Designer-turned-filmmaker Tom Ford drew from a family tragedy for the suicide scene in his acclaimed directorial debut, ‘A Single Man.’

In the movie, based on the Christopher Isherwood novel of the same name, Colin Firth plays George Falconer, a gay British college professor living in California who has just lost his longtime partner, played by fellow Brit Matthew Goode.

Ford says the tragedy of the movie seems authentic because he actually experienced something similar in his own family. Falconer is considering suicide and (spoiler alert) goes so far as to lay out the clothes in which he would like to be buried, along with instructions for tying his tie. He worries about making a mess.

Ford told the World Entertainment News Network, “The suicide in the story comes from my family. There was a suicide that really took place in my family. It was exactly that re-enacted in the film by Colin’s character with the suit and cufflinks laid out, and how he zipped himself into a sleeping bag because he didn’t want to make a mess.

“I remember very vividly that there were darkly comic moments because what are you gonna do when these things happen to you in your life.”

(Photo by PR Photos)

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