Here Weisgarber dreamcasts an adaptation of The Promise:True confessions. I’m not up on the latest when it comes to movie stars. But when I was writing The Promise, a novel set in Galveston, Texas, in 1900 at the time of a historic hurricane, I visualized Renée Zellweger as my Nan Ogden character. Nan is rough around the edges, prides herself on being self-sufficient, and can’t bear fussy manners. Renée Zellweger played a similar no-nonsense woman in Cold Mountain. Whenever I was stuck, I’d picture Renée Z. waging her finger at me for moaning about writer’s block. “You think you have it hard,” I could hear her saying. “My daddy run off when I wasn’t nothing but a little thing and I’ve just wrung the neck of a chicken for supper. Try that for hard.”Visit Ann Weisgarber's website.
My Nan character has a very different life story but she’s not above a little finger wagging. Renée Zellweger could slip into the role just fine. It also helps that she’s from Katy, Texas, a two-hour drive from Galveston.
Nicole Kidman was my image for the other narrator, Catherine Wainwright. Catherine is a college-educated pianist who guards her feelings. You might call her buttoned up. She’s also a well-mannered beauty whose smile charms men. Nicole Kidman has played several period piece roles where she’s a gracious but cool woman who struggles to keep up appearances. When writing The Promise, I visualized Nicole Kidman sitting on the edge of a parlor chair with her back straight and her chin up while holding a tea cup with her little finger out. This is my Catherine. Miss Kidman, the role is yours.
The other main character in The Promise is Oscar Williams, a dairy farmer who marries Catherine. I didn’t have an image of an actor in mind for him since he sprang from my imagination. But that’s not a problem. We’ll have a casting call. Somewhere, there’s an aspiring actor waiting for a break. The Promise might be it.
All we need is a producer and a director, and we’re ready to go to production!
--Marshal Zeringue
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