Lesley Paterson: From triathlon world champion to Oscar

This time, Lesley Paterson will be mingling with movie greats, rather than serving them drinks.

“I waited tables at the Governor’s Ball, which is the post-Oscar dinner … and I had Judi Dench and Jennifer Lopez at my table, which was really fun,” she told DW of an event 14 years ago.

“I remember pouring Jennifer Lopez, Diet Coke and Judi Dench, a cup of tea. Oh, my God. I mean, honestly, like, she [Dench] is a huge idol of mine, so I really hope to get to know her more in terms of level this time around.”

Dame Judi probably had no idea who her waiter was. She may well know by now, after Paterson’s long struggle, along with writing partner Ian Stokell, to have her screenplay adapted from Erich Maria Remarque’s classic 1929 anti-war novel “All Quiet on the Western Front” turned into a feature film for the second time. . The first was made in 1930.

Paterson traces a straight line from her wildly successful athletic career to her success with the film, which was nominated for nine Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay, a category for which she was nominated along with Stokell and the director of film, Eduardo Berger.

‘Running out of the womb’

“I was practically coming out of the womb,” Paterson said. “But to be honest, the creativity was always there. I was also a dancer from a very young age, so I think I’ve been expressing myself through my body for most of my life.”

Paterson’s first organized athletic endeavor was rugby at the age of seven. “I saw my brother playing in the mud and I said, ‘Dad, I want to play with this. It looks like so much fun,’ and I joined an all-boys rugby team.” It was Paterson and over 200 boys.

“So that was my first sport and it kind of sums up my personality. Brave and kind, you know, I like overcoming obstacles.”

Once she added ballet to the mix, Paterson’s dad encouraged her to run, then bike, and by age 14, she was doing triathlons. And she was good, eventually earning places in the Scottish team at age 15, and the Great Britain team soon after. But, she says, a change in triathlon’s Olympic format, with an emphasis on swimming, has left her disillusioned. She left the sport behind and moved to Southern California with her husband Simon Marshall, a sports psychologist who found a job there. She switched from competitive sport to a love of the performing arts, earning a Masters in Theater and Film.

“My art has allowed me to really develop my emotional sense of self. And because when you get into sport at a very young age, you know, and especially as part of a system like the British system,” she said, “they say there’s a way. And if you don’t fit that path then that’s it So I think going back to art really allowed me to open my mind a little bit about who I was, what I wanted.

Dreaming Big in Hollywood

Paterson tried his hand at acting for several years. But turning it into a music video was her only highlight and she determined it wasn’t for her. She had already realized her abilities in storytelling and began to follow up, with Stokell, on potential writing projects. As they say in Hollywood, they found one by accident in 2006. They would adapt “All Quiet on the Western Front”.

“There was a summer sale at a bookstore in Los Angeles,” Paterson said. “And we were both like, ‘Wow, we loved that book in school. Let’s read it again.’ So we read the book and thought, ‘Wow, this really hasn’t been done in modern times. I wonder who has the rights?’ just on a whim. Because normally the rights to war titles like this are taken over by big studios.”

“Then we found out that the rights were available. We released it and, lo and behold, we got it. And then we embarked, of course, on this journey to adapt this masterpiece, which is obviously a scary one.”

Adapting a screenplay would be difficult, but it might have been the easiest part of the next 16 years.

years of triathlon

Having kept fit from her early years, Paterson rediscovered athletic competition on a visit to Scotland in 2007. She competed almost playfully in the Scottish Championships. And won. She still struggled with swimming discipline, but with the help of her husband, a sports psychologist, she regained what she had lost somewhere between adolescence and adulthood, and then some.

She also found a new triathlon offshoot, Xterra, where the running and cycling disciplines meander through off-road, narrow and often rocky terrain. This required even more courage, determination and the ability to endure suffering than in road competition.

“And it suited my spirit,” Paterson said. I think you find a kind of joy in obstacles, you know, finding meaning through suffering. And you learn every step of the way. I think once you realize that adversity causes real neurological changes in your brain and makes you stronger for next time, then you kind of embrace those obstacles and use them as a counterpoint.”

In 2011, aged 31, she won the first of five world championships. Afterwards, she told a Scottish reporter that what she wanted next was to win an Oscar.

Overcoming rejections

That first world championship spanned five years in his efforts to turn his co-written English script of “Nothing New on the Western Front” into a feature film. All five of his titles, including the last one in 2018, would be needed to help fund ongoing payments for book rights.

Over the course of 16 years, she used $200,000 (€190,000) of her earnings. Between competitions, she focused on shopping the project to studio after studio, trying to find a way to overcome rejection after rejection.

But then, Paterson said, the industry changed course, with the Korean-language film Parasite winning Best Picture and the 1917 war film being universally acclaimed. She was asked to make the film in German, raised the funds and started production in 2020 as a Netflix original film.

“All Quiet on the Western Front” premiered at the Toronto Film Festival last September. Netflix started airing it in October. In January, it received nine Oscar nominations, including best adapted screenplay. In February, Paterson won a BAFTA in London for best adapted screenplay. On Sunday, March 12, she has a shot at her first Academy Award. And then maybe she can tell Judi Dench a little bit of her history at the Governor’s Ball.

Edited by Matt Pearson