by Lee Hill
“We were together a great deal…” Christiane Kubrick to LH, July 7, 2000.
CS’s observations of production, CS to LH, May 9, 1999.
Shift to black comedy, TS to LH, March 1993.
“He’s got a weird metabolism,” TS quoted in Newsweek, February 3, 1964.
Terry Southern to LH, March 1993.
“Terry would drink whiskey…” Christiane Kubrick to LH, July 7, 2000.
“We shared the vision,” TS to LH, April 1990.
Origins of Dr. Strangelove character, TS to Victor Bockris, November 1989.
“The financing of the film…” TS to LH, March 1993.
“Sellers would get a distinct high…” Christiane Kubrick to LH, July 7, 2000.
“I don’t know if…” CS to LH, May 9, 1999.
“After a few days, the studio…” Christiane Kubrick to LH, July 7, 2000.
“What was happening in the pie fight…” TS to LH, March 1993.
“I know that at least…” Bull’s Eyes: The Selected Memoirs of Peter Bull, edited by Sheridan Morley (London: Robin Clark, 1985).
“Nile and I went to Italy…” CS to LH, April 1999.
“One night somebody brought…” TS to LH, March 1993.
“We would have dinner…” CS to LH, March 1993.
TS’s Queen contributions: article on “The Theater,” January 30 and review of John Fowles’s The Collector, May 8, 1963, editions of Queen.
“At the time of the initial release…” TS to LH, March 1993.
Bosley Crowther review, “Dr. Strangelove: Kubrick Film Presents Sellers in 3 Roles,” the New York Times, January 30, 1964.
“There was a lot of publicity…” CS to LH, March 1993.
Upset about TS’s getting too much credit, letter by Peter George, Life, September 18, 1964, p. 32.
“Needless to say…” James Harris to LH, July 1999.
“There was gossip written…” Christiane Kubrick to LH, July 7, 2000.
“Stanley’s obsession…” TS to LH, March 1993.
Stanley Kubrick to Diane Johnson on TS, New York Review of Books, April 22, 1999.
“Terry and Stanley were good friends…” Christiane Kubrick to LH, July 7, 2000.
“[Stanley] had the highest regard…” James Harris to LH, July 1, 1999.
Candy sales figures, 80 Years of Best-Sellers: 1895–1975 by Alice Payne Hackett and James Henry Burke (New York: R.R. Bowker Company, 1977), pp. 193–94.
“I think by now [Strangelove] is iconographic…” Norman Mailer to LH, July 2, 1999.
7 Making It Hot for Them
“I quit before the shooting began…” TS to LH, March 1993.
“It was very disruptive…” CS to LH, May 9, 1999.
“First, he invited me…” Gail Gerber to LH, April 1–6, 1997.
“We spoke…” and “During most of our marriage…” CS to LH, May 9, 1999.
“He was writing the script…” GG to LH, April 1–6, 1997 “[He] is another writer…” Peter Bart on The Loved One, New York Times, August 6, 1964.
Joyboy episode from Loved One script, July 21, 1964, pp. 91–92, TS archives.
“[Paddy] Chayefsky…” Martin Ransohoff, American Film Institute Seminar transcript March 19, 1975.
TS working with Norman Jewison, GG to LH, April 1–6, 1997.
“Artie Shaw thought Terry…” John Marquand Jr. to LH, March 11, 1993.
“A film about love…” TS to Alexander Walker, Evening Standard, July 1965.
“The only excuse for writing…” and “As for my ‘outlook’…” TS to Maggie Paley from a 39-p. transcript c. 1965. Courtesy of Maggie Paley.
“I received a call from…” and “I was staying at the Dorchester…” TS to LH, October 1993.
“I think pop artists…” “A Creative Capacity to Astonish” by Jane Howard, Life, August 21, 1964.
“I’d never seen people…” GG to LH, April 1–6, 1997.
“I knew about Robert Fraser’s gallery…” TS to LH, October 1993.
Michael Cooper’s record player, TS in Blinds and Shutters (London: Genesis/Hedley, 1989).
“It was really a meeting place…” Sandy Lieberson to LH, November 16, 1993.
“He was just very open…” Anita Pallenberg to LH, December 9, 1993.
Cannes b.g. Gerard Malanga to LH, April 1999, and Kathleen Tynan to LH, January 1994.
Letter to TS from Godard’s Anouchka Films re: A Certain French Girl, April 29, 1966. Terry Southern archives.
Candy film info. Southern to LH, October 1993. Southern’s 136 pp. first draft can be found in the British Film Institute archives.
John De St. Jorres’s The Good Ship Venus (London: Hutchinson, 1994) has an exhaustive account of the Candy legal mire.
A Clockwork Orange b.g. from LH interviews with Sandy Lieberson, November 16, 1993, TS, October 1993, and Ted Kotcheff December 17, 1999.
Don’t Make Waves b.g., TS to LH, March 1993.
“I think the producer was…” Bruce Jay Friedman to LH, October 28, 1993.
“I started going to Elaine’s…” David Newman to LH, December 16, 1995.
“Jack Richardson had a play…” Bruce Jay Friedman to LH, October 28, 1993.
“Edie Sedgwick would always…” TS to LH, October 1993.
“We were going from L.A.…” GG to LH, April 1–7, 1997.
“I think this is a golden age…” TS quoted in “No Limits,” Newsweek, June 22, 1964.
“Terry created the enigmatic…” Arthur Kopit to LH, April 15, 1997.
Andy Warhol sits in on TV taping, Ted Kotcheff to LH, December 17, 1998.
“I had to go pick up Edie…” Lewis Allen to LH, January 15, 1999.
“‘Frank Dell at the Palladium’…” Bruce Jay Friedman to LH, October 28, 1993.
Seeing father after long absence, Nile Southern to LH, March 23, 1993.
“I said I’m happy…” CS to LH, May 9, 1999.
8 An Easy Rider at the End of the Road
Barbarella background, Jean-Claude Forest obit, the Guardian, January 5, 1999. TS’s draft, Interview, CS to LH, May 4, 2000. Charles Griffith discusses his Barbarella work in Backstory 3: Interviews with Screenwriters of the 60s (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997).
“The strain was with Dino De Laurentiis,” TS to LH, October 1993.
“The fact that Terry was writing…” Anita Pallenberg to LH, December 9, 1993.
“Ah by my troth…” TS quoted in Faithfull by Marianne Faithfull and David Dalton (New York: Little, Brown, 1994), pp. 128–129.
“Blood of a Wig” b.g., Paul Krassner to LH, July 1999.
“Terry was certainly doing more…” Peter Fonda in his memoir, Don’t Tell Dad (New York: Hyperion, 1998) p. 245.
“The first notion was that…” TS to LH, October 1993.
This writer has seen two drafts of the script. One version can be found in the archives of the British Film Instiute. Another draft, which is remarkably similar and is covered in Southern’s handwriting, is in the Terry Southern archives and was used as an exhibit in the lawsuit between Rip Torn and Dennis Hopper over the latter’s comments on The Tonight Show. A suit which Hopper lost. Dennis Hopper on Adamski, BBC2 documentary, “Born to Be Wild,” broadcast on December 19, 1995.
George Adamski’s book Inside the Spaceships (a.k.a. Inside the Flying Saucers) was published in 1955 and became popular with UFO aficionados.
“I didn’t know anything about Terry’s screenplay…” Buck Henry in letter to LH, January 23, 1997.
Ringo’s scenes in Candy were shot December 7–16 at Incom Film Studios. The 119-minute film was released on December 17, 1968, in New York and February 20, 1969 in London. Additional Candy information in Brando by Peter Manso (New York: Hyperion, 1994).
Richard Corliss on TS in Talking Pictures (New York: Penguin, 1975). “When money came in…” Si Litvinoff to LH, January 28, 1998.
“I remember bursting into tears…” CS to LH, May 9, 1999. CS adds “The
n Terry did the same thing over again [1993] but not on such a large scale and that’s when the house was remortgaged. He couldn’t get a mortgage so I got a mortgage for him. Then he died.” Additional IRS background, Nile Southern E-mail to LH, May 26, 2000.
Easy Rider location trip described in Paul Lewis letter, Dallas Observer, March 4, 1999.
Lewis says TS opted out of profit participation during the writing because he felt he didn’t contribute enough to merit credit and that Fonda got those points. Laszlo Kovacs on TS’s script, quoted in my Easy Rider book. Kovac refers to TS’s role in the BBC2 documentary as well as “Shaking the Cage,” a documentary featured on the 1999 DVD release of Easy Rider.
“The idea of meeting a kind of a straight guy…” TS to LH, October 1993.
Fonda’s “dumb-bell dialogue,” Letter from TS to Peter Fonda, April 24, 1968, Terry Southern archives.
“Going there wasn’t our idea…” TS to LH, March 1993.
Chicago Democratic Convention b.g. from Genet by Edmund White (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993) and It Wasn’t Pretty, Folks, but Didn’t We Have Fun?: Esquire in the Sixties by Carol Polsgrove (New York: W.W Norton & Company, 1995).
“Burroughs on my right…” Allen Ginsberg in Blinds and Shutters (London: Genesis/Hedley, 1989).
“Groovin in Chi,” by TS, Esquire, November 1968, pp. 83–86.
“During the writing of it…” Dorothy Tristan to LH, March 16, 1997.
Stacy Keach on End of the Road, Actors Talk: Profiles and Stories from the Acting Trade (New York: Proscenium Publishers, Inc., 1999), pp. 14–15.
“There was this seven-page rave…” Dorothy Tristan to LH, March 16, 1997.
“We tried to give…” TS to LH, October 1993.
John Cleese on The Magic Christian, Life (Before and After) Monty Python by Kim “Howard” Johnson (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1993), p. 42.
“I always remember John Cleese…” Joseph McGrath to LH, November 11, 1993.
The Magic Christian production dates from The Complete Beatles Chronicle by Mark Lewisohn (New York: Harmony Books, 1992), pp. 314–15. A letter from Joe McGrath to TS, January 23, 1969 confirms Southern’s lodgings during the shoot.
“Working with Sellers…” TS to LH, October 1993.
“There’s a sequence…” Joseph McGrath to LH, November 11, 1993.
A March 18, 1969, letter from Ted Ashley’s Famous Agency re: plans for Terry and Joseph McGrath to do The Last Days of Dutch Schultz in spring 1970.
“My wife and I…” McGrath to LH, November 11, 1993.
On Christian cameos, GG to LH, April 1–6, 1997.
“So we all went on this fantastic crossing…” TS to LH, October 1993.
Blue Movie review by David Dempsey, New York Times Book Review, September 13, 1970.
Blue Movie review by Michael Wood, New York Review of Books, March 11, 1971, pp. 43–44.
“I remember I was told…” George Plimpton to LH, October 25, 1993.
“Terry made a tremendous amount…” CS to LH, May 9, 1999
“I am aware…” letter to Dennis Hopper from TS, December 5, 1970. Terry Southern archives.
9 From Green to Amber
“If a writer is sensitive…” TS in Movie People edited by Fred Baker with Ross Firestone (New Yorker: Lancer, 1973), pp. 95–96.
“Terry didn’t know how to…” and “There was this embourgeoisement…” Ellen Adler to LH, April 22, 1999.
Background on DJ, Dick Fontaine to LH, December 1998. Double Pisces viewed at British Film Institute.
God Is Love outline, dated September 10, 1971. Terry Southern archives.
Background on Kubrick and Southern relationship: “Re: your note—of course I would like to work with you again—any ideas?” Letter from Kubrick to Southern, July 10, 1971.
“With each new film…” Christiane Kubrick to LH, July 7, 2000.
Dennis Hopper and TS outside Chelsea Hotel photographed by Fred McDarrah of the Village Voice, September 30, 1970.
Jay Cocks on A Clockwork Orange, Time, December 20, 1971, p. 53.
“We started to make…” NS to LH, March 22, 1993.
“I think Chuck Barris…” Grauerholz to LH, May 29, 1999.
“Nathanael West was one of my favorites…” Jerry Schatzberg to LH, April 23, 1999.
TS on Peter and Stones’s 1972 Tour, TS to LH, March 1993.
“He really looked like a lunatic…” Josh Alan Friedman to LH, May 18, 1999.
Southern’s boss at New York University was David Oppenheim, the dean of the School of Fine Arts. TS left the job in 1974 because he claimed it was taking too much time away from writing.
“We’re getting into a golden age…” Screw, no. 86, October 26, 1970, reprinted in Escapade May/August, 1971, p. 82.
Background on “Foreplay,” “How to Cast a Porno Film and Not Get Too Nervous,” Playboy, December 1974, pp. 187–190, pp. 324–334.
Double Date script pages and outline c. 1973 found in Terry Southern archives.
“Have no concern about…” Letter to TS from Stanley Kubrick, August 29, 1973, in response to TS letter of July 14, 1973. Inquiry about Blue Movie points, September 17, 1973—TS to Kubrick.
Deposition in TS’s suit against Playboy and Mason Hoffenberg was filed April 30, 1975. The suit was later dropped.
“As soon as I had this news…” TS to LH, October 1993.
“It is really too grotesquely…” Letter to Calley from TS, April 16, 1975. Terry Southern archives.
“I wish I were able to give you…” Blue Movie draft by Southern, c. winter 1975.
Blue Movie documentation: In a letter from Ringo to TS, June 7, 1974, mentions awaiting clearance from Kubrick on Blue Movie option. On June 19, 1974, Ringo’s lawyer, Bruce V. Grakal, writes to TS confirming an advance of $1,000 for Blue Movie work. Blue Movie, the book and film, was jointly owned by TS and Kubrick (a 60/40 split). The book was optioned by Ringo between 1974 and 1977.
“[Calley] had the idea…” TS to LH, October 1993.
A December 23, 1974, contract in TS archives for Hunters of Karin Hall by (Nya Svenska Nordish Tonefilm), based on novel by Carl-Henning Wijkmark, to be directed by Ingmar Ejve. TS’s fee was $10,000 payable in four installments and $5,000 payable on the second draft. He was also given 2.5 percent of the net.
Hunters of Karin Hall c. 1975, excerpt, courtesy of Terry Southern estate.
“Actually I was in the middle of…” David Newman to LH, December 18, 1995.
“A Piece of Bloody Cake was…” Ted Kotcheff to LH, December 17, 1998.
Kubrick on Bloody Cake, handwritten note to TS, August 2, 1974.
Visit to Nicolas Roeg set, NS to LH, March 23, 1993.
TS running off with car, David Cammell to LH, January 1994.
10 Junky
“Good writers have…” “Drugs and the Writer,” Unpublished, mid-seventies, Terry Southern archives.
“With reference to the pornographic library…” FBI memorandum, New Haven, February 26, 1965, Terry Southern archives.
“It was kind of vague…” Gerard Malanga to LH, April 20, 1999.
Dennis Hopper’s arrival from Apocalypse Now set, James Grauerholz to LH, May 29, 1999.
“Stern was trained…” TS to LH, March 1993.
“Étonnez-moi” joking, tape recording, c. 1977, Terry Southern archives.
“I remember one time…” James Grauerholz to LH, May 29, 1999.
“I think that Burroughs…” Victor Bockris to LH, October 1993.
Notes by Grauerholz on Junky meetings, William Burroughs archives: April 29, 1977, meeting at Gramercy Park Hotel, Hopper, Southern, Burroughs, Joe Bianco, and assistants in attendance. April 30, 1977, meeting—Grauerholz meets with TS, then Hopper and Mimi, Joe Bianco meets with Grauerholz, Hopper, Mimi, and Southern. Bianco at this stage confirmed that West German financing through Paul Hoffman, Johnny Brasha, and Rita Jennings, of Abracadabra had collapsed.
Grauerholz notes describing an 11:00
A.M. phone call by Stern to Burroughs.
The May 10, 1977, meeting is described by Grauerholz in a letter to Peter Matson, Burroughs’s agent, dated May 15, 1977.
Gathering at Hopper’s apartment, where TS and GG, Mimi, Hopper’s secretary, and “one Michael Green” are present.
“I have never known…” memo to Grauerholz and Burroughs, dated May 11, 1977, from Joe Bianco.
May 11, 1977, a memo from Jacques Stern re: Creation of Adam, an idea of Stern’s, which appears to have overlapped with Junky and created confusion as to what film they were making.
Background on James Jones’s funeral, Ellen Adler to LH, April 22, 1999.
Junky first draft by TS, May 25, 1977, Terry Southern archives.
May 29, 1977, Grauerholz notes: Terry and Hopper met with François de Menil and passed on copies of Junky with the hope that de Menil would cover costs of development such as securing Paul Lewis’s partcipation. Grauerholz phone conversation with TS suggests that “wildcat independent” financing be found utilizing various contacts or approaching est. producers. Lewis Allen, a friend of Terry’s, is mentioned.
“It turns out that…” TS to LH, March 1993.
“The whole thing was really a…” James Grauerholz to LH, May 29, 1999.
Hopper, TS, and Junky mentioned in Time, p. 44, June 20, 1977.
“The first scene of [Southern’s draft]…” TS to LH, March 1993.
Excerpt from The Donkey and the Darling, 1968–1977, courtesy of Terry Southern Estate.
Junky in limbo, background from: Grauerholz meeting notes, June 25, 1977: Joe Bianco asks Julian Neal to take over exec. producer role. Burroughs was in Paris for most of June. Option on Junky was expiring, but terms of renewal did not mean Burroughs was entitled to more money [a request for $5,000]. Hopper out of project by this stage. Grauerholz notes, June 29, 1977: As attempts to salvage the mess of Junky continued, mainly on Grauerholz part, he jotted down names of directors: Scorsese, Spielberg, Nick Roeg, Sydney Pollack, Terry Malick, John Milius, John Schlesinger, and Milos Forman. Joe Bianco was eager to keep project together. Hopper was considering waiving directorial role for $5,000 a month for four months. Letter from Grauerholz to Rudy Wurlitzer, August 4, 1977, states option on Junky would expire March 1978. Grauerholz mentions that he has written his own draft.