I haven't seen the film yet because I just got in from London. In the scenes where the two characters are bantering with each other, it is like bobbing at the net in tennis. ↗
All we did in Alabama was have a read through with the script, but there was, 'No, well, it needs more. You've got to do this, Albert. You've got to do that, Jessica.' It didn't feel like that at all. ↗
He tells you stories, but then, after a while, when you want more, he doesn't give you more. He insists on this old elaboration, the old stories that never changes. ↗
Then there was Clark Ashton Smith, who wrote for Weird Tales and who had a wild imagination. He wasn't a very talented writer, but his imagination was wonderful. ↗
Take a commonplace, clean it and polish it, light it so that it produces the same effect of youth and freshness and originality and spontaneity as it did originally, and you have done a poet's job. The rest is literature. ↗