Screen Arts Mavericks & Makers Acquires Filmmaker Jonathan Demme's Personal Archive

(Pictured on home page) Philip Hallman, film studies field librarian and curator for the Screen Arts Mavericks & Makers collections, pulls a poster for Jonathan Demme’s movie “The Manchurian Candidate” from a box of posters that are part of a large acquisition of materials from the filmmaker. (Photo by Alan Piñon, U-M Library)

(Excerpts below from text originally published in Michigan News on August 3, 2018 by Sydney Hawkins)

The University of Michigan Library will welcome the archive of the late award-winning director, producer and screenwriter Jonathan Demme. The donation from the Demme family was announced at the Traverse City Film Festival ahead of a special screening of Swimming to Cambodia, a 1987 film directed by Demme.

The personal archive comprises approximately 700 linear feet of materials related to Demme’s 40-year-long career that was punctuated by films like Silence of the Lambs, Philadelphia, Stop Making Sense, Something Wild and Beloved, among many others.

Included are photographs, scripts, correspondence, personal notes, unfinished documentary film footage, promotional items, costumes and props, which will become part of the popular Screen Arts Mavericks and Makers collection. 

According to Philip Hallman, curator of the Mavericks collection at U-M, there are many throughlines that exist between Demme’s archive and others whose materials are already at the university.

“It feels so right on a number of levels that Jonathan’s archive is at U-M,” Hallman said. “He’s worked with Nancy and Ira and John before, so there are actually many items related to his work that can already be found here. This donation both provides another important window into the world of indie film, and makes the existing archive stronger and more connected.”

To read the complete article from Michigan News, please click here.