Cinema Canada (Oct-Nov 1980)

Tom Sullivan's (Mark Singer) bachelor life includes a heartbreaking romance with Heather (Shari Belafonte Harpen, a summer passion with the waitress Helga (Sharon Lewis), and finally, true love with Patty (Sarah Torgov). behind schedule, he is not unduly worried. Neither, apparently, is Till, whose infectious laugh can be heard constantly on set, where the atmosphere is anything but tense. If You Could See What I Hear is the story of what Gillard considered to be the two most crucial years in the life of his friend, Tom Sullivan. The scene at the Rum Runner, 2 Cape Cod bar/restaurant, takes place in the summer 4/October-November 1980 between Sullivan’s junior and senior years at Harvard. The sassy blonde who shuts him up is Patty (the original Patty is now married to Sullivan), played in the film by Sarah Torgov (Drying Up The Streets, Meatballs). “Four of us, independently, came to the conclusion that Sarah was the only one for the part,’says Gillard. “She has the same untouchable quality, the same intriguing warmth.” At this, the chronological mid-point of the film, Sullivan, played by Marc Singer, is busy making money during the vacation singing with his band, and proving to himself that if there are more hearts to be broken, he’s going to be the breaker, not the breakee. This resolution is the result of his recently ended affair with Heather, the black Radcliffe girl he had lived with for several months before he knew she was black. Shari Belafonte Harper, the bubbly beautiful daughter of the calypso crooner, plays Heather, whose inability to make a commitment results in Sullivan’s broken heart. Singer's own heart is in this role : he’s had to learn how to golf, wrestle, skydive and row, not to mention move and act as a blind man. “He’s developed a kind of self-hypnosis for the part,” says Gillard. “He’s found a way to get his eyes out of focus so that he looks at you in a non-seeing fashion. It’s hard to do, and it’s been causing a few headaches.” It looks real enough, however, that strangers accept him as blind when he trips over them while practicing for the role. The real Sullivan, composer, singer, author, actor and athlete, thinks Singer is perfect to play him. There is a strong physical resemblance. He also has nothing but praise for R.H. Thomson in the part of Sly, his best friend through endless campus pranks. Sullivan, in town during the Festival of Festivals for a press brunch to promote the film, spoke about the screen Sullivan, as he actually spoke about himself in the third person : “Blindness is only a part of who Tom Sullivan is. It’s an inconvenience, not a handicap. You just have to find another way to do things.” That’s not just lip service ; it appears to be an attitude that he and Gillard share in common. When they met, and Gillard asked about the film rights to Tom’s book of the same name, he was told that the script was already being written. Three years, and eight versions later, the rights reverted to Sullivan, and Gillard started writing the script. He, too, found another way to do it. Instead of trying to cover the whole of Sullivan’s life, he confined himself, with the benefit of personal knowledge of his subject, to the two most critical and formative years. Perhaps the most remarkable part of the story is the feeling that pervades the set, and the attitudes of the people involved ; it is an attitude that stems from Sullivan himself, that as a blind person, no one owes him anything: Indeed, his approach is so positive, and unselfconscious, that everyone forgets that he