First Person: Couple in a Hole

A man and a woman live in a hole in a forest. We don’t know how they got there, though a homespun ceremony they perform suggests some kind of loss. She has difficulty leaving the hole, while he, a creature of the forest, ranges freely, foraging for food, steering clear of the rest of humanity until an emergency forces him to visit a nearby town. We realise, though the couple are British, that we’re in France. A local farmer recognises the man and the story begins to unfold.

Though I always wanted to play the man, I wasn’t sure the film would work, the premise being so strange. The first screening I saw was a public one at Dinard Film Festival in Brittany and the audience’s rapt attention was unquestionable. It won all three awards for which it was eligible: Best Film from both the jury and the public, and Best Screenplay. It’s a beautiful piece of work that has been loved by festival-goers all over Europe.

Couple in a Hole nearly didn’t happen. Tom Geens, the writer/director, and Zorana Pigott, producer, had already been working on the project for a couple of years when I met them four years ago. Then all went quiet. I met them again a year later – they’d had trouble raising the money but were nearly there. All went quiet again. Then, suddenly, two years ago, we were on. I’m quite skinny but I had to lose some weight – Carrefour doesn’t deliver to holes.

The French/British cast and crew convened in the Midi-Pyrénées. On the third day, I had to sprint across a muddy field, stopping abruptly when just out of shot to avoid colliding with a tree. On the third take I turned my ankle and ended up on my back but the take was good and we broke for lunch. Only after lunch did I take a look at how very swollen my ankle was. Still, I only had one more scene to shoot that day then I could put my foot up, get some ice on it and try some of the local analgesic. Zorana thought we should get it checked by a professional, as a precaution. I tried to explain to the doctor that my long, filthy toenails were for the role but he was admirably uninterested – I was someone in need regardless of personal hygiene. He said he thought the ankle was broken. I said it couldn’t be – I’d been walking on it for hours, albeit a bit gingerly.

The next morning, I walked into a hospital for an X-ray and left a few hours later in a wheelchair, in plaster up to my knee. Zorana had accompanied me and been very supportive but I’d glimpsed her through a window as she sat waiting in the corridor, head in hands, the very picture of despair. It’s funny, now, but we were pretty dejected at the time.

The French/British cast and crew disbanded. I did two months of physio in London while we awaited the insurance company’s decision on whether or not to let us go back and finish the film. As I couldn’t put any weight on my foot, and I didn’t want to put any on my body, I bought a big latex stocking online which covered the cast completely, with a valve attachment to pump out any trapped air – like shrink-wrapping – and went swimming every day. I was running again soon after and Tom believes the extra time we had to think and talk improved the film, so maybe we got lucky.

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Overleaf: watch the trailer for Couple in a Hole