Meryl-y We Row Along
Sharp-eyed members of the class of '70 who saw the watery thriller TheRiver Wild, featuring Meryl Streep, may have noticed among the credits the name of their classmate Denis O'Neill, responsible for the film's script and also the co-producer Streep herself spent a summer at a Hopkins Center drama course. Dartmouth gave her an honorary degree in 1981.
O'Neill, an enthusiastic fly fisherman even before he became Dartmouth's hockey captain (and also lacrosse and soccer star), reports that he expanded for film a short story he wrote four years ago for Fly Rod & Reel magazine, titled "Diary of a Bad Floater." When he met Steep in Hollywood and told her about the script, she asked, "Is there anything in it for me?"
"Funny you should ask," said O'Neill.
Streep spent a strenuous (and unstereotypicaol) 14 weeks in a rubber boat on northwestern Montana's Kootenai River. She did 80 percent of the actual rowing and shot turbulent rapids. When asked whether the Kootenai was really that rough, O'Neill said, "Well, it was a long way from Mink Brook."
