An Evening with Dr David Bowman of 2001: A Space Odyssey

The best things happen when you least expect them. Yesterday evening, there was this special screening of 2001: A Space Odyssey at the movie theater very near my house. A local movie club was organizing it. I went there expecting just to see my most favorite film, and unarguably one of the greatest films ever made, one more time on the big screen. But not in my wildest dreams, I had imagined to see among the audience the famed Dr David Bowman of 2001, the Hollywood actor Keir Dullea himself! Mr Dullea was actually invited by the movie club to be a part of this screening.

And, there he was; all agile, animated (looking at least a decade younger than his actual age) and excited to answer the questions after the film ended. How I wish I had known about this and brought my digital voice recorder, something which I generally carry with me most of the times, but didnt carry it yesterday!!  He talked about the film and answered quite a few questions from the audience. The questions ranged from the extremely articulate and profound ones (from people who had obviously seen, read and thought about the film a lot before this screening) to some trivial ones, posed by few first timers among the audience. I have myself read quite a bit about this film’s making and about the various interpretations associated with the film’s ending. So, there were no surprises in that regard. As Mr Dullea reiterated again yesterday, the film, like the monolith in the film, remains a mystery and is open to interpretation all the time. According to him, and something which is very well-known now, Stanley Kubrick didn’t just want to thrill us with this film but instead he wanted to inspire our awe for the unknown and force us to look for our own answers from the film.

Nevertheless, Keir Dullea shared some interesting tid bits about the film, about it’s making and about Stanley Kubrick which are not that well-known and which I wanted to share here.

1.The first segment of the film, The Dawn of Man, was actually shot in the end during the actual shooting. But, the more interesting part is that the segment was shot in Africa without Kubrick ever setting his foot there!! It’s well-known that Kubrick had a fear of flying, so he directed all that segment over the trans Atlantic phone line giving minute instructions to his assistant director and cameraman; Kubrick had studied all that area geographically through pictures.

2. All the special effects in the film, designed by Kubrick himself and for which he also got an Oscar, were done mechanically and there were absolutely no computer graphics etc involved in their production.

3. During the scripting of the film-which took almost 2 years-, Kubrick and Arthur C Clarke never emphasized on the philosophical and the allegorical dimensions of the story during their discussions with the main protagonist Dullia and the other actors. Even during the actual shooting, actors were just told to act their parts keeping the basic plot and the basic characterizations in mind.

4. Contrary to popular perception, Stanley Kubrick was not a dominating or a controlling director. Neither did he insist on tens of retakes for every scene, as it’s generally believed. According to Mr Dullia, in his long career as an actor, he found Stanley Kubrick to be the most prepared director on the sets and a genius in every sense. Dullia mentioned how he never saw Kubrick raising his voice or being tough with actors.

After the Q & A session, Keir Dullia went to the main lobby for an informal chat with people and to sign autographs etc. I wanted to tell him there that how much this film means to me and that how much this film has affected me over the years as a person & as an aspiring filmmaker and so many other things I wanted to say and thank him for…But, when I went up to him and shook hands with him, I got tongue-tied and could only mutter “Thank you very much Sir”. Still I’m glad that I had the presence of mind to take my cell phone out from my pocket and request an old lady standing near by to click a picture of us. Mr Dullia put his hand on my left shoulder and the lady clicked the picture. I’m generally not star-struck and would not insist on clicking pictures with them- except for the very few perhaps if I ever meet them-, but this was a different matter. I mean, this man had acted in 2001 and worked with the greatest film director ever!!! By shaking hands with him, I almost touched Mr. Kubrick!!

I know the pic below is very badly lighted and not a kind of picture which one would like to show to people. But, what the heck man; I’m still standing with the man who, on an ultimate journey into the unknown, triumphed over one of the smartest villains in cinematic history,  HAL 9000!!! And, I’m certainly not ashamed to show off that.