Layla Kaylif’s The Letter Writer hits all the right notes

If there’s a creative force with more energy than Layla Kaylif, please can we be introduced. When it comes to the business of interviews, the notion of them being a two-way street should never be taken for granted. With this filmmaker/musician, it’s often one-sided but only because she just loves to talk, and talk passionately. Similarly, you just love to listen. Isn’t that what the late, great Michael Parkinson used to say he loved about his job?

As Layla guides me through a potted history of her feature-length debut, The Letter Writer, such unbridled enthusiasm becomes apparent before minute one’s barely troubled the stopwatch. Set in mid-1960s Dubai, it tells the story of Khalifa, a troubled teenager who works as a professional letter writer each summer, scribing for locals whose grasp of English is nonexistent.

With Layla having been born and schooled in the UAE before moving to the UK, this movie is close to home in more ways than one. Her Arabic father was himself a letter writer, and his stories from her childhood have formed the personal memories on which the film is based. As she explains, however, that alone wasn’t enough: “In Dubai they didn’t teach Emirati history in the school curriculum, so I researched it myself and integrated it with the anecdotes. In the film I play my dad’s mum, which is maybe a bit creepy!”

‘Film is always political; they’re all generally expressing a point of view’

The movie is “an imaginary prequel to my parents’ marriage”; Layla’s mother being English which meant that summers growing up were spent in leafy Cambridge. The land of her birth remains the biggest influence on her career though, and one film in particular: Doctor Zhivago. “There’s an obsession with it because of Omar Sharif. I mean, we had a picture of him on the wall at home for crying out loud, and that role was particularly iconic for the Middle-East.”.

Her work isn’t without perspective on today’s political and social issues, so does she think filmmakers have a job to do in expressing their views? “I do think there’s a duty,” she says. “Film is always political; they’re all generally expressing a point of view. Even in my songs, they’re all little stories, vignettes of my life. I thought my son was wasting his time creating videos and social media posts, but that’s a form of self-expression.” Layla also describes The Letter Writer as “a sweet celebration of something old-fashioned”, in stark contrast to today, “where what’s happening globally is a general failure by leadership.”

Although this is her first feature, the transition from music to movies is far from recent, with the first draft completed back in 2013. Two years later, the initial script for her next project saw the light of day: an adaptation of Antony and Cleopatra, which is currently in the pipeline. “What I’m trying to do with it, instead of retaining the language, I’ve decided to be a Shakespeare heretic and modernise it. My Cleopatra is influenced by Elizabeth Taylor, but she’s different.

‘I think I’ve upset people by not being starstruck’

“She’s seen as a devious manipulator, but in my take she represents the soul, with Egypt the spiritual world, while Marc Anthony’s Rome is soulless.” This startlingly original approach doesn’t end there. “Georgia, Puerto Rico and the UAE have all been possible locations for shooting,” she explains. “Cleopatra is under threat in a territory that’s hostile, so there’s obvious contenders for settings.”

Speaking to Layla, such a bold style of filmmaking comes as no surprise as, despite her long career, she’s been starstruck just the once: “I think I’ve upset people by not being starstruck,” she explains. “The lines between hierarchies are not so obvious in the Arab world. You don’t revere other humans. But I was once at a book signing by Madonna, and didn’t want to stare. But I couldn’t help it, she’s got these kaleidoscopic blue eyes! That’s starstruck, right?”

After more than three decades in music and film, Layla Kaylif’s star is undoubtedly rising to new heights. It’s a unique hats-off-to-you talent that encompasses the guises of singer-songwriter and writer-director. The Letter Writer will be released on Amazon Prime Video for Valentine’s Day in the US, and on February 19 in the UK.