*Director David Lynch and director of photography Freddie Francis did put their trademark on the film, bringing a somber darkness to the screen. According to The Making of Dune, a promotional book written by Ed Naha for the Dino De Laurentiis Corporation, the art director Tony Masters said, “Dino visited the set one day when it was being built and he was very worried about the film being too gloomy and black-looking. He wanted everything lightened up. More color. As I was lightening things up and putting more color around, David showed up. He wanted things darker. So, I was struck between the two of them. Eventually we compromised…a little. Dino has accepted everything now. I don’t know if he gave up on us or what.” (Considering this with 20/20 hindsight it does seem to me that the film might have benefited by more light, emphasizing the blinding brilliance of the desert planet à la the film Lawrence of Arabia instead of cave-dark sietches and gloomy castles.)
*If singer Michael Jackson had been a member of the Academy, he might have voted for Dune. After seeing the costumes in the movie, he had similar clothing designed for himself, which he wore on stage.
*Many fans, upon reading Man of Two Worlds, assume that I wrote the humorous passages…because of my earlier satirical novels. To a large extent, this is not the case. In the first draft, I wrote it as a serious novel, and Dad later added most of the funny, wacky stuff.
*This involved the use of a key Dune Messiah character in the film version of Dune, Edric the Spacing Guild Steersman. Because of Frank Herbert’s poor health, the issue was dropped, without ever having been resolved.
**Dino De Laurentiis does not agree with this statement. A few years ago, he indicated to Mary Alice Kier, the literary and film agent for the Herbert Limited Partnership, that he, like Universal, had lost money on Dune. I am only reporting what Frank Herbert said, and cannot comment one way or another on details of the accounting.
*The new short story collection was a contractual obligation to G. P. Putnam’s Sons, as part of a package deal that included the “Dune 7” novel.
*Frank Herbert and Bill Ransom worked on plotting and characterization for The Ascension Factor, but the writing had to be done by Bill, after the death of his collaborator.
*See Chapter 4. My mother was born Beverly Stuart but changed her maiden name to Forbes later after her mother remarried.
*For more details on our collaboration, refer to the Afterword of Dune: House Atreides by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson.
**Dune, Dune Messiah, and Children of Dune formed a trilogy. God Emperor of Dune was a bridging work to a new trilogy that included Heretics of Dune and Chapterhouse: Dune. “Dune 7”—only a working title that would eventually be changed—was to be the third book of that trilogy.
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