I spent a little time in Germany as a schoolboy learning German, and it's a country I knew very well, spent a lot of time in. I knew the history very well. I've always wanted to do a piece of work about the post-war period, of one sort or another.
“When I got out of high school, I thought, I'll take a year or two off and play the clubs, get this out of my system, and then go to med school.”