Reg Little talks to local film producer Damian Jones about his career and new film Belle

A painting featured on BBC’s Antiques Roadshow that intrigued his wife, set film producer Damian Jones on a six-year movie making project.

There was clearly quite a story behind the unsigned painting depicting two attractive, beautifully outfitted young women, at leisure together, one white and one black.

Both peer at the viewer, the dark girl smiling impishly with a finger to her cheek, the other, resting from her book, absent-mindedly takes her companion’s arm.

What made it so fascinating to Mr Jones, was that this painting was created in 1799, in a Georgian society where black women were pretty well unknown.

Mr Jones, the Bafta-winning producer of The Iron Lady and The History Boys, said: “The women are stunning but the picture is completely ambiguous. You cannot tell whether they are friends — perhaps one a servant and the other a visitor.

“The clothing is exotic and they are touching. I think it is fair to say most portraits of the period do not feature black people, unless they are slaves or servants.”

When he began delving into the story of behind the picture, it emerged that the two girls were, in fact, sisters, both adopted and raised by Lord Mansfield — and Mr Jones immediately knew that he had found the subject of his next film, the period drama Belle, which opened at UK cinemas last month.

Discovering Dido Belle, the illegitimate mixed-race daughter of a Royal Navy admiral, was a welcome stroke of good fortune for Mr Jones, from the West Oxfordshire village of Church Hanborough.

By chance the actress who was brought Belle to life, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, was born and grew up just down the road in Witney.

But happy chance has always played its part in shaping the successful film career of Mr Jones, who, it seems, fell into the business by accident.

Having gone to France to work in a bar to improve his language skills, having finished his politics and history degree at Warwick University, he took the opportunity to work as a ‘runner’ on the set of Frantic, the Harrison Ford thriller set in Paris.

“I was getting the tea, coffee, doing reception work,” he said. But crucially he experienced what went on on a film set.

With Frantic on his CV, Damian was able get his foot in the door at Working Title Films, a British production company, where he worked his way up the ladder as a production assistant.

But at an early stage he recognised that there were three jobs that really counted: lead actor, director and producer. “Well, I quickly realised that I couldn’t act, did not have a clue what directing was but I was good at spotting interesting and talented people as well as organisation and making things happen.”

He set himself the task of making a short film, The Candy Shop, with a friend.

Oxford Mail:
Damian Jones and wife Lynn

“I spent two years raising the money for a film that took two weeks to shoot. I went to anyone I knew who was wealthy, as well as the traditional film sources. I even turned to my granny. You have to expect 99 ‘nos’ but you only need one ‘yes’.”

The film won the 1990 Bafta Award for best short film and on the strength of this he moved to Hollywood.

Over the next few years he produced films ranging from Michael Winterbottom’s Welcome to Sarajevo, which was nominated for the Golden Palm at Cannes, to Gridlock’d, which starred Tim Roth and the late rapper Tupac Shakur.

After 10 years he returned home and the subjects of two of his best known films could hardly have been more English: Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll, telling the story of Ian Dury, and The Iron Lady, featuring Meryl Streep’s Oscar-winning performance as Margaret Thatcher.

That project had begun with him simply wondering why no one had ever made a film about Margaret Thatcher. The original idea had been to focus on the lead-up to the Falklands War before he recognised the power of the story of the woman herself.

Many see something Jane Austen-esque about his new film about a mixed-race woman in 1780s England.

“It is not a history lesson,” said Mr Jones, whose wife Lynn is a black American.

“It’s about her journey to self-identity with colour and class all coming into play.

“She was illegitimate but because she was of their blood she became a member of the family. Yet when they had guests, she wasn’t allowed to dine with the family.

“Then she is willed money and suddenly all those people who did not want to marry her because of her colour, do not mind her colour. I think it says much about class, privilege, whilst still being a good old fashioned romance.”

His mother, Liz Gasiorowska, who still lives in Church Hanborough, tells The Oxford Times that during the making of Belle, Mr Jones was dealt the devastating blow of the death of his twin sister.

Selina Jones, a scriptwriter, died two years ago, aged 47, at the Sobell House Hospice, Oxford.

Ms Jones had been diagnosed with the degenerative condition Friedreich’s ataxia at the age of seven.

Belle was dedicated to her.

Mr Jones, who will be 50 later this year, is now busy on two eagerly awaited films. He is making Lady in the Van, written by Alan Bennett and starring Dame Maggie Smith, and Dad’s Army, based on the classic British sit com about the Home Guard. It will star Toby Jones, the actor from Charlbury, who will play Captain Mainwaring, with Bill Nighy as Sergeant Wilson.

Mr Jones said the “universal appeal” of Dad’s Army had convinced him that the time was right for Captain Mainwaring and his Home Guard to invade the big screen once more.

He does not seem to have made many wrong calls since giving up the bar job.