helpful. He's had so many movies made of his books that he realizes the thing to do it to sort of stand back and let you do your thing. He knows you've got to make your movie and it's going to be different fromthe book.
EQMM: You seem to like thrillers.
KOEPP: Yes. I like suspense very much.
EQMM: What's the attraction?
KOEPP: I just think it's uniquely filmic. It's one of those things that movies are very very good at. And I guess I respond to paranoia and that kind of thing. I don't know why. I dont't know why you like what you like. When I was Writing the script for the Panic Room, was talking to brian De Palma,a dn he asked, "What's it about?" And I said, "You know, some old thing. Upper-middle-class white people afraid in their houses. I cant't face this again." And he said, "Relax. It's called who you are. You write what's in you."
EQMM: Do you enjoy reading crime, suspense, thrillers?
KOEPP: Sure, when they're good.
EQMM: Any particular authors stand out?
KOEPP: I haven't read a novel since I started shooting this movie. But I loveElmore Leonard. James Ellroy I like. His best thing, I thought was My Dark Places.
EQMM: When you chose ro put this film, togeather you chose to keep the name of Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine prominebly in the story. Wouldn't it have been easier to chance it to a generic no-name publication?
KOEPP: No. The great thing about it is that it's just a wonderful name, and it's so well known. At least, well known to me-and people of my ilk. And it's so specific, it's great. I don't think there are any disadvantages to it. I thought it was fun once we cast Tim Hutton, whose father had played Ellery Queen on the television. It;s a great literary magazine. It's been around for a long time. And it's also graphically very strong. The cover was great. And since it figures prominently in the story, we wanted something that was good to look at. The cover we chose [from the June, 1995 issue of EQMM] shows a woman's feet in red heels going up a a set of stairs and in the background there's a man with a gun. And there's a shot in the movie where the magazine is flung open on a step as Maria Bello's character climes the steps at a moment of great danger. And her foot lands right next to the woman's foot, and it's very nice.
EQMM: Prior to working on this projectm had you read the magazine?
KOEPP: When I was younger I had.
EQMM: When you hear the name "Ellery Queen," what's the image that comesto mind?
KOEPP: The fedora. Immediatately. When the television show was on in the mid seventies, I loved it. I picked up the magazine back then.
EQMM: What was it like working with Stephen King and with the lead actor?
KOEPP: With Stephen King, first of all, it's the best deal on the world. He has all the control over the project, but he doesn't . It's great. He gives you a lot of respect, and a lot of room. you can't beat that.
EQMM: And Johnny Depp?
KOEPP: Johnny is great. He's extreamely inventive. And he's also on a real roll in his career right now, not just in terms of popular success, but artistically. And he comes with tons of ideas, and that's what you want. You want an actor who's going to bring a lot of ideas. And then you hash them out, see what works and what doesn't. But what's great is, since he's playing a writer, which is ulyimately a boring character-They're people who sit and stare, and that's just not cinematic-you want the most inventiveactor you can get. And to me that was Johnny. Movies about writers tend to be boring. But this one isn't , because I think he's so extremely creative.
EQMM: What is John Turturro like?
KOEPP: Turturro was really great too. I mean, he's playing a more extreme character. So he plays off Johnny's naturalism with a more stylized performance. Because he's playing someone who's really extreme.
EQMM: And working with Timothy Hutton?
KOEPP: Hutton was great. I mentioned to him about his dad playing Queen, and he said, "Yeah, that occurren to me, too, it's funny."