The Go-Between

Director Joseph Losey rented an abandoned manor house in Norfolk and had it renovated for the film.

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Speaking about shooting in Norfolk, director Joseph Losey said in an interview: "Norfolk helped me a great deal because Norfolk hasn't changed. Most of the costumes were original. We made very few, and we all lived in the house. They wore the costumes all the time, ate and wore their costumes. Once you have the whole house, the props, the costumes, something comes alive."

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Deborah Kerr was initially cast as Mrs. Maudsley, but she withdrew after director Joseph Losey kept her waiting for several hours in a hotel and then called her back. Margaret Leighton ultimately took the role.

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Director Joseph Losey stated in 1971 that producer/director Alexander Korda, who had bought the film rights to L. P. Hartley's source novel shortly after its publication in 1953, commissioned a screenplay from novelist Nancy Mitford that moved the action to a château in France. According to Losey, Margaret Leighton, the second female lead in his own version, was Korda's choice for the female lead of Marian. Although Leighton had played characters early in her film career that could be called romantic female leads — notably Bonnie Prince Charlie (1948) and The Fighting Pimpernel (1949), both of which Korda had a hand in (though not among the credits) — by the mid-1950s Leighton was firmly established as a character actress, for whom the role of Marian would have been highly unusual. In his preface to the Penguin edition of Hartley's source novel, Douglas Brooks-Davies notes that John Cresswell was brought on as screenwriter for the film, which stalled in the mid-1950s and whose cast was to have included Alec Guinness and Kenneth More.

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Almost the entire film was shot in Norfolk, England.

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In an interview with critic John Russell Taylor, screenwriter Harold Pinter said: "What I find most exciting about the subject now is the role of time: the destruction of time by the man's return to the scene of his childhood experience." Pinter told interviewer Michel Ciment, "I was fascinated by the concept of time and the cinema's power to suddenly reveal the meaning of an entire life, from the age of twelve to the age of sixty."

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While making this film, the British studio EMI Films began to run out of money and had to enter into a co-production with MGM.

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This was the fourth and final collaboration between director Joseph Losey and playwright and screenwriter Harold Pinter. The others were Accident (1967), The Servant (1963) and (with Pinter, uncredited) Modesty Blaise (1966).

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Screenwriter Harold Pinter had once written a screenplay adapted from L. P. Hartley's novel, but legal disputes delayed the shooting. When the problem was resolved, Pinter threw out his previous screenplay and started over, and the result was this film.

PRODUCTION STORY · SOURCED

This was Dominic Guard's (Leo) first feature film.

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L. P. Hartley strongly approved of this film version of his famous novel and was quite willing to say so in promotional interviews. Interestingly, although the book and film are generally seen as an attack on the British class system (the film was made by the highly radical Joseph Losey, who had left America to avoid being blacklisted as a communist), Hartley was often described as a man with right-wing and even reactionary views.

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James Aubrey, the head of MGM, which co-produced the film, disliked it and sold the studio's shares to Columbia Pictures shortly before the film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. It won the festival's prestigious top prize, the Palme d'Or.

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Parts of Michel Legrand's score for the film were also used in other films.

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In 1999 it was selected for inclusion in the British Film Institute's "100 Best British Films" list.

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Director Joseph Losey wanted unknown actors and actresses in the major roles. However, one of the conditions for securing financing was that well-known stars appear in the lead roles.

PRODUCTION STORY · SOURCED

This is one of two filmed adaptations of an L. P. Hartley novel to win the Palme d'Or (Golden Palm) at the Cannes Film Festival. The other is The Hireling (1973). Both won their awards in the early to mid-1970s.

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In the mid-1960s, Anthony Asquith had tried to set up a version of L. P. Hartley's novel starring Sir Dirk Bogarde.

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Sir Alan Bates and Dame Julie Christie also appeared together in Far from the Madding Crowd (1967), The Return of the Soldier (1982) and Separate Tables (1983).

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Director Joseph Losey tried to get this film made in 1963 but could not find financing. He tried again in 1968 with the same result.

PRODUCTION STORY · SOURCED

The Go-Between was nominated for twelve BAFTA Awards and won four: Best Screenplay (Harold Pinter), Best Supporting Actor (Edward Fox), Best Supporting Actress (Margaret Leighton) and Most Promising Newcomer to Leading Film Roles (Dominic Guard).

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In 2009, film critic, actor and composer Emanuel Levy labelled The Go-Between "Losey's Masterpiece".

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South African composer David Earl adapted L. P. Hartley's novel, the source for The Go-Between, into a two-act opera in 1991.

DEEPER MEANING · SOURCED

The cast of The Go-Between includes two Oscar winners, Julie Christie and Jim Broadbent, and three Oscar nominees: Alan Bates, Margaret Leighton and Michael Redgrave.

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Deborah Kerr was reportedly initially offered the role of the manor's mistress, Mrs. Maudsley, but she turned it down because she felt the part had only one good scene near the end of the film.

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The Go-Between holds a 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 11 critics' reviews.

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This is Margaret Leighton's only Oscar-nominated performance.

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The Go-Between is one of two films adapted from L. P. Hartley's novels in the 1970s; the other was The Hireling (1973).

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The cathedral in the film was Norwich Cathedral in Norfolk, and the parish church in the film was the Church of St Peter and St Paul in Heydon, Norfolk.

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Harold Pinter was paid £75,000 to write the screenplay.

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The Go-Between was Joshua Losey's first film, as the boy in the village (uncredited); Joshua is the son of director Joseph Losey.

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Simon Hume-Kendall had no further acting career but became known in connection with a company called London Capital & Finance.

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Michael Gough does not appear among the casting ideas and interviews for the role of Mr. Maudsley held in the BFI Special Collections.

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Michael Gough was the third choice for Mr. Maudsley.

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Liza Goddard read for the role of Marian Maudsley.

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Gary Warren was interviewed for the role of Marcus.

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The car in the 2015 production has the registration KVX 757, while in the 1971 production it is RXW 777.

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