It might be difficult to imagine anyone resisting those hallowed, desperate lines—“it wasn’t over; it still isn’t over”—but apparently Hollywood men were not enthused by the prospect of depicting Noah in Nicholas Sparks’s The Notebook.
According to Sparks, he had a hell of a time casting the role because, at base, Noah’s character arc is rather boring.
“It was really interesting because a lot of the actors said, ‘Well, what’s Noah’s arc?” Sparks explained in a recent IMDB interview. “It’s a guy who falls in love and then he just kinda does nothing, and then waits for her to show up, and then he’s there and he’s still in love and then at the end of the film, well, he’s still in love. Where’s the arc?”
I would also add that Noah builds a very excellent house (love that wraparound porch), but yes — otherwise Sparks has a clear sense of his protagonist’s drudging character trajectory.
But thank goodness for hero Ryan Gosling who, Sparks remarks, “came in and...really brought that story to life.” Part of Gosling’s appeal, the actor told Company magazine in 2011, was that he lacked the glamour and sexiness of more popular actors. Via Huffington Post:
“[Director] Nick Cassavetes called me to meet him at his house. When I got there, he was standing in his backyard, and he looked at me and said, ‘I want you to play this role because you’re not like the other young actors out there in Hollywood. You’re not handsome, you’re not cool, you’re just a regular guy who looks a bit nuts.’”
What a charming pitch.
If you’re the sort planning a Nicholas Sparks movie marathon for Valentine’s Day, then stay tuned. The Huffington Post reports that the CW is planning “a small screen adaptation of the film” to be released in the near future.
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Image via New Line Cinema.