‘I Swear’: Kirk Jones’ Biopic Of Tourette Syndrome Campaigner John Davidson Is A Record-Breaking Look At A Unique Life – Global Breakouts

Welcome to Global Breakouts, Deadline’s fortnightly strand in which we shine a spotlight on the TV shows and films killing it in their local territories. The industry is as globalized as it’s ever been, but breakout hits are emerging in pockets of the world all the time and it can be hard to keep track. That’s why we’re doing the hard work for you.

After world premiering in Toronto last month, I Swear, Kirk Jones’ biographical comedy drama based on the life of notable Tourette Syndrome campaigner John Davidson, released in the UK and Ireland on October 10 via Studiocanal. Upon release, it nabbed an unprecedented 87% ‘Excellent’ comScore PostTrak rating — the most highly rated film by cinema audiences in the UK since records began, above such blockbusters and Oscar winners as Bohemian Rhapsody, Top Gun: Maverick and Parasite. On Rotten Tomatoes, it’s carrying a 100% Fresh rating from critics and a 100% audience score. Since its debut, I Swear has played in the No. 1 spot at the UK/Ireland box office during the midweeks. Through Wednesday, the roughly $5M-budgeted film is at £3.34M ($4.46M).

Name: I Swear
Country: UK
Producer: Tempo Productions, One Story High
Distributor: Studiocanal (UK)
International Sales: Bankside
For fans of: Billy Elliot, The King’s Speech, Coda

Written and directed by Kirk Jones (Waking Ned Divine, Nanny McPhee), UK pic I Swear charts John Davidson’s journey from a misunderstood teenager in 1980s Britain to present-day advocate for the understanding and acceptance of Tourette Syndrome, a genetically determined neurological condition characterized by tics, and involuntary and uncontrollable sounds and movements. Coprolalia, or involuntary swearing, affects only around one in 10 people with the syndrome, according to Tourettes Action UK, although it is often portrayed or mocked in the media as a common symptom.

Diagnosed at 15, Davidson, who is affected by Coprolalia, navigated his way against the odds through troubled teenage years and into adulthood. The film tells his story while also exploring this misunderstood condition. Following its launch at the UK and Ireland box office, it has been both a critical winner, and online audience reviews outranking every other British film released to date. It’s also likely to recoup its estimated $5M budget set.

The cast is led by The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power’s Robert Aramayo as Davidson, along with Maxine Peake, Shirley Henderson and Peter Mullan. Producers are Piers Tempest and Georgia Bayliff for Tempo Productions, and Jones for One Story High. Executive producers are Cindy Jones and Davidson.

Bankside has sold the film to about 20 international territories including Australia, France, Germany, Spain and India. Negotiations are under way with distributors in the U.S., Italy and Japan.

Jones first discovered Davidson through a 1989 BBC documentary and followed his story through subsequent docs including one “which showed that John had really kind of found his purpose, and was focused on trying to bring the Tourette community together and to educate them and inspire them,” Jones tells Deadline. In 2019, Davidson was awarded an MBE by Queen Elizabeth II.

In a change from our usual format, a Deadline catches up with Jones for a Q&A chat about the genesis of the project, Davidson’s involvement and the movie’s success. Below are excerpts from our conversation which have been edited and condensed for clarity. Scroll down for a trailer.

DEADLINE: How did your collaboration with John Davidson come about?

KIRK JONES: I went up to Galashiels (in Scotland), and we sat and talked. The first thing he said to me when he opened the door was, ‘Kirk, come on in. Let’s have sex.’ I made a joke, because that’s in my nature. I wanted to take the edge off the meeting, and the next thing he says is, ‘Just ignore it… You know, ignore the tics,’ – but don’t ignore the person. Then I said, ‘Is it what is in your head? We’ve all got this little room in our head, which is double-bolted… Things never come out. Is it like your door is just swinging wide open?’ And he said, ‘Absolutely not.’

One of the things I was most aware of is that the Tourette’s community has historically been teased and mocked because of the nature of the condition, and it’s an easy kind of cheap gag to get someone on a radio show who’s got Tourette’s, or to write a character into a film or TV series who has Tourette’s, and I was very aware that John and many others in the community had felt like they’d been taken advantage of in the past. So right from day one, I promised that was not my intention. More than that, I said I would make him an executive producer. I spent a lot of time with John. I just listened to everything he had to say about his life; he told me the whole story.

DEADLINE: The film can be heartbreaking yet also has lots of humor. How do you walk the balance of keeping it respectful?

JONES: I just stayed really close and true to John’s actual story. That seemed like the right place to start. Of course, I changed some elements. Beyond that, it really just comes down to instinct. I’ve always enjoyed mixing humor, emotion and drama together – You’ll have a very dramatic, emotional scene, and I just love snapping the audience out of that and getting a laugh, and then a couple of minutes later, it dives down again. That delivers what people describe as a rollercoaster. They’re talking about John’s life journey, and the film has a rollercoaster of emotion.

I tried to keep the performances as natural as possible. I knew that from the documentaries when John’s story was presented as a straight documentary story that he was very engaging. It was also funny and emotional. You didn’t need to try hard on top of that.

DEADLINE: And in terms of the casting, was there ever a time you considered having a person with Tourette’s playing John’s role?

JONES: Yes, I thought, ‘Is it possible, on a film set, which is essentially nothing more than a military operation, to put someone who has Tourette’s in that situation? And then I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be amazing if John played himself in the last 20 minutes? From getting the MBE through to the end.’ 

I’ve worked with non-actors before with some success, and I’ve enjoyed that process. I wrote four or five bespoke scenes to shoot with John, and this is what I learned: Trying to suppress [the condition] or not suppress it is incredibly exhausting. After about 45 minutes of working each day, John was saying, ‘Have we finished now, can I go home?’ He was really tired.

The one key thing that made me feel really uncomfortable was, I said, ‘Look, you’re talking with Dottie (Peake), and I want you to say, “Fuck the Queen,”’” because that’s how it will end up being in the script.’ [Davidson famously said this as a result of his tics when receiving his MBE in 2019]. He said, ‘Well, I can’t really tic on demand. It comes out of nowhere.’ And I said, ‘John, if we’re going to do this for real, and this test is going to be thorough and proper, you’re going to have to do it.’ He felt really, really uncomfortable acting or ‘faking’ a tic, and I felt really uncomfortable asking him.

After a couple of weeks, I edited the material and I called John and said, ‘I don’t feel like it’s the right decision for these reasons.’ And he said, ‘I am so relieved. I’ve been terrified that you were going to say you wanted me to do it.’ John, very publicly since then, has said he doesn’t believe a person with Tourette’s could have worked within the confines of a film group.

DEADLINE: Do you think that there’s more awareness now of Tourette syndrome amongst the general public?

JONES: We do these market research screenings and then we have a focus group at the end, and someone the other day said they were going to google Tourette’s. They said, ‘One thing I know is that if I came here on the tube tonight and I saw someone behaving like John, I would have moved to another carriage. If someone [did the same] on my way home, I would smile at them and maybe chat to them if I was confident that it was Tourette’s.’

DEADLINE: You have some big credits with studio pictures, so why this sort of pivot?

JONES: I was really looking to make a low-budget British film that I had complete control over. Having made films for 30 years or so at different levels, I knew that that’s when I’m happiest – when I’m the most creative, and when I jump out of bed in the morning and don’t have to answer to a dozen people in a studio.

DEADLINE: And yet the independent sector is facing some serious challenges in today’s climate.

JONES: Probably six people contacted me just before the release of the film, and they said, ‘You do realize that the British film industry is watching the performance of your film this weekend, don’t you?’ I didn’t quite understand. And they said, ‘If I Swear doesn’t work, it’s a real problem for the future of the British film industry. It’s a homegrown story. It’s a British crew.’

We screened it to 2,600 people, and 100% said they’d recommend it, so it’s got word of mouth, on paper anyway, going into the cinemas. We had Studiocanal releasing on 650 screens – pretty unheard of for a low-budget British movie – so you couldn’t blame anything on that. It had great P&A and marketing, and we’d started screening it like three months before the release, so essentially, on paper, it ticked every single box. People were effectively saying the elements were in place and if the British public did not come to the cinemas to watch it, any financier moving forward would about other films, ‘I like that project, but I Swear had everything going for it, and look what happened.’ It’s reassuring that the public are actually still interested in, and prepared to come out and go to the cinema to see homegrown films.

DEADLINE: And were you ultimately surprised by that response in the UK?

JONES: It doesn’t always work, but it seems that on this occasion, we might have touched a nerve in some way. We live in a world where we could probably all do with respecting and considering other people, en masse. This reminds people that their normal isn’t always the same as someone else’s normal.

People are missing projects that feel unique, different or new or fresh. One of the reasons is that the people who are making the decisions and commissioning the projects have for many years now been playing very, very safe, with all of the remakes. Fresh is something which isn’t coming along very often.