How old is Wanton Muse?

Pikka Brassey: Two years old, we set up in February 1999.

Philippa Goslett: Pikka and I set up the company and Moira came on board a year ago -- we needed her.

How did the three of you meet?

PG: We've known each other for a long time, Moira and I since we were four years old and I met Pikka when I was 14. We hadn't seen each other for a while but then Pikka but I hooked up and we started talking about films and writing screenplays. She had a contact called Tony Defries who was interested in setting up a company to develop specific screenplays, like Paradise Lost that we're developing with a writer at the moment. The company was set up for that originally but we then managed to inspire him with our other ideas.

Where were you all before this?

PB - I worked at the BBC for about four years. I started as a production assistant and ended up subtitling films, that was great because you just watch a lot of movies in slow motion and you begin to learn how films are edited. I did that for a year but I was also working on screenplays and short films - then I found Philippa.

Moira Campbell: I've had many, many jobs! (laughs) Business administration, PR, journalism, chef, trapeze artist - hence my wounded hand.

What happened?

MC:I was doing this stupid move around the bar last night and all the skin on my hand just ripped off.

PG: I was in theatre production, I produced plays on the fringe but it was pretty horrible. Then I went to an agency called CAN, I was assistant to the main agent there Michael Wiggs for a couple of years. I did all the script reading and the publicity for all their clients - I loved the reading part but I didn't want to be an agent, that was where Pikka came in.

Tell me about Little Ashes?

PB: The story went that we entered a competition and we had to put in a few ideas, I did an outline for Little Ashes. It won the competition, it got script edited and then I had to write it, a bit of a surprise to say the least. That draft got funding from a big EU organisation called Media 2, they are quite picky when it comes to selecting. I think three UK companies got money last year, we were one of them and the other two were really well established - they normally go on track record so it was real coup for us.

What's the story about?

PG: It's set in Spain in the 1920's and it's essentially about the love affair between a very young Dali and the great Spanish poet Garcia Lorca. Dali was only 18 at the time he is in no way the man he became in later life, none of the moustaches and flamboyance although there is at the end of the film. He started off as a student totally paralysed with nerves, he couldn't even speak to people he was so shy and he desperately wanted to become part of this erudite set that Bunuel and Lorca were involved in. It's about his gradual transformation into this caricature that he created for himself.

Who is Garcia Lorca,

PG: He was a playwright and a poet who's very well known in Europe but not so well known over here. His assassination was ordered at the outbreak of the Spanish civil war by Franco, partly for being too forthright in his political opinions but also for being a homosexual. It's about a love affair between two men in a society where that was still taboo, there's very little of the actual war in the film.

Is Bunuel featured much?

PG: Not too much because Bunuel moves to Paris half way through the story, he became very jealous of their relationship.

PB: The element of the story that really works is young people and their sexual confusion, it transcends the fact that they become famous figures but the fact who they are becomes a really interesting way in.

MC: It's about choices in life, either going with who you are or choosing to become someone else to achieve your goals in a much more public sense.

How much did you get from Media 2?

MC: It was about 10,000 Euros, £6000 and I think we should have applied for more because we would have got it.

PB: It was perfect at the time and it's really kept the project going and now Philippa's been selected for the Moonstone lab.

PG: Last year it was in Ireland and this year it's in Italy -- it's a tough life!

PB: We've basically been developing Little Ashes and Paradise Lost, the project we were originally set up to develop. We were about half way through that but it's on the back burner now, it's enormously ambitious and it's best to go with someone more feasible. We've covered several ways of treating it because there are so many ways you can adapt it so we finally decided what we wanted to do with it and put it on hold. Then this new writer called Arash Amel suddenly phones us to say that he's actually just written the same screenplay that we'd been developing - practically exactly the same!

Does it work as an adaptation?

PG: It does work but it's a bit long winded so we've transposed all the characters into an almost sci-fi fantasy world and we've removed the pressured religious elements.

I thought that was the point?

MC: It is the point but Lucifer is the tragic hero and it's really a story about him and how he gets his revenge -- It still retains God, Paradise and Adam and Eve but it's a bit more acceptable.

Tony Defries sounds familiar but not from film, what's his background?

PB: He was a very big music manager in the 70's. He discovered David Bowie, Iggy Pop, Stevie Wonder, people like that. He's moved into film in the UK and also manages bands over here, he set us up really.

PG: It's so difficult starting up anyway but it's impossible without capital. We then went to Cannes very soon after, we went with nothing and really nothing on paper either. We just approached people professionally and with an open mind, we didn't try to sell anything we didn't have and it's something I'd recommend to anyone.

PB: Cannes will be really important this year. Before we went first time round we rang a lot of European production companies to set up meetings. Interestingly, the first company we met was Egmond who had produced Antonia's Line and developed The Luzhin Defense. We had a sketchy one page outline that they were really pleased with but it was almost a year later when we finally called them to say we had a script for it. They were again very interested and wanted a co-production deal just like that.

MC: Then they gave us Marleen Gorris - we'd heard before that she didn't want it but she'd not even seen the script -- anyway we went over to meet her after that. She was just fantastic and we shared the same passion for it - it's very nice when that happens.

PG: Since then I've gone over and re-written the screenplay with her.

How do the three of you work when one is writing a screenplay for the company to produce?

PG: One writes and the other two script edit and it's such an involved process that it gets to the point that none of us can be objective anymore. We've been lucky in that we've had script editing through Euroscript, the editor that worked on that liked the project so much that she was still interested by the time we'd finished the first draft. Now we've got Marleen giving her input and we'll have seven other writers giving their opinion on it through Moonstone.

What's the status with that project now?

MC: Basically Egmond are putting in 50% and we have to get the other 50% but we are already on board through Defries' Main Man company. So we now need another 40% and we want to start shooting in September/October - that's fairly near.

PB: So at the moment we are going hell for leather trying to attach cast and we are talking to sales agents and executive producers but Cannes will be a blitz to get the other 40%.

PG: We can't use American money or actors because of the strike so we'll have to find a British cast and talk to the European producers.

Tom Fogg