Growing up in England and Wales in the 1970s, June and Jennifer Gibbons, identical twins, were talking to each other all the time. They chatted, laughed, and whispered. They were prolific readers and wrote stories that displayed great creativity. They had ambitions to become famous writers.
However, throughout their childhood they experienced racist bullying at school, which became particularly severe at Haverfordwest, where they and their siblings were the only black students. I was. This is a condition usually caused by severe anxiety. In the end, they hardly talked to anyone but each other.
In his late teens, such behavior, along with petty theft and arson, culminated in nearly 12 years in Broadmoor, one of Britain’s most notorious psychiatric hospitals.
Only one of them actually left the facility. Jennifer died of heart inflammation the day he was released, at the age of 29.
Investigative journalist Marjorie Wallace, who first reported the story of the twins in the 1980s and appealed for their release from Broadmoor, wrote about them in her 1986 book, The Silent Twins.
“I loved their sense of humor,” said Wallace. “Very sarcastic, very sensitive. They saw the funny side of everything, but also the tragic side.” She first met the twins when she worked as a journalist for The Sunday Times. when I was They did not engage with her at first, but she read their writings and persuaded them to speak with her. For example, from Jennifer a novel titled “Disco Mania” and from June titled “Pepsi-Cola Addict”. Along with her diaries and other texts.
Wallace soon realized that there was an incredibly rich and complex world hidden in June and Jennifer’s silence. “It’s a bit like deep-sea diving,” she said. “And then you suddenly stumble into this Technicolor world they wrote.”
Over the years, June and Jennifer’s story has been used to sustain ongoing narratives about the perils of twins that are often seen in movies and television. Twins and the recent Netflix hit Echoes, which introduces the main twin characters as borderline psychopaths who exchange lives once a year, unbeknownst to their family and friends. please think about it. It’s full of charm, intrigue, fetishes, and horror tropes.
The new film about June and Jennifer, “Silent Twins,” starring Letitia Wright (“Black Panther”) and Tamara Lawrence (“Kindred”) as teenage and adult twins, promises to buck this trend. I am aiming.
Directed by Agnieszka Smoczynska (“The Lure”), the film hopes to capture the rich and tragic palette of the twins’ lives. A clever use of stop-motion animation and original music inspired by their writings.
“I wanted to tell this from the inside, from their point of view,” Smocinska said. “And it just presents them as beautiful, sensitive, very funny and intelligent sisters.” She was drawn to the story of growing up among her mother’s sisters’ “constellations” in Poland. .
“There are so many layers to their story. It’s one of the most beautiful love stories to me because it’s so dynamic,” she added. “And it ends with her act of love. After Jennifer died, June said that her sister had sacrificed herself for her and set her free.”
She spent weeks reading and discussing Wallace’s books and her sister’s diaries, novels, and poems with the cast and crew. says Smoczynska. “You have both psychological drama and fantastical elements, because the same was in their writings. They were very complex in terms of form and their description.” and some other works will be published professionally for the first time.
Wallace said it was a calculated choice to work with Andrea Siegel, who wrote the script, and Smoczynska, who she felt would bring justice to her report. “There were so many people who came to the show,” Wallace said. “One of them was her two white girls who were drug addicts and went to crazy raves in Mississippi.” Wallace worked as a consultant and co-producer on the film, and now with June But we have a close relationship.
Wallace said the new film “probably wasn’t what I wanted to do” (she wrote an adaptation for the BBC based on her book in 1986), but June and Jennifer’s Wright and Lawrence He described the depiction of the “At some point watching the film, I honestly thought I was back in Broadmoor,” she said, emphasizing the phrase June used in imagining the institution: “My sister And I am as vulnerable as the flower of hell.
Along with reframing June and Jennifer’s lives and honoring their creative endeavors, Wallace hopes the film will influence how the twins are portrayed in film and television.
“If you look at the old movies, and indeed the current movies, they make the twins as evil killers or freaks,” Wallace said. can be used to manipulate and wreak havoc.”
“It’s amazing that I’ve never seen a movie about twins that shows the complexity and depth of love and hate and how to find your own identity. The same person out there.” she said. “Until now, maybe, in this current movie.”
Filmmaker (and twin) Joe Garrity said Wallace’s book was a “really foundational” text in learning about the scope of twin relationships.Twinsburg‘ tells the story of a pair of twins who attend the annual (very real) Twins Day festival in Twinsburg, Ohio, and who, despite being raised inseparably, are radically different. I am working on the idea that there is
“The more depictions that examine the internalized identities given to us by others, the better,” he added. more people.”
Lawrence and Wright, the producers of “The Silent Twins,” became incredibly close during filming, talking all night to plan scenes and even moving next door to each other. Lawrence said she had a deep empathy for her sisters and knew they felt like they had no voice because of their race or gender. Many times I felt isolated in a facility much larger than I was.”
For Wright, who first joined the project and was already aware of June and Jennifer’s story, it’s important that she and Lawrence have creative control behind the scenes as the only black women on the production team.
“I understood early on that she didn’t have all the answers,” Wright said in an interview. “And right away, if I’m on this project, who’s going to play my twins, we need to get to the table, we’re executive producers or producers.” We have to have a say, because this is our story.”
Lawrence and Wright worked intensively with their movement and voice coaches to try to replicate the actions and appearance of their on-screen sisters, despite their dissimilarity. Wright sees June as a “caged bird,” with the maturity to understand that the twins’ way of life won’t last forever, but he has a lot of respect for his sister. He had a deep sense of love and loyalty.
Lawrance thinks that Jennifer was more insecure than June, which made her a little obsessive. “Watching documentaries and reading books really made me feel for Jennifer because I felt like past media coverage portrayed her as an evil twin,” she said. “The one who possesses June”
Looking back, Lawrence saw how their differences arose between them. “She wrote in her diary, ‘I have this scar on my nose. It is said that Cain killed Abel.” Twins should never forget that.
It’s inevitable that movies and television will continue to be fascinated with twins, as mythological twin stories go back thousands of years. Upcoming films featuring the twins include the horror Goodnight Mommy and the comedy musical inspired by The Parent Trap. Could ‘The Silent Twins’ have a small but lasting impact on their portrayal?
Smoczynska said a mother came up to her after the screening and was very touched and had a better understanding of twins.
“This is why we make films,” said Smocinska. “So that someone can find themselves, understand life, and heal.”