Deadly Intent
Lynda La Plante

A Conversation with Lynda La Plante

After a successful career as an actress, you turned to writing for television, including the Prime Suspect series, and now have a career as a novelist. How does writing books compare with writing for the screen? Do you prefer one over the other?

Writing for television and film is very different from writing a novel. As I am also the producer of my scripts, La Plante Productions produces everything that I write, which means I have to wear a few hats. The difference comes from the budget. If, for example, I know I have one million for a sixty-minute episode that has to be broken down into casting/crew/locations/directors/producers, then I have make sure I write within the budget, so often when I would like to have a fleet of helicopters, I can maybe only manage just one. This also applies to locations. Again, if I would like my characters to travel abroad inside the storyline, it is impossible as the cost would be astronomical. Writing a novel therefore gives me a wonderful freedom. I can have a fleet of private jets, etc. So, I enjoy splitting my time between the two. It is very productive, and I couldn’t really say which I prefer. Sometimes the constrictions of script writing make for a very tight, well-honed piece of work as I don’t allow myself to ramble. I cut and cut and edit, often working on five or six drafts before I am satisfied.

Have you found any similarities between writing and acting?

The only similarity between writing and acting is that I act out all the parts when I am working on a script. I natter away to myself and laugh and cry, and I also ask my staff to have readings of the drafts as I continue to cut and edit. This gives me an opportunity to hear the spoken words, and often I’ll play two or three parts. That is all the acting I ever want to commit to, as I have never regretted leaving my acting career behind. I get such a joy from writing and love every minute of it.

In addition to writing, you also run your own production company, executive-producing an array of television series. How do you find time to balance all your responsibilities?

Balancing the production side of my life only works because I have such a terrific staff at La Plante Productions. By the time it gets to preproduction, I am ready to take a breather from the computer, and it is actually like recharging my batteries. Bringing a director on board is a major step, as soon I will be handing the production over to him. Before that time, we cast at my offices so I get to hear the actors reading, and I enjoy the casting process very much. By the time we have the cameras rolling I step aside as I believe there should be only one boss on the floor, and that is the director. Now I use a different hat and that is editing. As the rushes come in, I check every take and monitor performances, etc. Once filming is completed I then have sessions with the director and editor to polish up the finished product. It never ceases to enthrall me, how much more work has gone into streamlining the scripts and how performances lift them up into a different dimension. I love it all.

Anna Travis is a young female detective working in a fast-paced, male-dominated world. What initially attracted you to her character?

Anna Travis is actually a new breed of female in the police force. There is some discrimination left over, but nowhere near the amount when I wrote Prime Suspect. I was very attracted to writing a young female officer after having talks with a young detective during my research. She was so informative and confident, and I felt it would be a good opportunity to show the new style of women joining the metropolitan police force. This would also give me a great springboard to show how gradually she would become the same rank as Jane Tennison from Prime Suspect, and it would allow me to follow her career through the ranks.

How has Anna evolved over the course of this series?

Anna Travis is evolving into a very experienced, tough detective. It shows how obsessive and career-minded she is, how much of her private life is dormant due to her work ethic. It also allows me to show her mistakes, her loneliness, and her vulnerability.

How did you come up with the idea for Alexander Fitzpatrick’s character? What research, if any, did you do to fill in the details of his crimes and the accompanying detective work?

Alexander Fitzpatrick is a character who had such a back story of drug dealing and wealth and a man who had also escaped justice. I began researching by first reading all about Howard Marks, who in the seventies was a notorious drug trafficker. I then visited a number of drug dealers in prison and began to piece Fitzpatrick together like a jigsaw puzzle. I worked with the drug squad to learn their approach to drug dealers and then switched back to the murder squad as they are brought on board due to the shooting of an ex-detective.

What inspires you? Where do the ideas for your characters and storylines come from?

My inspiration for virtually all my work comes out of the daily newspapers. I find some small article that interests me and then begin to follow it up. Sometimes the paper trail ends abruptly and I don’t think it will work out, so I start again. When I find something that interests me, and after researching and building up interviews, I have to begin to cloak the original. This is not only to avoid any legal issues but also many times to avoid betraying the people that have given me their time. As an example, in last month’s paper there was an article about a grandmother who was arrested for attempting to rob a post office. Digging into the facts of the story, it began to have many tentacles: that the grandmother was not, as I had expected, an elderly woman but was only forty-two years old and had seven children, four grandchildren, a husband in prison, and repossession order on her house. She had gotten into terrible financial difficulties because she’d borrowed from a loan shark and her debt kept growing out of all proportion. Having threats made on her life and then the eviction order pushed her into a desperate attempt to rob the post office! So from one small paragraph out comes a substantial story.

Do you ever read mysteries written by other authors? If so, what authors do you enjoy?

I read so many crime novels and watch virtually every crime show on TV until I have square eyes. One of the main reasons is that I would hate to ever cross over someone else’s plotlines. One of my favorite crime writers is Karin Slaughter, and I constantly return to reading Raymond Chandler’s short stories. They are brilliant.

The book has an open ending, with a few puzzles that we’d like to see solved. What else lies in store for Anna Travis?

I know there is an open ending to the book that leaves some puzzles, probably the biggest being that they lose their Prime Suspect. There is also again the feeling that Anna Travis could get into deep trouble because she is hotheaded and does not conform to rules. The following book will take Travis further toward losing her career unless she becomes a team player. She is also becoming less naive, more sexually aware, and unafraid to face her ties to Langton and set them loose for once and for all.