Willy Russell talks to Laura Davis about rediscovering an old film and his plans to make a new one

WILLY RUSSELL is a master of conjuring – he can turn plays into films, films into musicals and musicals into films.

Right now he is hoping a studio will take on the completed screenplay of his adored musical Blood Brothers, co-written with Midnight Express director Sir Alan Parker.

But it can’t be just any film company, oh no, it must be one with big money to spend.

“It’s not profligate, but if it’s going to be epic . . . it’s historical, that costs a lot of money; it’s musical, that costs a lot of money; it spans a whole range of time . . . You have to be talking $50m-$60m,” he estimates.

The scale of the budget means that financial backing will have to come from outside the UK, probably America, and that brings its own obstacles.

“For the Americans, on paper they look at it and they go ‘It’s British, urgh, it’s regional British, urgh, it’s regional British recent history, urghhhh,” says Russell.

“It’s a lot to ask but we’d rather have the film we want rather than having to compromise and pander.

“Who needs a bad film of Blood Brothers?”

Away from the simple terraced street stage set, the well-loved story of twins separated at birth could take on blockbuster proportions.

The terraces would be replaced with a horseshoe-shaped housing estate, modelled on St Andrew’s Gardens in Liverpool City Centre, and Mrs Johnson would sing Easy Terms while pushing a pram along the banks of the River Mersey.

“When Alan Parker first suggested that scene to me I went, ‘Hold on, this is a woman who’s just lost her baby, with a pram . . . ’ and as I was saying that I thought ‘Shut up, he’s right. This is cinema!’,” exclaims the writer.

“I can just see the shot now, it’s a chopper shot and she’s walking along by Otterspool.”

One of Russell’s early transpositions from stage to screen was the 1990 film Dancin’ Thru the Dark, based on his play Stags and Hens, about a soon-to-be-married couple marking their final night of freedom.

Starring Con O’Neill, Claire Hackett, Simon O’Brien, Julia Deakin and Mark Womack, it will be given a special screening at FACT on Monday accompanied by an audience Q&A with its writer, in aid of youth project Clapperboard UK.

Created for the BBC by Palace Pictures, which went bust shortly afterwards, the film has rarely been seen since its original showing and is currently unavailable on DVD.

“We’d love it to be available but it’s a film that got lost in some administrative hell,” says Russell, leaning forward on a sofa in the two-floor office he has used for decades.

“We’ve been chasing them for five years to do something about it but the people who handle it are in fairly lowly positions and they’ll start investigating it and 10 months later we’ll get a note saying ‘Hi, I’m Joe, I’ve just taken over from Julie, can you fill me in’. So the whole cycle begins again.”

That’s all about to change however, thanks to the film’s recent purchase by distributor Hollywood Classics, which plans to release it on DVD at an unconfirmed future date.

Monday’s screening will be only the third time the 62-year-old father-of-three has seen Dancin’ Thru the Dark, and he admits he is slightly nervous about watching it in the company of others.