Fifty Shades of Grey Screenwriter Jokes That She Watched “a Lot of Porn” While ... - Vanity Fair

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In a few short years, it seems like British screenwriter Kelly Marcel has already run the complete gamut of entertainment genres. After co-creating and executive producing the Steven Spielberg-backed sci-fi television series Terra Nova, Marcel plunged into the surprisingly dark personal history of P.L. Travers, the author responsible for one of the most uplifting children’s book characters, Mary Poppins, with the screenplay for Disney’s comedy drama Saving Mr. Banks, out this week in theaters. Last year, Marcel’s profile skyrocketed when the former actress and video store clerk was handpicked by Fifty Shades of Grey author E.L. James for her most high-profile task yet, adapting the erotic bestseller for the screen. On a phone call today discussing her poignant Saving Mr. Banks script, Marcel took a moment to reveal why she is not particularly worried about upsetting Fifty Shades of Grey’s passionate (and very blunt) fan base.

“There is a book. . . there [was] a template to follow on that one,” Marcel said of her Fifty Shades of Grey script. “It’s all laid out. So no, I didn’t worry about it. I had E.L. James with me every step of the way and she is very, very tied to her fan base and she really wants to make the film that they’ll be happy with. She knows her fans. She knows her audience. She knows her book, so having her around was invaluable because you can’t really go wrong when the author is overseeing it. I think it was a great thing.”

Despite her recent success, Marcel modestly describes herself as a prize-winning procrastinator. Among her favorite distractions: “Walk[ing] the dog, cooking, watching things on the T.V. pretending that it’s research. ‘Oh, I just need to see an episode of that because it is similar tonally to what I’m writing now.’” Asked whether she “researched” anything while writing Fifty Shades of Grey, Marcel joked, “Apart from the porn? Lots of porn. No, there wasn’t really anything.”

After finishing the script for Fifty Shades, which could very well be rated NC-17, the versatile screenwriter was hired to rewrite—what else?—The Little Mermaid for director Joe Wright. Although most people might see a content gap between these two projects, Marcel maintains that she did not really have to switch gears to go from Anastasia Steele to Ariel: The projects “are all character-led,” Marcel insists. “P.L. Travers is difficult and has traumas in her childhood and is that way because of those. Christian Grey had traumas in his childhood and lives his adult way because of those. The Little Mermaid is also a kind of tragic, love-lorn figure. These are all people that just have extraordinary stories that spin around them.”