High Spirits In the Midnight Garden

"I shall take this check which I am holding in my hand..." Peter O'Toole in High Spirits (1988)

One page on my tiny website that I had the most fun putting together was House of High Spirits.  Before I'd even heard of Anne Rice, I was introduced to the world of the romance novel and a cute comedy at the same time in my life.  Decades later, I noticed something.  I noticed that when I read a novel, a story, something in words with little to no illustrations to help visualize along the way, I tended to picture the settings of the novel according to whatever I was already familiar with.

Even if a crumbling Irish castle with a perpetually drunk proprietor and a farting ghost were my at that time limited point of reference on an English manor house occupied by nobility.

On the page of the website I linked above, I go into it in more detail.  It also includes an overview of the author of the novel I read, Laurie McBain--or rather, the books she published in a rather brief career as a romance novelist.  Also, there is a bit more about the history of this type of romance novel.

Then we get to the film High Spirits.

Yes, I do discuss the film to an extent, wanting to see if I could explain the way the images of the action and people in the novel I read were influenced by the setting of this film.  The simplest explanation is that if it is one's only point of reference, that's probably what will happen.  

After that, I discuss a bit about Dromore Castle in Limerick, Ireland.  This was the location used for what I can only assume were exterior shots in the film, given its current state of utter ruin.  Because I am nothing if not consistent, I've provided links to websites that have more information on the history of Dromore Castle.  It is actually pretty interesting, even if it's a little sad.

This blog post was put together to begin to "introduce" the small amount of pages on this little secondary site of mine.  I've always been a reader, and I have always loved the idea of seeing the stories told in words brought to life in pictures.  A lot of people are fascinated by filming locations.  That's one aspect of what fascinates me about bringing words to screen.  But to figure out what locations will work, you have to have an idea of what you're looking for.

Exploring what that is can be tricky, but it is exciting to see it happen.  It's really thrilling when the person who wrote the words sees the visual interpretation of their words and says yes, you've got it.

One of these days, I might go back and look this up, but I recall reading something several years ago about the movies made from the very first Nancy Drew Mystery Stories.  Bonita Granville played Nancy Drew.  I seem to recall reading that when the ghostwriter who actually wrote the very first novels in the 1930's saw the films, she commented that the set for Nancy Drew's house looked like the house she had in mind when she wrote those earliest novels.

Uh oh.

This means I am no doubt destined to write about this series for girls that is approaching its 100th anniversary.  I'll have to show some of the books in my collection.  If that happens, you'll see from the pictures that there is at least one obvious reason why I still have them.