Based on the true story of a love triangle that existed between the famous British artist AJ Munnings, his friend Gilbert Evans and their love interest, the beautiful painter Florence Carter-Wood, Summer in February will be released in Ireland this weekend. For the release of the film, we caught up with Dan Stevens who plays Gilbert Evans to chat to him about the project.
Dan has always had a very personal involvement with the project, his mentor and previous teacher Jonathan Smith was responsible for the book Summer in February which the film was based on and Dan was determined to get it to the big screen. “I read the book in the mid-90’s and I remember there being a lot of buzz about it. A few people had mentioned to me that this would make a great film and I agreed with them. I had always been close friends with Jonathan, so when the rights was bought for the film, we began developing the project.”
The character Gilbert has a very endearing quality, literally, he plays the nice guy. Dan was extremely interested in his character. “There was something about Gilbert, something that I really liked about the character. He seemed to epitomise the idea of British reserve, a real gentleman. We always ask those questions about women, why do they go for the wrong guy sometimes? I remember people asking, why doesn’t she choose him?”
She is, of course, Florence Carter-Wood who is played the beautiful Emily Browning. Unfortunately, not a lot of information survives about the true to life character of Florence, she is relegated to a couple of lines in Munnings biography and exists only in extracts of Gilbert’s diary, Dan tells us: “There are a few paintings that survive of Florence, but her brother was killed in the war and not a lot else survives. We liked that air of mystery, she had this nameless quality and that is why Emily fitted that role so well. She had kind of an ethereal quality, very magical. There was a beauty to her character.”
This was a very personal project for Stevens, and something he was very passionate about: “It was a beautiful story that really stayed with us. I always felt like Florence haunted the piece, she haunted me a little.”
Of course, when you speak to Dan Stevens, you cannot avoid the phenomenon that is Downton Abbey but he is happy to chat away about it. We mentioned that Christmas was ruined across the country following that special episode, but Dan was very apologetic: “I would like to sincerely apologise for that! I felt like I needed a new sense of adventure and that I could keep learning.” We didn’t tell him he broke our hearts.
Dan has plenty to keep him going anyway, his next project, The Fifth Estate, is based on the subject of WikiLeaks, a project which everyone has some sort of interest in.
Before we parted however, he insisted we take our mothers to the film this weekend. “Again, I am sorry.”
To see more from Summer in February, check out the official trailer here. Movie released on 14th June.
