E-Mail This Article to a Friend Out of the Fog Andre Dubus III muses on writing, his famous father, and the book that’s given him his first taste of Hollywood BY TAMARA WIEDER

FILMGOERS, TAKE NOTE: if you’re looking for your standard holiday-movie fare, the soon-to-be-released House of Sand and Fog may not fit the bill. The story, about a woman (Jennifer Connelly) who loses her house, the immigrant (Ben Kingsley) who buys it at auction, and the anguish that ensues for the two and those they love, is a harrowing bit of cinema, a gut-wrenching vision of the American dream spiraling unstoppably downward.

Andre Dubus III, who wrote the book on which the film is based, wouldn’t have it any other way.

The son of renowned writer Andre Dubus never expected Hollywood to come calling — but when it did, he hoped the resulting film would remain true to his novel, sunset-less ending and all. And on a cell phone from Newburyport, where Dubus — who for years worked as a contractor and carpenter — is building himself his first house, he explains why the film has not disappointed.

Q: So do you like the film?

A: I do. I like it a lot. It’s very loyal to the story I wrote, so I like it on that count, but also, I think it’s very honest. It took lot of courage to make that in the major-studio system. That’s not a Hollywood ending by any stretch. If someone else had done it, they’d all have been riding off into the sunset, happy as can be, everything’s okay.

Q: How important was it for you to like the film?

A: It wasn’t so much important for me to like the film. It was important to me that the film was loyal to the themes of the book and to the emotional tones of the book. You know, it’s a lot of calls from Hollywood if you get six a year on a piece. That one got over 140 calls. I mean, I’d get like four or five a week for a year and a half after its publication, from all kinds of people. When I would talk to them, invariably they’d be talking about, "We love the suspense, we love the drama. You know, we’ll have to make it softer." I’d say, "What do you mean, softer?" "Well, it’s got to be a little more uplifting in the end." I’d say, "Why? So you can sell more tickets?" "Yeah, so we can sell more tickets." So I would hang up.

Then I got a call from this guy Vadim Perelman, and he’d never made a film. I talked to him on the phone, and we had a nice conversation. He told me about his life a little bit and the fact that he’s been reading like 100 books a year since he was a kid, and he said some really nice things about my book, and then he said, "Listen, you may sell the rights to your story to some big movie person who’s made movies before, and they’ll give you a lot of money." He said, "But they’re going to take your baby," he said these exact words, "They’re going to take your baby, they’re going to chain it to a radiator, and they’re going to rape and kill it." That gets your attention. He said, "Well, I’m not going to hurt your baby. I’m going to make the movie from the book you wrote, not from some other place." And I believed him. So I went with him. So to answer your question, was it important for me to like it? No, I’m not one of these writers who expects a literal transcription of their story, because that really does rob the filmmakers of their creativity. See, for me — oh, I hate when writers talk this way — but characters for me are real people. I mean, they live inside my head as if they’re real people. They’re not inventions. And I wanted the movie to be respectful of their integrity, and that’s why I like it so much; I think it’s very respectful of the characters’ integrity and their stories, so I just feel really lucky.

Q: When you were writing the book, could you envision it as a movie?

A: No. Well, never during; during writing, I never think of anything like that. I don’t even think of publication when I’m writing. Well, in weak moments after a few beers I might. Normally, no. I just worked so hard on making these real people and trying to write as true a story to them and their situation as I could. Honestly, I don’t think of it that much. I’m not a big movie guy. I like movies, I don’t love them. I probably see six a year. I know a lot of young writers today are deeply influenced by film. I don’t know if I am. I think I’m more influenced by Springsteen and Bach. Van Gogh. And my kids.

Q: Is it true that you wrote most of this book in your car in a graveyard near your house?

A: Yes, I did. Isn’t that weird? Because we were broke, and we lived in this little tiny apartment, and we’re blessed with three kids who are, you know, kids, and so they’re loud, and I couldn’t concentrate, and I couldn’t afford an office. I taught at Tufts and Emerson, but I didn’t have an office at Emerson and I had to share an office at Tufts with five other people, so I had to find a place. One day I realized, God, my car is awfully quiet. So I said, shit, I’m going to start writing in my car. And also, it took four years to write that novel, and the whole four years I was writing it, we were having our three kids and I was making a living primarily teaching at five Boston-based campuses and remodeling two houses, bathroom jobs. So I would just pull over in that graveyard about a mile from my house and just get it done. In the winter I’d put the heat on, in the summer I’d roll the windows down and put on bug spray. I filled up 22 notebooks in three years and then made some room in my attic, which was unheated, and I typed it for a year up there into a word processor — not a computer; I didn’t have one yet. I still write longhand pencil in notebooks.

Q: So this book that you wrote in the car, because you didn’t have money for an office, now this book is going to turn into a blockbuster movie.

A: It turned into a blockbuster book, much to my shock. You know what, too? It went to 22 publishers before it got published. So it’s been a weird, strange ride all the way.

Q: Take me back. Why did you decide to become a writer in the first place? Was it a conscious decision?

A: No, it was unconscious. I didn’t want to be one at all. I mean, my father is a great writer with the same name — who wants that friggin’ problem? It wasn’t even a shadow thing. People have misunderstood that: "Oh, he didn’t want to write because he didn’t want to be in his father’s shadow." I didn’t feel in my father’s shadow; I’ve always been my own man. I didn’t feel intimidated or ambitious in that way. It was really more, I wanted my own identity. Which is different. I wanted something my mom and dad didn’t do. It was that simple. And also, I think I made the subconscious conclusion that we do as kids and young people, we make a sort of subconscious conclusion we’re not even aware of, and that was, well, there’s already a writer in the family; I must be something else. You just assume, well, that role’s taken; I must be a doctor, a lawyer, a plumber, a carpenter. I must be something else.

I’d gotten a degree in political science and sociology, and I was heading off to get a PhD in, honestly, Marxist social science, because I was a Marxist. So I took a year off, and I was working with my brother, who’s a guitarist and painter, remodeling houses in Lynn. And I was training for the Golden Gloves. I was into this really self-denying purist thing: I didn’t have a phone, I didn’t have a TV, I didn’t have a radio. It was just a quiet, Spartan apartment with no furniture. I slept on a one-inch foam pad. This is bizarre: my pillow was a pillowcase with two work boots in it. So I work all day at construction, and then I go to the gym for a couple hours and box, and then I come home, I brew tea and have an egg or something, and I would read Marx and Engels and Max Weber and all these social theorists. It was bizarre. I was just a very serious guy. On weekends I’d go get drunk and chase women. And I fell in love with this girl who was writing fiction, and I began to read her manuscripts, and ironically I grew up the son of a writer, but we didn’t live in the same house after me being 10, so I didn’t really read books or think about them much more than I had to in school. So I started to read fiction, and I just got so friggin’ inspired. It was a shock to me. One night, almost in a trance-like state, it’s so bizarre to think about — I sat down, and I started to write a scene about a woman who loses her virginity on the hood of a car in the rain in the Maine woods. I don’t know where it came from. It was overwritten and just bad writing. But you know what? I felt like myself for the first time in my entire life. It was a religious experience. I just felt like me. So that was how it started. And about four months later I finished a short story, and gave it to my girlfriend hoping she’d like it, and she didn’t, but I didn’t care anymore. I said, well, I’m going to write another one then, because I just love how I feel when I write. I never even wanted to be a writer; I wrote 10 years before I even had a book, and I didn’t really care. No, I cared. But it was never the goal. It was never the goal to be a writer. I just wanted to write. And even today, with all this wonderful stuff that’s happened in my quote-unquote writing career, well, you know, that’s nice, but I don’t care as much about it as I do the actual writing. I just love writing. And I love how terribly hard it is. I think that’s one reason we love it: because it’s so fucking hard to do well and honestly.

Q: Was your father encouraging of your writing?

A: He was very, very encouraging. He said I was going to be a writer whether I wanted to be one or not, and he said some really encouraging things. He was always very generous and very encouraging. There’s none of that petty jealousy you read about in some literary families. None. He was very generous and very supportive. He and I, we had a relationship apart from writing. We hardly ever talked about it.

Q: I read that you don’t like using the "III" in your name.

A: No, I fucking hate it.

Q: Does your publisher ask you to use it?

A: No. Just out of respect for my father. There has to be some distinction between the two names. It’s like Hank Williams and Hank Jr. You’ve got to have Jr. there so you know you aren’t buying a Hank Sr. album. It’s easier in the entertainment world, because you know, how you look is a big thing. In the literary world, your byline is out there most of the time without your face attached, so it’s not as clear. So there has to be some kind of distinction. I never liked the III because it just sounds so damned elitist, and I grew up in a single-parent family in hard times, man. I’ve never had any money and my family’s never had any money; I come from a line of muleskinners and pipe fitters. I’ve had a lot of experiences where people meet me and they expect some effete guy from the East Coast, and I’m a working-class snob with a fancy name. That’s the reason I don’t like it. Other than that, fuck it, I can live with it. I mean, there are worse problems to have. But you know why I didn’t change it? I actually, all through my 20s, agonized about it, but I just couldn’t. And maybe I’m just too passionate and literal about this, but because of that feeling I told you about, that authentic true feeling? I never felt more like me, and I couldn’t put a fake name on it. My name’s Andre Dubus. Two John Kennedys, two Hank Williamses, two Alexandre Dumases. Okay, there’s two Andre Dubuses. That’s the hand I was dealt, I’m going to play it.

Q: Tell me about this house you’re working on.

A: It’s my first house. I’ve never owned one. My brother designed it. Here’s the irony: a book I wrote about a woman who loses her house, and the great suffering and fighting over it, enabled me to build my first house. It’s a gorgeous, freakin’ gorgeous house. I’ve been out here every day for a year. We framed last year in that 40-below winter, every day. We sheaved in the wettest spring, we did the roof in the heat wave in June. One of my carpenters said, "Hey man, what’s next, locusts?" And so right now, I kind of went broke, so it’s just me and my wife and brother working on it. My wife and I are shingling and he’s doing carpentry. I’ll tell you, it’s been a beautiful experience. There’s something primal that happens when you build your own shelter. I think everybody should experience it. It’s been something else. I guess for me too, I’ve had a landlord over my head all 44 years of my life. So this is a big deal.

Q: So are your days generally a mix of writing and working with your hands?

A: Here’s my routine, and I really kind of like it. I work here eight to four, 4:15. I go straight to my downtown Starbucks and get a bunch of caffeine. I go to my little office — I have an office now. My sister’s the executive director of the women’s crisis center in Newburyport, and I rent a little office there. I have the security code, and I go by all these domestic-violence pamphlets. It’s really kind of surreal. By the time I get there, the building’s empty, so it’s nice and quiet, and I work for about two, two and a half hours on the new novel, and then I go home and play with my three kids and my wife. It’s been very nice.

I forgot how I really like writing sessions after I’ve been physically exhausted all day. Because when you sit down after, like, eight hours of heavy labor, you’re too tired for that damn [internal] editor to show up, so you just rap out those sentences. You just keep putting them down and putting them down. You get a lot more done. You can always go back with the editor later. But it’s nice — you’re so tired, the editor doesn’t even show up.

Q: So what are you going to do when the house is done?

A: Well, you know what? I think I’ll be broke again, and I’ll be going back to working all day somewhere, somehow.

Q: Were you actually a bounty hunter?

A: That’s a weird story. Yeah, but I wasn’t like a bonded guy that you see in these new shows. Okay, so I go to University of Wisconsin at Madison for four days. After four days, I quit. I said, you know, I don’t want to be a sociologist. I don’t know what my life is, but it has stories in it, and art. So I quit, and I ended up in Colorado where the writer girlfriend I’d been dating was going to school. I got a job in a bar, and then I saw an ad in the paper for a job working in, what looked like, I thought, a nut house. Dispensing medication to patients. And I thought, well, that’d be interesting — I’ll do that. I got the job not knowing that I was actually working with convicted adult felons from the state penitentiary. It was a really interesting job. And actually, most of my first book, a collection of stories called The Cage Keeper, came from that job. Well, at the same time I met a guy who was a private investigator who specialized in hunting down only killers. And he had a young 22-year-old kid like me who was an adrenaline junkie who wasn’t afraid to sit in a car for 12 hours and watch somebody’s house, drinking cold coffee and peeing in an empty cup. That’s really all the job is. Pretty glamorous. So I did that for six months, and he paid me cash.

I took these jobs because they were at night, and they gave me mornings to write. It wasn’t even really the adventure. I found the adventure vaguely interesting, but I liked that it was all night and I could work all morning.

Q: So what are you working on now?

A: I’m working on a novel. I’m always very vague about what I’m working on. I really think that whether you’re a male or a female writer, when you’re writing a story, you’re kind of pregnant with that story, and the cells are multiplying and dividing inside you, the way they do in a woman’s womb, and you want to keep it dark and mysterious and protected from outside light and air and attention. So I can just answer you vaguely. I’ve written a couple novellas in the last few years that have been published, and I’ve got a novel draft I finished, but there’s something not right with it; I don’t know what it is, but it’s on the back burner, simmering. And I’m a couple hundred pages into something new and weird, and every day I go to it and I’m terrified of it, and sometimes I feel nothing and think it sucks and so do I. Only writers do that, by the way. My wife’s a dancer and choreographer, and she says, "You know, if I have a bad day choreographing, I don’t automatically assume I’m not a choreographer and never have been. You writers are so weird: you think, ‘Oh, I’m not one, I never have been one.’ " Why do we do that?

House of Sand and Fog opens in Boston on December 26. Tamara Wieder can be reached at twieder[a]phx.com