Robert De Niro was involved with the film. How did that come about?
De Niro’s company, Tribeca, were the first people to read the book and then, unfathomably, it wasn’t Tribeca who bought the film but another company, New Line, who bought it for them. In the end, they sold it before the film came out. I don’t know if you guys noticed, but there are 11 people listed as “producer”. Hugh Grant was telling us that you were hardly ever on the film set. Was that by choice? I would have thought you’d want to follow your baby every step of the way. Well, the simple explanation is that my last book, How to Be Good, came out at the same time as these guys were filming and I was on a book tour. Having said that, even if you do feel that it’s your baby, there isn’t an awful lot you can do that will protect it in any way whatsoever. Unless you start behaving like a lunatic and run on to the set saying, “Cut!” Once you’ve taken the decision that it’s in the hands of the right people, you accept that they know a lot more about making films than you do. Those people w
