Hilary and Jackie
Director Anand Tucker and actress Emily Watson
Symbiotic doesn't begin to describe the intense relationship cellist Jacqueline du Pré (1945-87) had with her older sister, and that complex bond forged from devotion and rivalry is at the heart of the biographical film, Hilary and Jackie (1998).
After making her professional debut while still in her teens, Jacqueline du Pré quickly ascended to the heights of the 1960s classical music world. Her impassioned (often downright sensual) playing, combined with her youth, vitality and charisma, made her fame akin to that of a rock star, and her 1967 marriage to the equally photogenic pianist and conductor Daniel Barenboim was an internationally reported social event. But as Hilary and Jackie makes clear, being a musical prodigy was a mixed blessing for the emotionally stunted du Pré.
"She could not cope with the ordinary things that you and I would take for granted in the real world," explains director Anand Tucker in New York. "She was a child, but when you give her the cello, she played like a god."
"What was extraordinary about Jackie," continues Tucker, "was that she found a way to express every emotion under the sun through her cello. That was her voice."
Emily Watson (Breaking the Waves, The Boxer) had played the cello briefly while in her teens, but began an intensive crash course when she took the role of du Pré so that she could convey Jacqueline's performances onscreen.
"What her legacy is is music," Watson explains, "and I felt that we had to at least attempt to get somewhere close to the spirit of what she was musically in the film to earn the right to tell what is a very dark, complicated, personal story."
In their extremely closeknit family in Oxford, England, both Jacqueline and Hilary (played by Rachel Griffiths) were trained from an early age by their pianist mother. Initially, it was flutist Hilary who gained attention and awards, but Jacqueline's prodigious talent swiftly eclipsed everyone else.
"The genius of Jackie," said Tucker, "was the atom bomb that blew the familyto pieces."
Based on a memoir written by Hilary and her brother Piers, Hilary and Jackie illuminates some dark family secrets, including the year-long affair Jacqueline conducted with her sister's husband, with Hilary's tacit blessing. But Jacqueline du Pré's tumultuous life changed drastically when, in 1973, she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, a degenerative muscle disease. Even though they were estranged, Hilary came to her aid.
Anand Tucker firmly believes that Hilary de Pré told her sister's story out of an immense personal need to reclaim her legacy.
"Really, what this is about," he says, "is Hilary finding, literally, the piece of herself that was torn away."
© 1999, Serena Donadoni. All rights reserved.