22 May 2025
Having enjoyed Jonathan Coe’s latest novel 'The Proof of My Innocence' (reviewed here in December 2024) I realised there was a gap in my Jonathan Coe collection. I had somehow missed his 2020 book ‘Mr Wilder and Me’, which I have now read as an unabridged audio book (narrated by Kristin Atherton). In a break from Coe’s novels set against the backdrop of recent British politics, this gentle elegiac story recounts a teenager in 1976 meeting the legendary veteran film director Billy Wilder. As he approaches the end of his career Wilder - famous for his classic comedies - is trying to make a more serious, personal movie that is not really working. Coe takes the opportunity not just to indulge his own cinephile enthusiasms but also to reflect on the experience of those who lived through the horrors of the Second World War and the difficult relationship Jewish filmmakers who left Europe for Hollywood then had with their home continent. But it is tempting to see Coe himself in this novel - famous for his satirical comedies and now trying to write a more serious, personal book which doesn’t entirely work. Nevertheless I love Jonathan Coe’s distinctive voice and carefully constructed narrative and it was good to fill this omission in my knowledge of his works.
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