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Born in 1925, O’Connor was a highly regarded fiction writer in
the Southern Gothic style. Yet in the nearly 60 years since her
untimely death from lupus, her personal letters and opinions on
race have been criticized for evidence of racial prejudice.
In “Wildcat,” which had its international premiere at the
Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), Hawke pulls from the
author’s fiction to tell her story. He and his daughter Maya
Hawke, the film's star, wanted to showcase O’Connor’s ability to
capture the human condition in prose.
“I used her own words, I didn't try to defend her,” Hawke said
at TIFF. “I used her own writing to tell the story.”
O’Connor’s writing won several literary awards, and she was
featured on a postage stamp in 2015. Yet personal letters show a
woman who was, in her own words, a “segregationist by taste.”
“Wildcat” is meant to tell O’Connor’s stories, but is not a
biopic, said Maye Hawke, who plays O’Connor as well as
characters from her writing.
“I felt attached to her from when I was young because she was
the first famous writer who I ever heard hate themselves,” Maya
Hawke said.
Loyola University of Maryland in 2020 said it would remove
O'Connor's name from a dorm, citing some of her writings that
reflected a racist perspective.
Laura Linney, who plays O'Connor's mother Regina among others in
the film, said it would be one-dimensional to gloss over
O'Connor's writing achievements and merely remember her for her
personal views on race, ideas O'Connor also struggled with.
“She’s also diving into everything that is wrong with us as
human beings. She’s challenging her readers to really look at
things and to not be afraid to lean into uncomfortable
situations,” Linney said.
(Reporting by Jenna Zucker; Editing by David Gregorio)
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