The China Mail - For Laura Linney, role in Parkinson's-themed movie marked a turning point

"I left that movie a very different person than when I went in," the American actress said in an interview with AFP during the Toronto International Film Festival.

"I was very rattled by that...in a good way," she said. "The whole experience is still with me."

Directed by John Madden ("Shakespeare in Love"), "Onwards and Sideways" focuses on how the paths of Emma (Linney) and Tony (Rhys Ifans) cross when, on the same day, a neurologist diagnoses them both with Parkinson's and predicts they have "five good years" left.

The film, which premiered on Sunday at the festival, does not aim to be "a lesson about what that condition might be," its director explained.

"I just wanted to see what would happen with those two people...because then suddenly you are locked into that relationship," the British filmmaker told AFP.

Madden, who received the initial script years ago, stressed that a Parkinson's diagnosis still carries a heavy stigma.

"Always the reaction is, 'Oh no!' because when I grew up, it was something you just didn't want to talk about or hear about, because it was the end of your life, but it isn't that way with Parkinson's," he said.

The director initially decided against working on the project because someone close to him had been diagnosed with the disease.

However, after getting the script again years later, he could not resist the work of writer Paul Mayhew-Archer, who suffers from the condition himself.

"The script was funny. I mean, not only funny... it was as if he had a kind of defiance about the condition thrust upon him, and that was very striking," Madden said.

Mayhew-Archer, who also appears in the film, said "serious illnesses don't need to be treated seriously all the time."

"There's comedy there, and if we just stay miserable about it, we just make ourselves worse," he told AFP on the red carpet at the premiere in the Canadian city.

- 'Responsibility' -

The story also left its mark on Rhys Ifans, who plays a schoolteacher who, unlike the effervescent Emma, keeps his diagnosis hidden.

"It has changed me," he told AFP. "I don't know whether it's softened me, but it certainly made me more aware of my own innate softness."

For both actors, the script presented physical challenges in portraying the bodily changes their characters undergo over the years.

"We both kind of curiously and foolishly said 'yes, let's give this a go,' and then suddenly it dawns on you...the huge responsibility you have because you're representing people who are diagnosed with Parkinson's and who live with it day by day," Ifans said.

"Wanting to represent a community in a way that was appropriate and respectful," Linney added.

For the team behind "Onwards and Sideways," the film was essentially an ode to life.

Mayhew-Archer is one of the hosts of the award-winning podcast "Movers and Shakers," which covers the day-to-day reality of living with Parkinson's. He said the film sought not only to amplify the community's voice but to offer support to those diagnosed with the disease.

"If you have Parkinson's, don't panic, just keep going out there, keep being strong," he told AFP.

"I hope people with Parkinson's gain confidence and strength from this film, as well as having a good laugh."

P.Ho--ThChM