Where does a leading screenwriter find his inspiration for blockbuster movies such as Gladiator and Les Miserables? Barcombe, of course, where William Nicholson sits at his desk gazing out over the South Downs and letting his imagination run riot.
The tranquility of the East Sussex countryside is a far cry from the dramatic scenes he creates for the big screen, but the peaceful setting is just what he needs to allow his mind to conjure up emotionally-charged and action-packed scenarios.
Sussex has always been close to William’s heart – he grew up in Seaford. His much-loved old farmhouse just outside Barcombe has been home to him and his wife Virginia, a well-known social historian, since 1990 when they decided to leave London and settle in the countryside.
“We literally stuck a pin in Lewes on a map and drew a circle around it when we were looking for a house to buy,” William recalls with a smile. “The house which has now been our home for almost 30 years was Virginia’s favourite but wasn’t the one I liked best at first.
“Her mother found it and I agreed to go and look at it even though an old farmhouse with very low ceilings wasn’t what I had in mind. It’s an old hall house with lots of character, but it was the enormous view, looking out at the Downs, that sold it to me and I very quickly fell in love with it.
“We are very lucky to be here and it feels unthinkable that we could ever live anywhere else.
“It was a wonderful house to bring up our three children. As a child I moved four times but our children never knew any other home when they were young. We did a lot as a family, a lot of walking, and they thought of this as their natural habitat, that this was how the world is supposed to be. I like to think that kind of strong grounding is ideal for forming psychological roots.
“The children have all left home now but come back a great deal and bring their friends.”
William has enjoyed a remarkable career as a highly-respected screenwriter who has been nominated twice for an Oscar.
After studying English at Cambridge University, he worked for the BBC as a director of documentary films between the mid-1970s and mid-1980s, and gained renown as a novelist and playwright when the first book of his popular Wind on Fire trilogy won the Blue Peter best book award and the Smarties Gold Award for best children’s book. He has several popular novels and fantasy books to his name.
He was twice nominated for Tony Awards for best play, for Shadowlands and the Retreat from Moscow, and also turned Shadowlands, based on the relationship between CS Lewis and Joy Gresham into a BBC TV play in 1985 and an acclaimed film starring Anthony Hopkins and Debra Winger in 1993.
He later worked as a writer on the Academy Award-winning epic Gladiator in 2000 and wrote and directed the 1997 film Firelight, set around Firle Place. In 2007 he co-wrote Elizabeth: The Golden Age and 2012 saw him adapting Les Miserables as a film.
His achievements were recognised in 2015 when he was awarded an OBE in the New Year Honours for services to drama and literature.
“My life in the film industry consists of sitting in my study at home, writing,” he says. “Essentially I am a writer, I sit there in the study and my brain goes all over the world. I don’t feel I have to leave here to find the big world outside.
“I’ve just completed a film, Hope Gap, which will be released later this year, which meant I did have to spend a lot of time in London where we have a base as well. And of course I spent time in Seaford, where I grew up and where the film is largely set. Lewes is also part of it and I researched the architecture in great detail.
“One of my characters works in the planning department at Lewes and has to come to terms with changes to conservation work in an imaginary village close to Lewes. A lot of my characters are based on people I’ve known in Lewes and who have populated my imagination.
“My favourite film is always the most recent but I’m extremely proud of Hope Gap because I’ve both written and directed it. That gives me control of what I do and because it is local, it’s where I live, it’s what I know and what I love.”
Of the big Hollywood films like Gladiator which William has been involved with, one stands out as particularly significant for him – Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom.
“He was such an important subject, an extremely important man,” William says. “His life came to change his country so he is such a model, a compromiser who managed to bring together two groups who hated each other by getting them to understand one another and their fears.
“That kind of greatness and leadership are exactly what is needed in all countries where groups feel contempt for others’ views.”
Close to home, William spends a lot of time in Lewes and he has great admiration for the town.
“It’s where I like to shop and I have a lot of friends there,” he says.
“There is a wonderful diversity about Lewes and the people who live there, and so many artists and writers. It’s a small town but you never feel it has a small horizon and it never feels provincial, perhaps because of its tradition of always being radical. In these days you hear so much about town centres dying, but Lewes is full of life.”
William Nicholson - achieving Hollywood heights from his Sussex farmhouse