In "49 Up," Michael Apted includes commentary from several of the participants regarding both their discoveries about meaning in their lives and their thoughts about participating in the "Up" series.
TONY: "We are the backbone for the kids." ... "I like being with my own people, and I'm a traditionalist." ... "I'm happy now, [I want to] be healthy, with all my family -- anything else will be a bonus, and thats all I really want."
JACKIE: "This one ["49 Up"] may be the first one that's about us, rather than your perception [Michael] about us." ... "It ["42 Up"] should have been about what I can do, what I am doing, what I will do." ... "And there are lots of times I sit and I cringe, not just for me, but for other people." ... "[Other participants] will talk about their marriages or their divorces or the state of their lives. I don't think you should be into that, I don't think you should even be asking that." ... "What I want to do, what I hope to do. I just don't want that personal conversation." ... "I'd like to go back to school so that I can hold a conversation with anyone in the world and know what I'm talking about."
SUE: [Apted] "Have you moved up a class?" [Sue] "I suppose it feels like that to me." ... [Describing her job at University of London] "I think I was born for the responsibility."
BRUCE: "You know, one's dreams go in the ordinary living of day to day life and family life takes over. I think we just sort of live without our dreams."
PAUL: "Without a family, what have you got? ... You've got nothing unless you've got family and your health anyway. It would be awfully lonely without family, I think."
SUZY: "Maybe now is the first time that I actually feel happy within my own skin; it's taken me a long time to do it." ... [On being in the films] "Very difficult, very painful, not an experience Ive enjoyed in any way; every seven years it throws up issues that I guess we all learn to put into compartments for seven years and then it all gets opened up again, and its difficult." ... "I'm not an outgoing, confident person. I like my privacy." ... "People seem to read into what they think we all think, which I find very hurtful really. Because most of them come up with things that they think which are not at all what's going on in my head." ... "This is me saying hopefully Ill reach my half century next year and I shall bow out."
NICK: "I think this film is extremely important. It's important to me, but it seems to be important to other people as well. That doesn't make it easy thing. It's an incredibly hard thing to be in and I can't even begin to describe how emotionally draining and wrenching it is just to make the film and to do interviews. And that's even when I'm pretending that no one else is watching it." ... [Says Nick's wife, Chris] "The series is a heavy reminder that hes missing his roots. I mean there are an awful lot of emotions that are attached to having a scrapbook that's as vivid as this."
LYNN: "All these things I've said over the years are flying through my mind at the moment, but yes, it has been worth it, and you'd better cut it, because otherwise I'm going to cry."
SIMON: "I will say that I do love watching everybody else. I always hate them, to be honest, and by the end of it, I normally hate you." [said to Michael Apted]
ANDREW: [Referring to John, Charles, and himself, the three upper-crust lads] "We've become more guarded over the years. ... I'm guarded about being guarded."
JOHN: "Obviously it's nice to have money -- who wants to be the richest corpse in the graveyard?" ... "It has to be said that I bitterly regret that the headmaster of the school where I was when I was seven pushed me forward for this series because every seven years that little pill of poison is injected." ... "I suspect that why this program is compelling and interesting for viewers, and I quite see why it is, is because really its like Big Brother or I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here!, it is actually real life TV and with the added bonus that you can see people grow old, lose their hair, get fat fascinating I'm sure. But does it have any value? That's a different question."
NEIL: "You have to make do with the reality [there's] little help in being regretful. ... Be what you are."
TONY: "We are the backbone for the kids." ... "I like being with my own people, and I'm a traditionalist." ... "I'm happy now, [I want to] be healthy, with all my family -- anything else will be a bonus, and thats all I really want."
JACKIE: "This one ["49 Up"] may be the first one that's about us, rather than your perception [Michael] about us." ... "It ["42 Up"] should have been about what I can do, what I am doing, what I will do." ... "And there are lots of times I sit and I cringe, not just for me, but for other people." ... "[Other participants] will talk about their marriages or their divorces or the state of their lives. I don't think you should be into that, I don't think you should even be asking that." ... "What I want to do, what I hope to do. I just don't want that personal conversation." ... "I'd like to go back to school so that I can hold a conversation with anyone in the world and know what I'm talking about."
SUE: [Apted] "Have you moved up a class?" [Sue] "I suppose it feels like that to me." ... [Describing her job at University of London] "I think I was born for the responsibility."
BRUCE: "You know, one's dreams go in the ordinary living of day to day life and family life takes over. I think we just sort of live without our dreams."
PAUL: "Without a family, what have you got? ... You've got nothing unless you've got family and your health anyway. It would be awfully lonely without family, I think."
SUZY: "Maybe now is the first time that I actually feel happy within my own skin; it's taken me a long time to do it." ... [On being in the films] "Very difficult, very painful, not an experience Ive enjoyed in any way; every seven years it throws up issues that I guess we all learn to put into compartments for seven years and then it all gets opened up again, and its difficult." ... "I'm not an outgoing, confident person. I like my privacy." ... "People seem to read into what they think we all think, which I find very hurtful really. Because most of them come up with things that they think which are not at all what's going on in my head." ... "This is me saying hopefully Ill reach my half century next year and I shall bow out."
NICK: "I think this film is extremely important. It's important to me, but it seems to be important to other people as well. That doesn't make it easy thing. It's an incredibly hard thing to be in and I can't even begin to describe how emotionally draining and wrenching it is just to make the film and to do interviews. And that's even when I'm pretending that no one else is watching it." ... [Says Nick's wife, Chris] "The series is a heavy reminder that hes missing his roots. I mean there are an awful lot of emotions that are attached to having a scrapbook that's as vivid as this."
LYNN: "All these things I've said over the years are flying through my mind at the moment, but yes, it has been worth it, and you'd better cut it, because otherwise I'm going to cry."
SIMON: "I will say that I do love watching everybody else. I always hate them, to be honest, and by the end of it, I normally hate you." [said to Michael Apted]
ANDREW: [Referring to John, Charles, and himself, the three upper-crust lads] "We've become more guarded over the years. ... I'm guarded about being guarded."
JOHN: "Obviously it's nice to have money -- who wants to be the richest corpse in the graveyard?" ... "It has to be said that I bitterly regret that the headmaster of the school where I was when I was seven pushed me forward for this series because every seven years that little pill of poison is injected." ... "I suspect that why this program is compelling and interesting for viewers, and I quite see why it is, is because really its like Big Brother or I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here!, it is actually real life TV and with the added bonus that you can see people grow old, lose their hair, get fat fascinating I'm sure. But does it have any value? That's a different question."
NEIL: "You have to make do with the reality [there's] little help in being regretful. ... Be what you are."
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