Deep Fry

‘His dialogue is simply faultless. Of course, people think that’s what creenplays are made of, but it isn’t. They are about structure. The experience of film is the experience of story. There are marvellous scenes in the novel, which is great for the film, but Waugh is quite surreal.’

At 6ft 5in tall, Fry is quite surreal to behold himself. A lumbering giant who at first awes you with his enormous size, before wooing you with his golden tongue. He’s articulate and hugely engaging. The subject matter of his film is quite revealing, given Fry’s own historically difficult relations with the press.

‘Newspapers don’t come out of the film that well to be honest,’ he says. ‘People who work for them commit suicide, and they are badly pressured into providing stories. I have said some pretty severe things about the press. It’s a phase you go through if you’re in the public eye. It’s like if you live in a tropical climate. It’s silly to moan about mosquitoes because everyone
knows mosquitoes live in tropical climates and to moan about them is ridiculous, and yet what human being wouldn’t if they were being constantly bitten?’

Fry has already been bitten by one mosquito in Alexander Waugh, grandson of
Evelyn, who has attacked him for changing the title of the film.

‘It’s in the interest of the book that the title has changed. There is now and always will be only one Vile Bodies, and that’s the novel.’

Other Waugh purists are dismayed by the change of ending. But you can’t fault Fry for taking risks. The lead male role is played by a virtual unknown, Stephen Campbell Moore.

‘It was a weird thought that when we were casting a couple of years ago, the Jude Law generation was just too old. I made a pact with the film people that if we got enough big names to play the old characters then I was allowed to have the heroes as not well-known.’

Fry’s disappearing act all those years ago led to months of therapy. It
now seems as if he has regained his confidence.

‘Yes, I think I have. When I came back I went pretty quickly into doing Wilde. I have written three books since and I’ve done quite a lot of other things.’

The rehabilitation continues apace. He is a regular on Radio 4’s I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue, a presenter of the Baftas and the BBC2 quiz, QI, and appears in the odd film (most recently Le Divorce and Gosford Park).

‘I’ve just stayed clear of the stage. If I did it again, it would probably have to be with friends and in a play I really loved, but for not much longer than three months. The great thing about directing a film is that every day is supremely different. It’s the knowledge you’re going to be stuck in that same theatre eight times a week doing exactly the same thing which is so off-putting.’

Following his troubled adolescence, Fry has always been able to rely on his sister Jo for support.

She has been his agent since his Cambridge days and was an assistant on the set of Bright Young Things.

And after being celibate for 16 years and consumed with self-loathing, Fry is now in a steady relationship.

‘Yes I am very happy. Seven years and one month happy, which is pretty good going by anyone’s standards in a relationship.’ Would he ever adopt children? ‘No. I think I might if I were not well-known. I am enormously fond of children but the addition of having to be put under such a spotlight being gay parents is too much.’

Not surprisingly, Fry has paternal feelings towards his own film. ‘I will be like the parent peeping at his child through the school gates to see if they’re playing happily with other children, and if they are sitting alone I’ll feel pretty miserable about it.’

But this time he is determined the critics won’t get him down and he will not be deterred from making another film. ‘Only if I believe the criticism. Only if I see that I have f***ed up and it’s manifest that I have. But I have enjoyed it so much I certainly will direct another film.’

You can bet your bottom euro Fry will not be running off again. The ‘silly old fool’ has wised up and settled down.