Peter Cattaneo earned an Oscar nomination for 'The Full Monty' and then couldn't figure out what to do next. He's back 23 years later with the British choir comedy 'Military Wives.'
In 1997, Peter Cattaneo’s directorial debut “The Full Monty” swept the box office before winning the BAFTA for best film and scoring four Oscar nominations, including for directing. It was a whirlwind time for the British filmmaker, whose first child was born only days before the Academy Awards, and he spent years afterward trying to live up to the success of his first feature.
“Military Wives,” set on an army base in the north of England, has a similar flavor to “The Full Monty,” and it’s also about average people coming together to lift themselves up. Based loosely on Gareth Malone’s BBC documentary “The Choir,” the film follows a group of spouses living on the fictional Flitcroft Garrison as their partners are deployed to Afghanistan. Instead of wallowing, the women decide to form a choir, which becomes their lifeline through the crisis.
Casting was key for Catteneo, who didn’t want to fill the movie with Broadway-level singers. The filmmakers went out to Oscar nominee Kristin Scott Thomas and “Catastrophe” creator Sharon Horgan simultaneously, who both quickly agreed to be part of the film, and then expanded the cast with an ensemble that reflects the sorts of women who would actually be living on a base.
He laughs, adding, “And then I’d be wandering around this base and I’d hear secret rehearsals going on.” The selection of songs was key, and Cattaneo spent hours digging through Spotify. The tracks needed to resonate, but they couldn’t slip into pure cheese. That balance was important throughout the entire film, and Cattaneo focused on how to “steer that tonal line between being feel-good, uplifting and fun, and keeping its feet on the ground to undercut it when we can.
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