Stephen Gyllenhaal On The Kennedy Detail
November 22, 1963 – The day the world stood still and mourned the assassination of the 35th President of the United States.
President John F. Kennedy, 46, suffered a fatal wound to the head as his motorcade rode through Dealey Plaza in Dallas, Texas.
I wasn’t born yet, however, I often feel as though I was. I’ve always been so deeply impacted by this.
The Alfred Zapruder film that captures this dark moment in our history will always be singed into the minds of anyone’s who sees it. It’s been reenacted multiple times and in multiple films about the Kennedy family.
Award-Winning Writer/Director, Stephen Gyllenhaal was just recently announced as the man who will pen and direct a new film that focuses on this fateful day.
The Kennedy Detail – also the title of the book on which it is based, tells the story of President Kennedy’s Secret Service detail with him on the day of the assassination and from their perspective.
“I followed them my whole life, so I know a lot about them. I’ve sort of absorbed it over the years.” Stephen said of the Kennedy family.
A conversation with Stephen is not your average conversation. It’s a conversation with someone who has a vast knowledge of almost any topic you bring to the table – with that knowledge you also get the passion he has in discussing it. It’s very contagious.
He told me via phone the story of how he became involved with this project.
“Ken Atchity and I had been talking about another script that was kind of a romantic comedy. It was an interesting piece. We met a couple of times and discovered we were of like minds; we liked each other right away. It was nice to run into a producer like that.” Stephen said. “We circled around it for a while, I was busy doing Grassroots – which is a comedy and I love comedies, but I’m really a drama guy. So, there was a script which we were going to do a rewrite on with the original writer. I just didn’t have the time and I wanted to do something a bit different than a comedy.”
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