Dustin Lance Black On Making ‘Under the Banner of Heaven,’ Mormonism, and Doing Brenda Lafferty Justice

Editor’s note: The following contains spoilers for the real-life crime explored in Under the Banner of Heaven.

COLLIDER: You worked on this project for about 10 years. Why did it take that much time to get to this point? Were working on it for that long? Was it a challenge to find a home for it? What took that span of time? When you’re reading the book, I think the experience others had was of walking side by side with him, as an investigator into this. For me, I grew up in this world, but for other people, it’s a very foreign world. We needed to create the investigation. It needed to feel investigative. It needed to feel active. Hopefully, we took what otherwise might just feel instructive and gave it a heartbeat. You could feel the blood pumping. It could feel like it was a true-crime thriller.

What was helpful was that these brothers were stepping into the biblical Old Testament, New Testament, and Mormon fundamentalism, and following the rules of the original founders of the faith. It meant that, thankfully, I got to depict and needed to depict the founding of the faith, from the beginning, when it was two lovestruck teenagers with vivid imaginations, all the way to a place where decisions were made that it was okay to shed blood in the name of God, to protect this thing.

Thankfully, I had the book, at that point, so I was able to stop him and say, “Is there anything that Jon wrote in the book that’s not true when it comes to the events of the murder? Is there anything that’s not true in the trial transcripts?” He said, “No, no, no, it’s all accurate. That’s what happened.” So, I was able to say, “Then, I don’t wanna hear it. I don’t need to hear it.

BLACK: First of all, I was in college in the early nineties, so the idea that I would ever get to work with Pearl Jam, was unbelievable. I definitely geeked out in the early meetings. Now I know Jeff, so I can admit it, but I was pinching myself. You very quickly have to move from fanboy to showrunner, and what he was pitching to me was that he was gonna go away and experiment with some of the best musicians in the world, with sound and texture, and he wanted me to send him footage.

lovelylaurajd Absolutely BEST ever - love DLB and hope UTBOH gets all 6 awards they are up for, they deserve every one of them. My heart hurts for Lance and what he says at the end. Sending him love.

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