NICK Hamm talks about some of the challenges of directing rock and roll comedy Killing Bono, liaising with the real-life U2 and working closely with Pete Postlethwaite on what proved to be his final film…

Q. I think this has take about five years to bring Killing Bono to the screen since you first set about preparing it. So, what was the appeal for you? I mean, it’s quite a specific story but at the same time universal as there are bits that all of us can identify with…
Nick Hamm: Well, that was really it. I think the most interesting thing for me was the fact that it was an everyman story. In a sense most music movies are the exact reverse; most music movies deal with the journey towards stardom, so the third act after the second act breakdown is full of the concert, the signing to the label and then ultimate success. But this was a complete reversal; this was a complete downward spiral towards total failure and rejection. That, to me, seemed to be a great story for a comedy and great raw material for a comedy… that comedies are, in a sense, best told when the character is as much an everyman and people can see themselves in him or her. And I think a lot of people wake up in the morning, stand in front of that mirror and pretend they want to be a rock star. That journey to failing in that achievement can be quite funny, so that’s really where I came from in it.

Q. How did you decide which parts of the memoir to stay faithful to and where to take some dramatic licence with the story?
Nick Hamm: Look, the movie takes fact and makes it fiction and it takes fiction and makes it fact. So, certain authentic things happened. U2 did do the audition in Larry’s mum’s kitchen, they did put the notice on the notice board and they did play in the school disco. They did do those things. So, as filmmakers we all sat down and said we need to represent that correctly and accurately and with a sense of authenticity because that’s not fictional; that’s actually rock and roll history and you want to get that right and people are going to be looking at that. However, the rest of the story – the extrapolation of that – yes, Ivan did go to that interview but he was told at that moment that he didn’t get the gig.

Well, there’s no tension in that, there’s no fiction in that, there’s no drama in that, so we suspended that decision and had his brother not tell him. Therefore, we took elements of the book and condensed them and made them into a much more dramatic through-line.

Q. One of the things the film will be remembered for is the final role of Pete Postlethwaite. Is it true that the role had to be cut down because of his illness?
Nick Hamm: The role was created for Pete. It was specifically designed because Pete had been involved in the project over a few months, when we were putting it together and then got ill as we were just literally about two months away from shooting. So, initially Pete was going to play a different role but he wasn’t insurable in that role because he was sick at that moment. He was determined to do it because he believed in the story of the movie. He believed in the notion of what the movie was trying to say about the notion of celebrity. And he wanted something to aim for in that sense as he was going through his illness.

So, we gave him that opportunity and to be honest with you all of us associated with it were completely honoured that he could do that. And he was a delight to have on set. We think he’s given a great comic turn. Pete has given a little juice to the movie, that’s all. He’s not central to the picture, as you can see he doesn’t go through the movie all the time, but what he says in the movie and what he represents… he gives a sense of enjoyment, so he was great to have and we were honoured to have him there.

Q. How straight-forward was it to get permissions to represent U2 or any sort of music that we hear in the film?
Nick Hamm: It was completely un-straight-forward from the very beginning because once you take on a project that involves any band, as other people who’ve made music movies will tell you, you’re making two films. You’re making the film that you’re making, the drama that you’re doing, but you’re also to a certain extent representing and using and working with the name of the people that the movie is about in some respects. So, it’s not a movie about U2, it’s about somebody’s relationship to them. My relationship to them has always been incredibly close, from both a management standpoint and sitting with The Edge and talking to him about it.

As Neil [McCormick] said, they’ve always been incredibly supportive of the project… it wasn’t a U2 project and it shouldn’t be a U2 project. It’s an independent film that stands alongside them, so I can only really thank them for all their help. When they saw the movie, and they saw it about a month and a half ago in a cinema in Melbourne… the whole band went to se it one lunchtime with all the people that worked for them – all their colleagues and friends that were on tour with them, there were about 40 people in the cinema – and they loved it and they rolled around the floor laughing. In a sense, those early scenes that we tried to get right come from a place of real admiration for the band… they come from a sense that this is a bloody good rock and roll band. I don’t really need to say that, it’s self evident, but we wanted to get those scenes right.

Q. Was there ever a suggestion that Bono would cameo himself?
Nick Hamm: In the script at the beginning, when we were trying to raise money for the movie initially, Bono was in the picture. The first conversation I had with every financier was: “So, he’s going to play that, is he?” And I was like: “Well, no, he’s not going to play himself at 18 because he’s now 45 or 48, so ‘no’ he’s not going to do that.” It was then: “Oh OK, so we’re not going to give you the money.” I just used to then run around Soho going: “Well, I don’t know what to do now because I can’t represent Bono properly because I can’t get the money and secondly I don’t want him in the movie anyway because it’s not about him; it’s about him as a young man.”

So, he went through many incarnations. To be brief on it, the person that told me about Martin McCann playing Bono was Pete Postlethwaite. He rang me three months before we started and said: “There’s a guy I want you to meet…” Bono at that point was half-written in the picture. Those later scenes with Robert [Sheehan] in the taxi, the scene on the phone with Ben, were not in the original script. I knew I would have to have some scenes with him but I didn’t know what they were going to be. It utterly depended on somebody playing Bono with a sense of authenticity and passion and reality. And Pete Postlethwaite was the guy who gave me that name of Martin McCann. So, Bono’s relationship to the movie in terms of being in it has changed and modified and grown and been organic.

Q. Is it true that The Edge had some funny ideas of his own about casting?
Nick Hamm: Well, Edge had his own ideas about many things. But one of them was that he wanted to cast Danny DeVito as Bono.

Read our review of Killing Bono

Read our interview with Ben Barnes and Robert Sheehan

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