Latest / Crosswalk Talk: Celebrity Christian Interviews / Amazing Grace Turns 20 and the Cast All Became A-List Stars | Bob Beltz

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Amazing Grace Turns 20 and the Cast All Became A-List Stars | Bob Beltz · Crosswalk Talk: Celebrity Christian Interviews

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Life Audio. Hey, Bob, thanks for joining me.
• 0:06
  Speaker 2: Well, it's good to be with you today, and thanks
• 0:08
  Speaker 2: for allowing us to come on and talk a little
• 0:12
  Speaker 2: bit about a great movie.
• 0:13
  Speaker 3: Amen to that.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: Bob Beltz, associate producer of the movie Amazing Grace, which
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year. I loved it
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: the first time I watched it. I'm looking forward to
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: covering it this year as well. It's currently on Angel,
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: also can be purchased or rented on all major platforms,
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: and it's now on DVD as well. The movie, of course,
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  Speaker 1: tells the story of abolitionist William Wilberforce, who fought to
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: end the British slave trade and fought to end slavery
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  Speaker 1: as well. Bob, you're also the author of Real Christianity. Bob,
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  Speaker 1: you have long studied William Wilberforce. You've written about him.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: Why do you think his story is still celebrated? What
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: is it about him that we are attracted to, and
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: why do we need to hear his story?
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: Well, I'll take you back 20 years, first of all,
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: and Prior to making the film, I think I was
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: part of a small Wilberforce fan club. A few people
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  Speaker 2: that did know about him, and any time sort of
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: the topic of faith and social change or action would
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: come up, it always seemed like, you know, that the
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: example that people would use was William Wilberforce. And yet,
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: you know, so few people knew his story, knew about him,
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: and that was, I think, you know, the big motivation.
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: to make the film was to try and introduce this
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  Speaker 2: guy who, you know, I think was one of the
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: most honestly incredible human beings that has ever walked the planet.
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  Speaker 2: And it wasn't just his fight for the abolition of
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: the slave trade. It was a guy that really, out
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: of a renewed faith and commitment to seek his purpose
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: and and sensing a calling from God not only to
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: what he called his two great objects, you know, not
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: only to tackle, you know, the abolition of the slave trade,
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: but then also to really tackle British society and the
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: injustices that he saw around. And I think he ended
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: up either starting or being involved in over 90 what
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: they called at the time societies, which would be kind
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: of like nonprofits today or ministries or NGOs, and it
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  Speaker 2: was said that he made doing good fashionable. Somehow or other,
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  Speaker 2: he was able to get on board many of these causes,
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  Speaker 2: you know, people that were very unlikely, I think, you know,
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  Speaker 2: to be a part of, you know, seeking to, you know,
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  Speaker 2: change British society. So he was just a remarkable human
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: being that, again, you know, very few people knew about.
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  Speaker 2: And we just had a desire to make his story
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  Speaker 2: known and And I'm very proud of the movie. You know,
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  Speaker 2: the owner of the company, this is his favorite film
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  Speaker 2: that we've ever made. And, you know, I just think
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  Speaker 2: it's an excellent film about an amazing human being.
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: We're talking the late 1700s, early 1800s, I believe, if
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: that's correct. And of course, this is a full 50
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: to 60 years before the U.S. abolished slavery. What role
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  Speaker 1: did Wilberforce's Christian faith play? in his beliefs? Was that
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  Speaker 1: the core of what he was, you know, was that
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: the core of his beliefs? Yeah, definitely.
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  Speaker 2: And again, as a young boy, he had come to
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  Speaker 2: faith through the influence of his aunt and uncle who
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: he'd been sent to live with. They happened to be
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: friends with and supporters of George Whitefield, John Wesley, and
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  Speaker 2: John Newton, you know, who actually wrote the hymn Amazing Grace.
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  Speaker 2: And Newton had a big influence on him as a child.
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  Speaker 2: But his family got very upset about that, because in
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  Speaker 2: those days in the Church of England, these guys were
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: looked at as sort of renegades. They came up with
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: a couple of terms to call them that were actually
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: not intended to be complimentary. One was evangelicals. That was
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: really a bad term in those days. And Methodists, that
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: was another one. So anyway— So what happened is he
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  Speaker 2: almost got deprogrammed to the point that by the time
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  Speaker 2: he went to Cambridge, I don't think he had any faith.
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  Speaker 2: You know, he was there with William Pitt, very good
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  Speaker 2: friend of William Pitt's. And by the time that they
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  Speaker 2: graduated from Cambridge at the age of 21, they both
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  Speaker 2: became members of parliament. Pitt, at the age of 24,
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  Speaker 2: became the prime minister of England. Again, you know, part
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  Speaker 2: of what we're hopeful is just that this will connect
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  Speaker 2: with a new generation, particularly of faith. But in terms
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: of his own faith, what happened is he actually, this
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  Speaker 2: is not in the film, the film starts out with
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  Speaker 2: a very little scene where, you know, his butler asks him,
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  Speaker 2: you know, have you found God? Because he's out praying,
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  Speaker 2: you know, and Wilberforce, I think, responds with a good line.
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  Speaker 2: He says, well, I think he found me. And He
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  Speaker 2: had gone on a vacation with a man named Isaac Milner,
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  Speaker 2: who was a professor of mathematics at Cambridge, the contemporary
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: of his, who held the chair there that was held
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  Speaker 2: by Sir Isaac Newton originally, and then finally Stephen Hawking
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  Speaker 2: was held to the same chair. So this was no dummy.
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  Speaker 2: And they went on a vacation together and decided to
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  Speaker 2: study a book called The Rise and Progress of Religion
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: in the Soul by Philip Doddridge. It was sort of
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  Speaker 2: the mere Christianity of the day. And through that, really,
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  Speaker 2: is when he came to, I think, that was this
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: process of him coming back to a real solid faith
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  Speaker 2: and relationship with Christ, and then trying to process, which
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: the film shows, what do I do? Do I stay
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  Speaker 2: in politics, or do I become a minister somewhere? And
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  Speaker 2: both Pitt and then Newton went back to see Newton.
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  Speaker 2: That's in the film. And they both said the same thing,
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  Speaker 2: you know, why can't you do both? God can use
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  Speaker 2: you there. You need to stay there. And then again,
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  Speaker 2: in his faith, he began to seek, what's my purpose
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  Speaker 2: then in politics? And that's where these two great objectives
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  Speaker 2: came out, that he felt like God was leading him.
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: So his faith was at the center of it, really,
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  Speaker 2: and probably more than the film even shows, and great
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: stories behind much of what's in the film. And like
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  Speaker 2: the Milner story. So yes, you know, your answer is
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  Speaker 2: Christ was at the center of it and his relationship
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  Speaker 2: with Christ. Very deep devotional life, by the way, that
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  Speaker 2: you don't really see in the film. But, you know,
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  Speaker 2: that was at the heart of everything he did.
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: You mentioned a couple of things there I want to reference.
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: You mentioned William Pitt. Benedict Cumberbatch portrayed William Pitt in
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: the film, I believe. And of course, this is Doctor
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: Strange now in the Marvel movies. And so you guys
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: got Benedict Cumberbatch, I guess, before he became big, so
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  Speaker 1: that was really cool.
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: We get asked a lot about this, and I think
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: one of the things about re-releasing it, when we made
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: the film, nobody knew who these actors were. You look
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: at the list of actors that are in this film,
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: and they all now are sort of A-list, well-known people.
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: The film actually looks like it was just made because
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: of all of the characters there, and the only reason
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: we got those guys is because the director was Michael Apted,
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: who was a Brit and knew all these these actors
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  Speaker 2: that were really not known in the States. And consequently, again,
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: the cast is amazing.
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: They all do an unbelievable job. And the film is really,
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: really high quality. Some may wonder about the title of
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: the film. It's called Amazing Grace. I think you already
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: referenced that. It's because of William Mobile Force's friendship with
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: John Newton, who wrote Amazing Grace, and he was a
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  Speaker 1: former slave ship captain, I believe. He was just transferred.
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  Speaker 1: That's what Amazing Grace was about. Wilberforce fought the slave
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  Speaker 1: trade for years and lost a lot. And I was
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  Speaker 1: going to ask you, what's the lesson there? Because we
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: live in such an instant gratification society where, you know,
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: if you don't get it done and you don't see
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: results immediately, sometimes you just People just want to give up.
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  Speaker 1: So what can that teach us about perseverance?
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: I was going to say, one of the underlying messages,
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: I think, of the film is persistence or perseverance. The
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: film actually opens at a time when he almost had
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  Speaker 2: a nervous breakdown. That was 10 years. The opening sequences
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  Speaker 2: was 10 years into his battle. He thought he had
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: the votes. Every year he put a bill on the
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  Speaker 2: floor of parliament from 1787, I think, was the first
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: bill that was put on the floor. Every year he
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: put a bill on, and in 1797, he believed that
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  Speaker 2: he had the votes, and his opponents went out and
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  Speaker 2: bought tickets to a comic opera that was reeled, the
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  Speaker 2: big ticket in town, and gave it to everybody that
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: was going to vote pro. And the consequence was that, again,
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  Speaker 2: it was shot down and it really got to him.
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  Speaker 2: And part of the, I think, the message of the
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: film when you see, you know, how he was, you know,
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  Speaker 2: he was at the point of, you know, giving up
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  Speaker 2: and was really encouraged to get back into the fight.
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: And he, it was another 10 years before finally, you know,
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  Speaker 2: in 1807 is when Parliament passed the bill that abolished
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: the slave trade throughout the British Empire. You may say
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: a little bit earlier about how it was so much
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: longer here. Interesting thing is that he was a good
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  Speaker 2: friend of John Jay. John Jay was the first Chief
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: Justice of the Supreme Court, and the slave trade trade
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  Speaker 2: in America was actually abolished a year after it was
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  Speaker 2: abolished in England. But slavery, which Wilberforce went on to
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  Speaker 2: battle for, was abolished there in 1833. And Wilberforce died
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: three days after that bill was passed in Parliament. He'd
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: been ill for some time. And it took us another, what,
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: 60 years, I guess, to finally abolish slavery in the States.
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  Speaker 2: So He had influence here. He was pretty well known,
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  Speaker 2: I think, in those days, even here. But again, you know,
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  Speaker 2: so few people know the story behind all of that
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  Speaker 2: these days. So it was abolished in the 1830s in
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: Great Britain.
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: United Kingdom, is that right?
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  Speaker 2: Okay. Yeah, 1833.
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  Speaker 1: Okay. Because about 30 years then, I guess, the difference there.
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  Speaker 1: But it does seem like the United Kingdom was a
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  Speaker 1: little bit ahead of us, even though there were a
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  Speaker 1: lot of abolitionists. And the Continental Progress in Philadelphia in
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: 1776 that, you know, we wrote the Constitution kind of
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: with both sides just agreeing to disagree and just going
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: forward is what we did. Let's briefly switch lanes here.
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  Speaker 1: This is not your first rodeo. You've been involved in
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: quite a few films over the years that all of
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: our audience has enjoyed. One of the projects was the
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: Narnia series. What was your role in the Narnia series
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  Speaker 1: and why did you want to see that on the
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: big screen?
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  Speaker 2: Well, first of all, I was a big C.S. Lewis
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: fan to begin with, and we had people in the
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: company that also were, and they had been approached multiple
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: times about getting film rights to the books. And one
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: of the things was is that they, you know, prior
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: to our relationship with the estate, there were four men
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: that made all the decisions about the C.S. Lewis estate,
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: and at least two, if not three of them, were
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: not believers. One was his stepson, Doug Gresham, who was
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: a really strong Christian, but they had never given those
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: rights away. So when we began to talk with the estate,
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: we didn't want just the rights to one book, and
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: we actually had the rights to all seven of the books,
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: but it became so difficult to working with studios and
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: demands and things that we, we, we couldn't, we just
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: couldn't get beyond that third film. So, you know, for
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: me to be able, and again, my, my job in
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: the midst of all of that was to try and
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  Speaker 2: keep the film on track with the books. And the
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: environment in those days was not very friendly toward things
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: of faith is, and, you know, Mel's film had come out,
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: so that was obviously a huge success. So my job
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: was to try and keep things, you know, faithful to
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: the books and to the faith, you know, dimension in
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: the books. And that's kind of what my role has
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: been with the film company 25 years now. So I
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: think I've been involved in over 30 films, but those
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: were real, something really special just because I was such
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: a a fan of C.S. Lewis, and I just got
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: mad when they kept trying to take it different directions.
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: So I'm nervous about Netflix having those rights now, and
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: I'm just hoping they don't ruin the deal.
• 13:48
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• 13:51
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• 13:52
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• 13:55
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• 13:57
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• 14:01
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• 14:06
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