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Posted: |
Jan 13, 2017 - 11:57 PM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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A SHOT IN THE DARK started life as a 1960 French play, "L'Idiote" (The Idiot), a comic mystery by Marcel Achard. The English adaptation of the play, by Harry Kurnitz, was renamed "A Shot In the Dark," and had a 1961–62 Broadway run. The cast included Julie Harris (as the guileless and amoral young woman, "Josefa"), Walter Matthau (as her wealthy banker boss, "Benjamin Beaurever"), and William Shatner (as Examining Magistrate "Paul Sevigne"). Matthau's performance earned him a Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play.
The film was originally meant to have been an adaptation of the stage play. Walter Matthau and Peter Sellers were cast as the male leads, but Sellers did not like how things were going and wanted out. To keep Sellers on the project, United Artists dismissed the original director and brought in Blake Edwards, who had just completed work with Sellers on THE PINK PANTHER. Edwards looked at the script and thought that it might be better suited to the character of Inspector Jacques Clouseau, and rewrote the entire script with a young William Peter Blatty. The Matthau character was eliminated, as was Matthau. A SHOT IN THE DARK was released in the U.S. only three months after the original THE PINK PANTHER. Other than a few re-recorded tracks on a compilation album, Henry Mancini's score has not had a release.
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Posted: |
Jan 14, 2017 - 12:13 AM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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When Blatty wrote the screenplay for JOHN GOLDFARB, PLEASE COME HOME, no studios expressed interest in it. So he reworked it as a novel, which was published by Doubleday in 1963. The novel's success led Twentieth Century-Fox to acquire the film rights.
The comic spoof of the Cold War was inspired by a May 1960 incident involving American Francis Gary Powers, a CIA operative whose U-2 spy plane was shot down over the Soviet Union, sparking an international diplomatic incident. Blatty's tale concerns John "Wrong-Way" Goldfarb (Richard Crenna), a former college football star who once ran 95 yards for a touchdown in the wrong direction. Now a U-2 pilot, his plane malfunctions and crashes in the mythical Arab kingdom of Fawzia.
J. Lee Thompson directed the 1965 film. John Williams' score was released by Film Score Monthly in 2001. In 2007, a musical comedy version of "John Goldfarb, Please Come Home" was performed in New York City as part of the annual Fringe Festival. William Peter Blatty's script for the show followed his original screenplay fairly closely, although none of Williams' music was used.
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Posted: |
Jan 14, 2017 - 12:22 AM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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Arthur Hiller was not a writer-director, and he was only rarely a producer-director. He was primarily a director for hire. For producer Ray Stark and Seven Arts Productions, Hiller directed the 1965 romantic comedy PROMISE HER ANYTHING. William Peter Blatty wrote the screenplay, from an original story by Arne Sultan and Marvin Worth. As the film opens, widowed "Michele O'Brien" (Leslie Caron) moves into a Greenwich Village apartment with her infant son, "John Thomas" (Michael Bradley). Her neighbor is "Harley Rummel" (Warren Beatty), who wants to make art films but supports himself by making burlesque movies.
John Barry's score for the film was rejected, and replaced with one by Lyn Murray. Murray's score was released on a Kapp Records LP, but it has never been re-issued on CD.
The film received mixed reviews. Variety called the film "light" and "refreshing" and added, "Well-paced direction of many fine performances, generally sharp scripting and other good production elements add up to a satisfying comedy." On the other hand, Time Out New York said, "This dull attempt at an offbeat and sophisticated romantic comedy falls flat on its face, thanks largely to the usual sluggish direction from Arthur Hiller [and] … a dismal script by William Peter Blatty."
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Posted: |
Jan 14, 2017 - 3:29 AM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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The opening title card for 1973's THE EXORCIST reads "William Peter Blatty's The Exorcist." Blatty is also credited on a later title card, which reads: "Written for the screen and produced by William Peter Blatty based on his novel."
Although "The Exorcist" was a book of fiction, author Blatty based his international best seller on an actual exorcism of a fourteen-year-old boy that took place in Silver Spring, MD in 1949. According to various sources, Blatty learned of the exorcism while attending nearby Georgetown University, where the film adaptation would later be shot. The character of “Father Merrin” (played by Max von Sydow) was loosely based on Roman Catholic priest Teilhard de Chardin, a theologian who possibly performed an exorcism in Africa. According to historical sources, the Catholic Church reported only a handful of exorcisms in the twentieth century, one of which was the Silver Spring case.
Blatty became friends with actress Tippi Hedren in the early 1970s, and she named one of her lions Billy after him. He gave her a copy of his unpublished novel "The Exorcist" and she was so absorbed reading it, that she woke up her then-husband, agent Noel Marshall, in the middle of the night and told him that he should represent Blatty in publishing the novel and arranging for the film adaptation. Hedren took the photo of the author for the novel's first edition back jacket. The 1971 novel became a bestseller, and Marshall would be credited as 'Executive Producer' for the film adaptation, where he was supposed to receive 15% of the profits.
Stanley Kubrick wanted to direct the film, but only if he could produce it himself. As the studio was worried that he would go over budget and over schedule, it eventually settled on Mark Rydell, but Blatty insisted on William Friedkin instead. After a standoff with the studio, which initially refused to budge over Rydell, Blatty urged Warner Bros. executives to watch the just released THE FRENCH CONNECTION. This helped seal the deal, and Blatty eventually got his way.
Stacy Keach had originally been hired by Blatty to play the role of "Father Karras" until Friedkin spotted Jason Miller in a Broadway play. Despite Miller never having acted in a movie before, Keach's contract was bought out by Warner Bros. and Miller was cast in the role. The Prospect Avenue apartment where the story takes place was once inhabited by Blatty, while he was a student at Georgetown University.
In order to bring some levity to the shoot, Blatty suggested shooting a scene (not for the movie, but to amuse everyone at the screening of the rushes) in which Father Merrin would enter the house, take off his hat, and reveal himself to be Groucho Marx, a friend of Blatty's. The parody would even go as far as featuring an appearance from the duck from Marx's quiz show "You Bet Your Life." (Blatty had once won $10,000 on the show.) Groucho was keen to do it, but William Friedkin got sick that day and the idea was abandoned.
Blatty insisted that William Friedkin misinterpreted one of the most famous scenes in the film--the head spinning scene. Blatty said that the screenplay described Regan's head as turning almost all the way around, not literally all the way around, rotating 360° the way it did.
According to Blatty, Warner Bros. wanted to change the title of the film after taking a survey, which found none of the participants knew what an exorcist was. A studio executive advised Friedkin to make several cuts to the movie prior to the release, citing that the scenes were unnecessary. Friedkin complied, which offended Blatty, who thought these scenes formed the heart of the movie. Blatty even refused to speak to Friedkin for some time, but they eventually made amends. Many years later, when the immense popularity of the movie warranted a re-release, Friedkin agreed to re-evaluate some of the deleted scenes and put several of them back as a favor to Blatty, creating an extended "Version You've Never Seen". By his own admission, Friedkin tends to see this extended version as his favorite.
Blatty filed suit against Warner Bros. and Friedkin over credits and for being barred from production. Friedkin claimed that Blatty was only barred from post-production, and that Blatty wanted the credit line, which was added prior to the picture’s release,: “William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist.” Blatty later dropped the suit against the studio but not against Friedkin.
When the film became a blockbuster, Blatty refused to give the 15% share of the profits to Executive Producer Noel Marshall that he had promised, since the two had never signed a written contract. Marshall sued, and the lawsuit dragged on for several years, eventually reaching an out-of-court settlement. These were trying years for Tippi Hedren and Marshall since they needed the money to feed the big cats for their film ROAR (1981). The financial stress would result in their divorce. Many years later, Blatty ran into Hedren at a party and said hello. She walked away from him, without acknowledging him. As late as 1978, Blatty was still involved in a suit against Warner Bros. for his share of the profits. He had received $15 million from the studio and was suing for an additional $1.5 million.
Blatty won an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. It was on this film that Blatty met his wife-to-be, professional tennis champ Linda Tuero. She'd been hired as an extra.
Although composer Lalo Schifrin was originally chosen to score the picture, Friedkin rejected his early efforts in favor of existing compositions. Mike Oldfield’s “Tubular Bells,” from his debut album by the same title, became an international hit after the film’s release and has become synonymous with the film’s haunting mood. Warner Bros. Records released an LP of "Musical Excerpts" from the film, which they later reissued on CD. A CD that was included with some video releases of the film included a suite from Schifrin's unused score.
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Blatty certainly left his mark on cinema. I think Keach would also have worked as Merrin. Hes excellent in The Ninth Configuration.
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Posted: |
Jan 14, 2017 - 2:09 PM
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By: |
Octoberman
(Member)
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The film and "Tubular Bells" were a match made in Heaven (or Hell perhaps?).
Interestingly (for me, anyway), I often listen to TB and the film never enters my mind, while whenever I think of the film, TB inextricably pops into my head.
I've often said (and I'll repeat it here, so forgive me) that when WB put that nice CD in that nice box set, they should have found a way to include the single edit of TB in the content. Not just for the sake of completeness or esthetic continuity, but also because Oldfield enthusiasts had been clamoring for a CD release of the single for ages (prior to 2009, anyway, when it was finally released in the TB Deluxe Edition).
In all the material about the film I had read over the years, I did not know about Kubrick's interest. Or maybe I did and simply don't remember.
But it's my feeling that if Kubrick DID make it, we would have ended up with a film in much the same vein as what we got when Boorman did E2.
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Posted: |
Jan 14, 2017 - 6:03 PM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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In 1966, Blatty's novel Twinkle, Twinkle, "Killer" Kane was published. Blatty said, "I considered it a comic novel, but a great deal of philosophy and theology crept into it. But the farcical elements outweighed the serious elements." Blatty adapted the novel into a screenplay, and intended for it to be filmed by William Friedkin. Blatty said that the script "was what you might call bizarre material. I had hoped to direct it myself. But after seeing THE NIGHT THEY RAIDED MINSKY'S (1968) I thought the script would be safe with Friedkin. I sent it along to him. He liked it. But we couldn't find a studio that liked it."
After THE EXORCIST was completed, Blatty returned to Twinkle, Twinkle, "Killer" Kane. In lieu of filming the novel, Blatty decided to rewrite it: "I decided that I could develop the story a great deal. So I rewrote it and fleshed it out, Cutshaw became the astronaut in THE EXORCIST that Regan warns about going into outer space, and I fully developed the deeper implications and theological themes." The rewritten version of Twinkle, Twinkle, "Killer" Kane was published in 1978 under the title The Ninth Configuration.
Blatty has said that he prefers the first version of the book to the second: "the first one is infinitely funnier and wilder, and stranger and more of a one of a kind; the second one has the same plot, but the prose is more finely crafted, I think. In the first one I allowed the comedy to carry me, so I think I prefer that one...I loved the characters and it was a pleasure to write."
Blatty then developed The Ninth Configuration into a screenplay for Columbia Pictures (Blatty did not want to work with Warner Bros. as he had sued that studio over his proper share of profits from THE EXORCIST). Columbia then placed the screenplay in turnaround; Blatty took the script to Universal Pictures. Universal rejected it; according to Blatty, this was "not because of any consideration of quality, but simply because Columbia had let it go. There was nobody prepared to take a chance on their own judgement."
With no major film studio prepared to fund THE NINTH CONFIGURATION, Blatty decided to raise the film's $4 million budget by putting up half the money himself, and persuading the PepsiCo conglomerate to provide the remaining $2 million. The company had funds that couldn't leave the country of Hungary and to use them, they decided to co-finance the film. Both Pepsi and the director had clauses: Pepsi's was to shoot the film in Budapest; Blatty's was to not have any product placement by the company. Both agreed to the terms, although Blatty slightly relented: a Pepsi machine does appear briefly in one scene. Ironically, Warner Bros. wound up releasing the film in the U.S., despite Blatty's misgivings.
Stacy Keach and Scott Wilson were last-minute replacements for Nicol Williamson and Michael Moriarty, who were originally slated to play the roles of "Colonel Kane" and "Captain Cutshaw." The film is set in a special psychiatric hospital housing mentally disturbed military personnel. Robert Loggia plays one of the inmates, "Lieutenant Bennish," who believes that he is a Space Marine who is being held captive by shape-shifting Venusians. Barry DeVorzon scored this 1980 film.
There are five different versions of the film, with various running times from 99 up to 140 minutes. Blatty disowned all versions except one: his approved cut runs 118 minutes and is the version that was originally released theatrically in the USA. This version is available on DVD. Blatty won a Golden Globe award for Best Motion Picture Screenplay for the film.
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Posted: |
Jan 15, 2017 - 12:06 AM
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By: |
Bob DiMucci
(Member)
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Blatty had nothing to do with the 1977 film EXORCIST II: THE HERETIC. Four years after that disastrous film, Blatty told the 17 February 1981 Hollywood Reporter that his current project, titled "Legion," would be the true sequel. Blatty's 1983 novel, "Legion," was originally unconnected to THE EXORCIST, other than its protagonist being Washington, D.C., homicide detective “William Kinderman,” a secondary character in THE EXORCIST.
Two actors from the first film did not return in the new film despite the continuation of their characters. Actor Lee J. Cobb, who portrayed Lieutenant Kinderman, died in 1976. George C. Scott assumed the role. In the first film, Rev. William O’Malley, a Jesuit priest, had played “Father Dyer” in what amounted to a cameo, then immediately retired from acting. His role, now the second lead in the new film, was assumed by Ed Flanders.
William Friedkin was originally attached to direct the film. Blatty said that "I hadn't written the script, but I had the story in my head...and Billy [Friedkin] loved it." Friedkin, however, soon left the project due to conflicting opinions between him and Blatty on the film. Blatty ended up directing the film himself.
Production company Morgan Creek decided to call the film "Exorcist: Legion" even though the screenplay and novel featured no exorcisms whatsoever. However, test audiences reacted negatively to the film, primarily because of the misleading nature of the title. The producers determined that additional scenes needed to be written and then added into the film in order to make it a more recognizable sequel of THE EXORCIST. Actor Jason Miller was written into the script, as was Nicol Williamson’s “Father Morning,” in order to create a sense of continuity from the original film and to justify the word “exorcist” in the title.
The last third of the movie had to be entirely redone at a cost of $9 million. The exorcism scene alone cost nearly $4 million. Newly renaming the film THE EXORCIST III, Morgan Creek Productions held off press screenings until hours before the film opened nationally. The film debuted as America’s number-one film, but sales dropped by sixty-one percent the second weekend. Gross receipts for the two weeks totaled $16.6 million. Ultimately, the film grossed $39 million worldwide. Barry De Vorzon's score for the 1990 film has not had a release.
THE EXORCIST III was Blatty's final film project. Blatty's original cut of THE EXORCIST III was considered lost for decades. And, in terms of a viewable print, it still is. For the 2016 Blu-ray release of the film, the Blu-ray's producers went back to Morgan Creek looking for the original footage. They failed to find it, but did locate VHS tapes of the film's dailies. They used this along with portions of the released film to recreate, as closely as possible, the director's cut. This cut is included on a second disc in the Blu-ray package, and is titled WILLIAM PETER BLATTY'S LEGION.
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Posted: |
Jan 15, 2017 - 3:10 PM
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By: |
filmusicnow
(Member)
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A SHOT IN THE DARK started life as a 1960 French play, "L'Idiote" (The Idiot), a comic mystery by Marcel Achard. The English adaptation of the play, by Harry Kurnitz, was renamed "A Shot In the Dark," and had a 1961–62 Broadway run. The cast included Julie Harris (as the guileless and amoral young woman, "Josefa"), Walter Matthau (as her wealthy banker boss, "Benjamin Beaurever"), and William Shatner (as Examining Magistrate "Paul Sevigne"). Matthau's performance earned him a Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play.
The film was originally meant to have been an adaptation of the stage play. Walter Matthau and Peter Sellers were cast as the male leads, but Sellers did not like how things were going and wanted out. To keep Sellers on the project, United Artists dismissed the original director and brought in Blake Edwards, who had just completed work with Sellers on THE PINK PANTHER. Edwards looked at the script and thought that it might be better suited to the character of Inspector Jacques Clouseau, and rewrote the entire script with a young William Peter Blatty. The Matthau character was eliminated, as was Matthau. A SHOT IN THE DARK was released in the U.S. only three months after the original THE PINK PANTHER. Other than a few re-recorded tracks on a compilation Album, Henry Mancini's score has not had a release.
Those graphics on the bottom with the woman shooting the man presage that of "The Satan Bug" (were they done by DePatie-Freleng, who also did the opening credits for "The Satan Bug"?). R.I.P. William Peter Blatty. He got his first taste of fame as a contestant on "You Bet Your Life".
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