12 NOVEMBER 2022
‘I Preferred the Book’: what’s it like to see your novel adapted for film or television?
Novelist and now screenwriter Louise Doughty saw her number one bestseller Apple Tree Yard adapted as a hit BBC One TV series starring Emily Watson, but what was it really like behind the scenes? As her most recent novel, Platform Seven, is in pre-production, and her first original series for television, Crossfire, starring Keeley Hawes, is available to watch now on iPlayer, she is uniquely placed to talk about the difference between writing for both genres and what it feels like when you see one of the characters you created take on living form.
Andrew Bibby has written the following about the very successful event with Louise Doughty:
The Autumn and Winter programme of Hebden Bridge Literary & Scientific Society continued on Saturday November 12th with its second lecture of the season, when novelist and TV dramatist Louise Doughty was the guest speaker.
Louise is the author of a string of successful novels, including the best-selling Apple Tree Yard which tells the story of a successful middle-aged professional woman who, after an affair, finds herself in the dock at the Old Bailey on a very serious charge. The book’s central theme, Louise told her Hebden Bridge audience, came to her very suddenly late one night, and unusually she wrote the opening pages very rapidly. The novel was later adapted as a series for the BBC, following a competitive auction for the rights.
Louise is also the author of the TV series Crossfire, which was shown earlier this year on BBC1 and where she wrote the TV script herself.
Louise described the process by which a novel is adapted to the very different medium of television by reading a section of the opening prologue of the novel and then showing the opening sequence of the TV adaptation, showing the very different way that narrative is communicated in the two mediums.
Louise’s presentation was followed by a lively Q&A from the Town Hall audience.