🔗 Share this article Unveiling the Conflict Among Director and Screenwriter of the Cult Classic Film A screenplay penned by Anthony Shaffer and starring Christopher Lee and the lead actor could have been an ideal venture for director Robin Hardy while the production of The Wicker Man more than half a century ago. Although it is now celebrated as a cult horror masterpiece, the extent of misery it caused the film-makers has now been revealed in newly discovered letters and early versions of the script. The Plot of The Wicker Man This 1973 movie centers on a puritan police officer, portrayed by Edward Woodward, who travels on an isolated Scottish isle looking for a lost child, but finds sinister local pagans who claim the girl was real. the actress appeared as an innkeeper’s sexually liberated daughter, who tempts the religious policeman, with Christopher Lee as the pagan aristocrat. Creative Tensions Revealed But the creative atmosphere was frayed and contentious, according to the letters. In a message to the writer, the director stated: “How could you handle me like this?” Shaffer was already famous with masterpieces like Sleuth, but his script of The Wicker Man shows the director’s harsh edits to the screenplay. Extensive crossings-out feature Summerisle’s lines in the final scene, originally starting: “The girl was but the tip of the iceberg – the visible element. Don’t blame yourself, it was impossible you could have known.” Apart from Writer and Director Conflict escalated beyond the writer and director. A producer commented: “Shaffer’s talent has been offset by a self-indulgence that impels him to show he was overly smart.” In a note to the production team, the director complained about the editor, Eric Boyd-Perkins: “I don’t think he appreciates the subject or approach of the film … and feels that he is tired of it.” In one letter, Lee described the film as “alluring and mysterious”, despite “having to cope with a talkative producer, an underpaid and harassed writer and a well-paid but difficult director”. Lost Documents Found A large collection of letters relating to the production was part of six sack-loads of documents forgotten in the loft of the old house of Hardy’s third wife, his wife. Included were unpublished drafts, storyboards, production photos and budget records, many of which reflect the challenges experienced by the team. Hardy’s sons Justin and Dominic, currently in their sixties, have drawn on the material for an upcoming publication, titled Children of The Wicker Man. It reveals the extreme pressures on the director throughout the making of the film – including a health crisis to bankruptcy. Family Fallout Initially, the movie failed commercially and, in the aftermath of its failure, Hardy left his wife and his family for a fresh start in the US. Legal letters reveal his wife as the film’s uncredited executive producer and that Hardy was indebted to her as much as £1m in today’s money. She had to sell the family home and passed away in the 1980s, in her fifties, battling addiction, unaware that her film later turned into an international success. Justin, a Bafta-nominated historian film-maker, described The Wicker Man as “the movie that ruined my family”. When he was contacted by a resident who had moved into the former family home, inquiring if he wanted to collect the documents, his first thought was to suggest burning “the bloody things”. But then he and his brother examined the sacks and understood the importance of what they held. Revelations from the Papers His brother, a scholar, commented: “Every key figure are in there. We found the first draft by the writer, but with dad’s annotations as filmmaker, ‘containing’ the writer’s excess. Due to his legal background, Shaffer tended to overwrite and dad just went ‘cut, cut, cut’. They sort of loved each other and clashed frequently.” Compiling the publication provided some “resolution”, Justin said. Financial Hardships His family never benefited monetarily from the production, he added: “The bloody film has gone on to make so much money for others. It’s unfair. Dad accepted a small fee. So he never received any of the upside. The actor never received any money from it either, although he performed the film for no pay, to leave his previous studio. So, in many ways, it was a very unkind film.”