“I’d love to make a musical”: Kevin and Andrew Macdonald on career ambitions and the projects that got away

Scottish filmmaker Kevin Macdonald, known for documentaries including Touching The Void and One Day In September, has revealed an ambition to helm a musical.

“I’d love to make a musical,” he told audiences yesterday (August 16) at the Edinburgh International Film Festival (EIFF) while taking part in a keynote conversation alongside his brother, EIFF chair and DNA Films producer Andrew Macdonald.

“They say it’s the hardest thing,” reflected Andrew, who has produced one musical in his career, 2013’s Sunshine On Leith directed by Dexter Fletcher, which he described as a “great experience”.

Kevin expressed “jealousy” of Richard Linklater, who is adapting Stephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along, starring Paul Mescal, Ben Platt, Beanie Feldstein and Lin-Manuel Miranda for Blumhouse Productions.

“They’re doing it over 15, 20 years, a bit like Boyhood he did before. What a wonderful idea – that would be so much fun to do,” said Kevin.

He also spoke of a desire to direct an animated documentary, after one in the works about the Thai youth football team that were trapped in a cave got canned. In 2018, the project was announced as being set up with National Geographic Documentary Films, and John Battsek attached to produce.

“I was working with producers who had the rights to that, and recorded all these interviews with the divers who rescued them. I did a lot of animation tests and I thought it was absolutely brilliant, then I showed it to the producers. This was maybe a mistake.” 

Andrew, producer of the 28 zombie thriller franchise, revealed he also went quite far along with an animation project with his frequent collaborator Alex Garland (Ex Machina, Warfare, Civil War). Garland had written a script, for which Sony paid for development.

“We screened at the studio, and they passed,” recalled Andrew. “We’re still looking for a way of doing it.” 

An area that the brothers remain cautious about is TV. “I don’t think we’ve cracked it… Drama TV is really about ongoing series, that’s the highest bar, whether its Friends or Frasier or The Sopranos. The characters have to come first – you have to have a mentality I don’t think we have,” said Andrew.  

He produced Garland’s Hulu series Devs, while Kevin directed a pilot for 2016 Stephen King mini-series 11.22.63, also for Hulu. Kevin currently is developing a six-to-eight-part series with Scottish writer, David Harrower, which he would like to shoot next year. 

Kevin said he generally tries to alternate between making fiction and non-fiction projects. In the documentary space, he has found music and more celebrity-focused features – with his credits also including Marley, Whitney, One To One: John & Yoko and High & Low - John Galliano – have become “one of the few types of documentaries that can get made easily, and you can earn a living on”.

Andrew, meanwhile, commends his collaboration with Garland and A24 with how he has kept his company going. “He [Garland] seems to be able to do everything. He can come up with a script in 24 hours…If we didn’t have him, it would be very difficult to constantly make films, it’s so difficult to run a company. It’s like any business – you need new product, new films and television shows. That constant thing is very difficult to do these days.”

Career beginnings

The brothers, who are the grandsons of Emeric Pressburger, one half of the revered UK filmmaking duo Powell and Pressburger, said that their route into the industry was not a result of familial connections. 
“It’s easy to forget that Powell and Pressburger, back in the [19]70s and 80s when we were growing up, were completely forgotten… There wasn’t any nepotism that was possible because nobody knew who they were, expect for Lynda Myles,” said Kevin.

Growing up, they say, the family’s main business was a sheepskin tannery near Loch Lomond. 

The only film the brothers have made together was The Last King Of Scotland, which premiered at Telluride and Toronto in 2006. Kevin directed, while Andrew was an executive producer on the Fox Searchlight feature. Lisa Bryer and Andrea Calderwood were lead producers.

Fox Searchlight apparently tried to stop the casting of Forest Whittaker in the lead role, because, according to Kevin, they thought he was “so gentle and sweet”. Whittaker ended up winning an Oscar for his performance as Ugandan president Idi Amin.

Andrew commended then head of film at Channel 4 David Aukin with helping to get his early films, Shallow Grave and Trainspotting, off the ground.
“Channel 4 had a new boss [Aukin], and he wanted to do some different things… I can’t see Channel 4 making those kinds of films now, really aimed at young people,” said Andrew.

Kevin also spoke about being given the chance to direct 2009’s State Of Play, which he said was conceived as an “all-star, intelligent thriller for adults at $100m – can you imagine that today?”

Brad Pitt was initially attached to the cast, although he ended up dropping out of the project over dissatisfaction with Kevin’s vision. It ended up starring Russell Crowe, Ben Affleck, Rachel McAdams and Helen Mirren.

“They [Hollywood studios] were trying to make intelligent, good films – still,” reflects Kevin. 


On the topic of AI, Kevin said he is using it, but as a tool for efficiency. “I’m using AI on a project I’m doing now… You give people the tools, but if they don’t have a story to tell or the taste to make it, or the skills to make it, they won’t. I think that’s the same with AI and film. You can do anything, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that what you’re going to do is going to be interesting.”

He continued, “I do slightly worry that filmmakers are going to end up basically sitting behind computers making films, that would be very depressing. Luckily, I’ll be retired.”

EIFF runs until August 20.

• Why Sepideh Farsi’s childhood in Iran compelled her to make Gaza doc ‘Put Your Soul On Your Hand And Walk’