Jason Isaacs on Telling a Love Story With “Polar Opposite” Gillian Anderson in ‘The Salt Path’
Jason Isaacs and Gillian Anderson had only met socially when they began shooting The Salt Path, but soon built a sparkling chemistry onscreen as a desperate husband and wife walking England’s blustering coast.
The Salt Path is a true story. In the memoir written by Raynor Winn, Raynor and her husband, Moth, are in their 50s when they lose their farm, business and money to legal costs. After their home is abruptly torn away from them, Moth is diagnosed with a terminal neurological illness. With nowhere to go, the pair decide to set about, with only ￡115 ($150) in their pockets, walking the South West Coast Path — a 630-mile stretch.
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What unfolds is a story of love, determination, compassion, strength and pain. Over 1 million copies of Ray’s tale has sold across all formats in the U.K. and internationally. The film, which stars Isaacs (The White Lotus, Harry Potter, Peter Pan) and Anderson (The X-Files, Sex Education, The Crown), is adapted from Winn’s book by Rebecca Lenkiewicz. Helmed by Marianne Elliott — in her feature directorial debut — it premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival Thursday night, to Isaacs’ delight.
“I want people to go and see independent films,” the 61-year-old tells The Hollywood Reporter. “It’s the most important thing, that we don’t only go and see films where the actors are in lycra. But secondly, I think you’ve got a duty as storytellers that the bare minimum when a film finishes is that people think, ‘Can we see another film?’ Because they’ve had a special experience, but a big experience.”
He says of The Salt Path and its message: “When you see a story about people who survive almost all of the worst things you could possibly imagine, and they survive spiritually as well, they survive physically, it’s a reminder — maybe more palatable than actually having any of this awful stuff happen to you yourself — of the things that are important to life.”
When congratulated on such a gut-wrenching yet utterly charming performance, Isaacs is quick to dismiss the compliment, and instead pays tribute to the people who inspired The Salt Path. “Obviously all actors are a bottomless pit of need for flattery,” he jokes, “but the truth is, they’re extraordinary people. Moth — not that Ray isn’t — but Moth just radiates joy and love and laughter and wants to lift everybody around him.
“Even though, quite often with me, he was describing the most unconscionable things and indignities he’s had to face. I felt like I just had to get out the way and try tell Moth’s story and their story of what happened to them. So any praise that comes back is really just admiration for them, who they are and what they did.” He adds: “And hopefully I didn’t distract too much.”
Isaacs says he hopes people will feel the love that radiates from this film. He boils down the most important thing in life is who you love and who loves you, and “what you do with that.” But what Ray and Moth did with it, he says, is remarkable. “To meet them is to believe again in things that seem overly sentimental, things that only Hollywood could dream up. A love story that started in their teens, that saw them through the worst things life could throw at them and continue to see them through challenging times.”
And it might surprise audiences that Isaacs and Anderson, despite their obvious talent and mutual connection onscreen, are very different people in real life. “She’s incredibly easy to work with, but she she is the polar opposite of me and the way I like to live and work in almost every way,” Isaacs explains.
“And so it was kind of rather hilarious. I’m very chatty, much like Moth, and she likes quiet and still, and she doesn’t give herself over easily. She doesn’t want to make new friends. She’s not interested in being center of attention.”
Isaacs went on to describe Anderson as more of an “empire” than actress. “Various products and books and philanthropy, and she would be sitting very quietly on her phone in the middle of fields … I don’t feel like I know her much better than when we started. I’m sure she feels the same about me, but we have this tremendous respect for each other. We let the work spoke. We both love being parents, Gill and I talked a lot about our kids. I wonder if, in some unconscious way, we were trying to find common ground in parenthood.”
The pair of them will fool viewers into thinking they know each other very well indeed. The Salt Path will release next spring in the U.K., while a U.S. date is yet to be confirmed.
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