Michael Douglas on Cuckoo’s Nest at 50: The Actor-Producer on moving on from Hal Ashby, Getting Jack Nicholson his first Oscar, and Telling his Father Kirk he wouldn’t be playing McMurphy

Michael Douglas is well known as an era-defining actor of the late 1980s and early 1990s, with a resumé of, among others, Fatal Attraction (Adrian Lyne, 1987); Wall Street (Oliver Stone, 1987, for which Douglas won the Oscar for Best Actor); War of the Roses (Danny DeVito, 1989); and Basic Instinct (Paul Verhoeven, 1992). As Gordon Gecko in Stone’s Wall Street, he delivered perhaps the defining, likely most prescient movie line of the 1980s: “Greed, for lack of a better word, is good.” His long-acting career has continued unabated through many industry transformations right into the streaming era, for example, with his work for the Golden-Globe winning, Emmy-nominated Netflix show The Kominsky Method (2018-2021) and with Apple TV for (and as) [Benjamin] Franklin (2024). He is also, of course, the son of Hollywood legend Kirk Douglas and his first wife, actor Diana Dill.

Perhaps less well known, at least today, is that Douglas had won an Oscar previous to playing the memorable Gecko in Wall Street, namely, for Best Picture for co-producing (as a first-time producer, with Saul Zaentz) One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (Milos Forman, 1975). This past November was the 50th anniversary of the premiere of Cuckoo’s Nest, one of the most celebrated films in US film history. Cuckoo’s Nest’s box-office success and Oscar accolades were highly unusual even for that storied “New Hollywood” era of which it is regarded as paradigmatic. One of only three films ever to win all five major Oscars, the Douglas-Zaentz-produced, Miloš-Forman-directed movie is hardly forgotten, but the extent of its influence has been underestimated. To cite just one highly unusual example, the film managed to cause considerable controversy and soul-searching in a major medical subfield, in psychiatry and its institutions; it also cemented Jack Nicholson’s status as the key actor of this watershed period for U.S. cinema. The film has a fascinating backstory not only for adapting an era-defining novel, but also because it was then adapted for the stage by Dale Wasserman (Man of La Mancha) for Kirk Douglas, who played Randle P. McMurphy off Broadway in 1963. In the interview below, the younger Douglas discusses having to tell his father that he will not play the film version of the lead role he had originated (notably, author Ken Kesey found the elder Douglas much better on the stage than Nicholson in the film).

Given that Kesey’s novel was published in 1962, but that Forman’s film was not shot until 1975, its adaptation spans a fascinating, transformative era in U.S. culture, reflected in the changing portrayal of “Chief” Bromden, the Indigenous narrator of the novel, and of Nurse Ratched, a role that many prominent actors turned down, likely as too sexist, but that then won the relatively unknown (and very late cast) Louise Fletcher her only Oscar.

While writing a book for BFI’s Film Classics series about One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest in the context of the 1960s and 1970s, I interviewed Douglas via videoconference in January 2025 about making the film and what its success means now, 50 years after its release.

• J.F.

***

I don’t mean to start out talking about myself, but – and I suspect you get this kind of testimony all the time – I was raised by dropout hippies in Vermont, and I can’t really remember a time when I had not seen Cuckoo’s Nest. My father became a therapist, and the film meant a lot to him – in fact, I think he decided to become a therapist around that time in the mid ‘70s.

Great to hear.

I have some overarching questions about Cuckoo’s Nest, because the 50th anniversary was this past November (2025). In a late 1990s interview about the film, you once said that you thought the film would be the first item on the resumé of everyone involved. I was wondering if you still think that way now, looking back 50 years from its release.

[laughs] Well, it is certainly the first item on my resumé. With Saul Zaentz – my producing partner on Cuckoo’s Nest, may he rest in peace – it might be a bit more complicated: he did go on to win Academy Awards for Best Picture in both the 1980s and 1990s, with Amadeus in the 1980s and with The English Patient in the 1990s. I do still believe that Cuckoo’s Nest stands out in a special place for Jack [Nicholson]. It was his first Oscar after four nominations. And for Miloš [Forman], it was his breakthrough picture in the US. For me, it still leaves a bigger impression on me than, for example, my Oscar for Wall Street [for Best Actor, as Gordon Gecko]. Producing was not something that I was ever thinking about at all, except this opportunity arose to adapt this book that I loved. It played such an amazing, important part in my life. And it gave me a whole other career in producing films that I had never anticipated.

I was wondering if you can recall the first time you read the book – my mother told me she had it assigned in a college course in the late 1960s, and that was part of why it was so meaningful to her.

The first time I remember it was when I went to see Dad [Kirk Douglas] in the play in 1963. He had bought the rights to Cuckoo’s Nest in galley form, I believe, in 1961 and hired Dale Wasserman to do the play version. His idea was that the success of the play would allow him to make a film with this great leading part of McMurphy. But, of course, it didn’t work out that way. I entered college in 1963 at University of California, Santa Barbara, and very early on I had a class in 20th century American literature, and, in that class, we read One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. It just knocked me out. You have to keep in mind that I had been in private schools and boarding schools back east, but then I came out to UC Santa Barbara, as my big chance to become a hippie and all that involved. So, the hype, the whole psychedelic aspect of the Big Chief really affected me as well as understanding that Ken Kesey was working in a mental hospital when he was writing the novel.¹ So, I love the book, was completely fascinated by it.

Dad did not have any luck with trying to get a movie made from the Cuckoo’s Nest play. I think his efforts there were really impressive: in 1960 he had had his biggest hit with Spartacus, so he was a major, major movie star, and yet he chose to go back a couple of years later to do this play. Anyway, he didn’t have any luck between 1963 and 1969 with the Cuckoo’s Nest film, so he was going to sell the project. 

Michael Douglas in CBS Playhouse

By 1969 and 1970, I was a young actor, starting off in episodic television, including on CBS Playhouse and Medical Center. I happened to overhear my father talking about selling the rights, and, impulsively, I said “Wow, I love that project! Please give me a chance, let me run with it. I know you want to play the part. I’ll give you half of my production fee if I ever get it made.” And Dad said yes – I mean, I think he was thinking, “I’ve tried for six years to get this project made, I might as well help my son out.” And that was that.

Do you have any sense of why the studios were resistant at that point? After all, it went on to be such an important cultural milestone that was also commercially a smash – just a hugely successful film all around.

Well, initially, with the studios’ passing on it, the play did not work, so I think that was an aspect of it. 

I think something relevant to the stage production was that it premiered earlier in the same month that John F. Kennedy was assassinated, November 1963, which I’m sure had something to do with its limited success. Who would want to see a show at that point, especially a play that could be perceived as downbeat?

Yes, that is a good point. Anyway, with the studios turning it down, I also used to hear often: “Nobody wants to see another Snake Pit (1948).” I wish I had found out earlier: I learned later that Snake Pit was quite a successful film. I don’t think anybody really saw the humour in the Cuckoo’s Nest story, the vulnerability of characters, not laughing at them, but with them. That, with the humour, came up when we were trying to find a director.

I went through my dad’s files on Cuckoo’s Nest, to see to whom he had reached out over the years. And I found this one contact of this company, Fantasy Films in Berkeley, California. By that time, I had gotten the series The Streets of San Francisco and was up there [in northern California] a lot shooting. I also had a friend of mine, Larry Hauben, a writer from Santa Barbara, do a cut-and-paste job of the novel into an early draft of the screenplay. He actually did a very good job.²

Soon thereafter, when I was up in San Francisco with Streets, I reached out to Saul Zaentz at Fantasy and tried to find out what happened with his interest in the project. And that started this partnership with him.

Yeah, actually, I had some questions about that aspect of the production. I met Paul Zaentz, Saul’s nephew, at a screening of Cuckoo’s Nest in Marin in the fall [of 2024]. I was chatting with him afterward, and he said he didn’t actually know how you and Saul had met.

I contacted Saul after doing my homework in Dad’s files on trying to get Cuckoo’s Nest made. I think he had made one film before, Payday (1973). We just hit it off. I think it helped also that he was a bit of an outsider in Hollywood, and I am sort of second generation there. He really supported me and the production, and I will always be very, very grateful to him. He was a true partner and a very important person in my life and in my career. I adored him.

We began the slow process of developing the project, and I was often in San Francisco, so Berkeley was fairly close, and we could touch base as the steps progressed. We began the process of interviewing directors.

And Saul had already been a successful record producer, right? And he, rather amazingly, agreed to finance the entire film? 

Well, it was a different era. Saul’s Fantasy Records was predominantly a jazz label; they also absorbed the Prestige Milestone jazz label. But they also had a band called Creedence [sic] Clearwater Revival, which was obviously very successful. I think our original budget was around $1.6 million, but we ended up close to $4 million, and he accepted it. He took a lot of heat from his other executives, and others who had a financial interest in Fantasy Records. A lot of them felt that I was leading him down the proverbial path on this one! So, I’m so glad, for that reason alone, that it all turned out well.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest

You didn’t have any studio support, right? 

None whatsoever. The plan from the beginning was to make the picture and then look for a distribution deal back in Los Angeles. So, we had a picture that ended up with nine Academy Award nominations, but that every studio had turned down. That was a good education in all this [laughs]. I’m sure it was a tough deal, but the picture had been fully financed, all sewn up and ready to go.

With a major star, too, at that point, right?

Yes, with a major star at that point, exactly. We did have to wait for Jack. We postponed our shooting for like six or eight months. Hal Ashby had suggested him after his The Last Detail [1973] – Ashby was somebody we had considered earlier on. When he suggested Nicholson, Saul and I weren’t so sure – with Five Easy Pieces [1970] he played a kind of erudite rich kid or something like that. But in The Last Detail, his character is a career navy man and realising he had the kind of gravitas he would need for Cuckoo’s Nest. But then, unfortunately, Saul and Hal had kind of a falling out. So, we moved on.

Yeah, I was curious about that. I was looking at the Ashby papers, and he had a lot of correspondence, including with you, about the project in general. He was an already established and important director, who then went on to continue his streak of important films in the ‘70s after leaving Cuckoo’s Nest. I think he said his departure was because he was attached to the Kesey script³, and he felt it was wrong to move on from Kesey’s own screenplay.

Well, I remember the split with Ashby much more as a conflict with Saul, but Ashby may have been committed to Kesey’s version. As you know, once we had the rights, we reached out to Ken [Kesey] and thought, let’s give him a chance to write a screenplay. We said, whether you write the screenplay or not, we’re going to give you 3.5% of whatever the profit definition was. And, so, he wrote a script. Of course, it’s very difficult for an author to write a screenplay from their own books. For example, he kept some of the things in the book that just didn’t work in the screenplay, like the hallucinatory visions of the Big Chief. The character was great, but the depiction of him just wasn’t quite there. And this was after Larry Hauben had done his version. 

So, we moved on, but that led to the only bad aspect of the whole experience: it created this bitter split with Kesey, including around his compensation for working on the screenplay. Ken tried to claim he should get 3.5% we had promised whether he wrote it or not, plus another 3.5% for writing it, so that would be 7.0%. That was an on-going issue, he bad mouthed us to other writers, etc. 

There was eventually a settlement after the Oscars, correct?

We held on to his share in an escrow account, and I think it was up to $3.5 to $4 million dollars. And then Saul said, we should donate it to the University of Oregon, with Ken having studied there and was then living close by. We were going to create the Ken Kesey Chair in American Literature. He was pleased and settled quickly. But that really was the only bad experience we had with the making of the film.

I’ve read Kesey’s screenplay, and I don’t really see how it was very filmable, given how it is far too laden with psychedelic material from the novel. That is something you might expect from a writer not being able to relinquish their own writing. With the hallucinatory parts, I just can’t imagine how it could have been effectively filmed. In some instances, he even ratcheted up (so to say) Bromden’s hallucinations, often mixing and matching of his visions and memories. It would have yielded, I think, a mess of a film.

Yeah, that’s what we thought.

I think your and Saul’s decision to forego Kesey’s screenplay, difficult as it must have been, was a crucial decision for the direction and ultimate success of the film. I was wondering if Ashby ever said anything about how he would have shot it? Because I know that you’ve said that when Miloš Forman came in to discuss his approach with you and Saul, he was pretty clear about what he would do with it. It was a much more realist approach.

With Ashby, we were very impressed with his sense of humour that was also tied to reality, as with Harold and Maude (1971). When we were auditioning different directors, we were surprised at how much the directors held their cards close to their chest. In our meetings with them, they just weren’t sharing. As a first-time producer, I was totally naïve about what they would share. 

Finally, Larry Hauben said to me: did you ever think about Miloš Forman? And I thought, Miloš Foreman, wow! There’s a film, Firemen’s Ball – it’s a lovely picture, but it almost all takes place in one room with a lot of different characters. Very humorous, but without trying too hard, with a particular overarching tone. And it was just the kind of tone that we were excited about. So, we sent the screenplay to Miloš. I think many people thought he was having a bit of a breakdown, was staying in the Chelsea Hotel in New York. But he came out to my house in L.A., I’ll never forget it. He sat down with Saul and me, opened the script to page one and told us exactly what he would do. He walked us through page 2, page 3, etc., and both Saul and I had this cathartic moment, we almost hugged each other, thinking, “Oh, God, we’re not crazy.” It brought tears to our eyes. We were so happy to have found him.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest

And he was clear already then that it was going to be a much more realist approach? Firemen’s Ball is generally realist, but with quite stylised, almost absurdist humour. I would call it realist absurdity or absurdist realism. He walks an amazing line between realism and otherworldliness, especially given that he is working with a lot of non-professionals. He doesn’t make fun of his characters – maybe a little bit, but the audience ends up very sympathetic to them. The tone is, as you say, kind of perfect for Cuckoo’s Nest.

Yeah, exactly. For example, Miloš had worked with a lot of non-professional film people, and on Cuckoo’s Nest he even had patients on the production, although we were so nervous. We had somebody working in the Arts Department who had been an arsonist. He was hanging paintings, and we wondered, “Is this really a good idea?”

Did he choose the art department? That is the question. . . 

[laughs] Then we had another guy who was a bank robber. He was so drugged up on methedrine that he robbed a bank, drove around, and somehow forgot that he had robbed the bank already – he came back to rob the very same bank again. And all the police were there looking for him.

In any case, besides his working with non-professionals, a big part was that Miloš emphasised the real humour in the novel and in the screenplay, which is something most people missed. There is certainly the drama between the Big Nurse and McMurphy, but the inherent humour between the patients is crucial.

The humour really works as part of the film’s humanity. I just saw it screened with a packed house in Marin, and people were laughing out loud, especially in the cuts to Danny DeVito as Martini and Christopher Lloyd as Taber. I think one of the greatest of the film’s many successes was its casting. That is especially true when you think about what all these actors went on to do – it’s frankly amazing, given the careers of Louise Fletcher, DeVito, Lloyd, and Brad Dourif. I guess you knew DeVito from earlier?

Yes, I knew Danny. Danny was the first actor cast because he was actually doing an off-Broadway version of Cuckoo’s Nest as Martini. I took Miloš to see him, and he was included immediately. Otherwise, we actually have Jack to thank for our casting – because we were waiting for him, we had a lot of time for auditions, which really helped. And we had two camps going, one in LA and one in New York. And we started with maybe four group sessions on each coast, auditioning those key ensemble scenes. And we would narrow them down until we had our best group from California and our best group from New York.

During this phase, as I was going from one coast to the other, I happened to be sitting on the plane next to a guy named Mel Lambert. He was a rodeo announcer from Oregon and also had a car dealership. His father was an “Indian agent,” so Mel was selling cars to Native Americans because they trusted him. Around this time, we were trying to cast Bromden, and I told him about the part. It was the penultimate part we were aiming to cast. About four months later, I had a call from him, “This is Mel Lambert, from Mel Lambert Motors,” and he tells me: “the biggest son of a bitch Indian I have ever seen came in the other day. This son of bitch was big, you know . . .” And that’s how we found Will Sampson. Will was a forest ranger up in Yakima, Washington.

One of the great memories from the project I have was when we were all going up to the Oregon State Hospital to audition Dr. Dean Brooks [as Dr. Spivey] – Dean was the head of the hospital. Jack went up with us because we wanted him to read with Brooks, so we also coordinated meeting Will Sampson at the airport – he came down from Yakima, Washington to the Portland airport. So, Jack, Saul, and Miloš and I were all at the gate. Will came out with his cowboy boots, and with his hat he was close to seven feet tall. And I just remember Jack saying, “Jesus Christ! It’s the Chief, man. It’s the Chief!” – he just couldn’t believe it. “Holy shit! It’s fantastic. Can he talk? Wait a minute. He doesn’t have to talk!” We were so enthralled. We had this little plane, and Jack was sitting on the Chief’s lap in the plane, just looking at him like he was Santa Claus: “My God! The Chief!” That was a big, big moment, finding Will for the part. We were ecstatic.

One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest

In my account I talk quite a bit about Samson, and he made a huge difference in my analysis of the film, a huge contribution to its success. I think it is crucial that you, Saul, and Miloš committed to having a Native person play him, because, as you know, it often was not the case in the stage versions leading up to the film. In fact, I believe it was the first major production of Cuckoo’s Nest in which a Native person had played Bromden. To me, this reflects the historical changes between 1962, when the novel was published, and 1974 and 1975, when you cast and made the film. Given how important civil rights were at that time, there was a new awareness about the appropriateness of having someone Indigenous play Bromden.

One of the challenges we had was how Kesey described him in the novel. Native Americans are not generally so tall, so we were really lucky to find Will. He was a lovely guy. He’s another person we miss.

Yeah, I saw he died quite young, too, unfortunately⁴. Did you, Saul, and Miloš have a discussion about what to do if you couldn’t find someone for Bromden?

I guess it wasn’t any conversation – we just knew it had to be a Native person, given the realistic direction and tone we were going with, as with Dean Brooks as Dr. Spivey. Tonally, it just had to be.

Another crucial casting decision, also one registering the kind of historical change from 1962 to 1974 or 1975, was finding Louise Fletcher to play Nurse Ratched. I believe you and Saul offered that role to a number of prominent actresses, and they all turned it down. Then, last minute, Fletcher was cast, in part because of her subtle humanisation of Kesey’s rather one-dimensional character. The humanisation of Ratched that Fletcher developed (and that you all achieved by casting her) was crucial to the film, not least given the intervening years of feminism and its impact. By that point, Kesey’s version of Ratched seemed really dated.

Yeah, I’m not sure feminism initially helped the casting there – that is why I think a number of people to whom we offered it decided to turn the role down. Especially when you think how great it is to play a good villain – getting a good villain role is great, you can really show your chops. To many women at the time, the idea of playing a villain like Ratched, in such a feminist era, was a no-go. For example, I think Ann Bancroft was talked out of it by her husband, Mel Brooks. Others just passed on it. We got a reward [for our perseverance] with Louise [Fletcher], who, of course, got the Oscar for the role.

Miloš found her, actually, in an Altman movie [Thieves like Us, 1974]. She had a small part, with a little girl’s voice but then icy blue eyes. . . 

Yeah, and quite tall, a real physical presence.

She did not even have to be stern, she could just talk quietly. 

Yeah, the casting was great. It was then all a matter of polishing it. We had 2 weeks of rehearsal, but Jack wasn’t able to make all the rehearsal times because of his previous commitment. Given the time we had, the other actors were able to join group sessions in the mental hospital wing. So, they were in the group sessions with the actual patients there for a while.

Then Jack came up to Oregon for the last part of rehearsal and started working on the scenes. I remember that we broke for lunch one day, and he looked a little worried, pushing his tray away. He went outside – then Saul and I were worried! “We’ve got a problem with our star,” we thought. I went to talk to him, “Jack, are you okay?” And he said, “Who are these guys? I mean they don’t break at lunch?! They all stay in character – who are they?” [laughing]

He didn’t know any of them yet, but he became friends with Danny DeVito later, I believe.

Yeah, he became friends with Danny but another one, Billy Redfield, was also an East Coast actor. We had a big decision to make with Billy. Halfway through the picture, we got a call. Billy went to the hospital, maybe he had come down with some pneumonia. Dr. Brooks said, “Let me go down and check on him,” and he came back and said “I don’t know how to tell you this, but he’s dying.” He had a lymphoma thing, and he was dying. His wife was in Oregon with us, and I had to go tell his wife. And she looked at me, and she said, “Yes, I know.” We found out that, even though you have to do a physical with a picture, they had covered it up. So, we had no idea whether we really had insurance or not, after they had covered it up. But Billy begged us, “Please let me finish the picture,” and if we replaced him then, about halfway through, we would have had to go back and re-shoot everything. That was one of the toughest moments we had, particularly for Saul [who was financing the entire production]. Anyway, Redfield made it – he passed away soon after the movie was released.

I think he is great in it, more excellent casting. I wanted to ask you about Haskell Wexler, the famed cinematographer who had already won on Oscar by that point. Wexler was, of course, another major figure who was involved in the picture. But there was some controversy surrounding his departure from the production part of the way through, maybe about a third of the way through?

Maybe it was about 40% through?

And I guess it was primarily conflicts with Miloš Forman?

Yes, it started with Haskell asking, “Why are we shooting this up here in Oregon?” This is January in Oregon. It gets dark outside at 3 o’clock, and they had only a few windows. But we really thought that it was important for the verisimilitude of the picture. Even though we knew that Haskell was a pro – and we weren’t! For him, shooting on location made it much more difficult.

Then we went on and on about the look of the hospital, for example, with the colour of green on the walls. We just could not get a balance between the light and the walls. Haskell was also a director, had directed before, and he had strong opinions about how things should go and look. 

And Miloš was not allowing the actors to see any dailies. Progressively, as time went on, Haskell started to undermine Miloš by, for example, taking his light readings with the actors right in front of him and then rolling his eyes at some of Miloš’s direction [Michael Douglas imitates Wexler eye rolling and shaking his head dismissively]. Since they weren’t seeing the dallies, and Haskell was already well known, the actors started to rely on Haskell for feedback on how they were doing.

And Miloš, well, he would be with the actors [imitating Forman]: “Perfect, perfect, but one more time!” That, of course, confused the actors a bit. He was not one of those touchy, friendly types of directors. He’s Central European. It reached a point where Miloš went to Saul, and he said, “I can’t work with Haskell anymore.” And we thought, “oh, we’re in trouble.” Haskell Wexler had won an Academy Award and everything. So, that was probably one of the worst jobs I ever had: to sit down in front of Haskell Wexler and fire him. He looked at me like this [Douglas feigns Wexler’s utter contempt]. You know, I was 29 years old.

Ken Kesey’s book

Yes, it could not have been easy, but there, again, I think you and Saul made a crucial decision. 

Yeah, it was a crucial decision. I said to him, “What do you want us to do? Fire the director, Haskell?” And then we persuaded Miloš about the dailies – “Listen, you gotta show Jack some of this stuff.” And it was really good footage. In the group therapy sessions, not saying a word, just watching reactions – you couldn’t take your eyes off it! Just sitting there, just reacting to what was going on. It was magic. Then Jack calmed down. But we went through, unfortunately, two more cinematographers. The second one, Bill Butler [who had shot Jaws shortly before], had to leave due to commitments, so Billy Fraker finished up.

Yeah, Fraker did the fishing trip?

Yeah.

Wexler mentioned that there was a break between Nicholson and Forman about this issue with the dailies, and that Nicholson was losing confidence in Forman. Wexler claimed they didn’t talk for weeks at one point, even though Nicholson and Forman were friends before and remained friends after.

There were some tensions, you know, leading up to that – I think it was partially motivated by Haskell’s take on it all.

Yes, Wexler would have had an interest in saying that Forman had a fight with Nicholson.

There were some tensions from Haskell sharing with Jack his thoughts on things, his criticisms. But Jack and Miloš had a solid professional relationship. Jack is one of the best partners in the film you want to have. He understands production, etc.

Yeah, he’d worked as a writer and director himself. 

He has been on many projects, and he’s very responsible as an actor. He doesn’t show you his work – it always looks as if it is just happening, but he works hard. With Miloš, I don’t think there was much of a disagreement with him. I mean, Jack knew something special was happening. And then, when we showed him some of the footage we had shot, he realised that something really special was happening.

And you mentioned another crucial factor in the success of the film – another decision that you and Saul made that was central to its success, shooting on location at the Oregon State Hospital. I was wondering if you and Saul always thought that way – it also corresponded with Forman’s other work, in which he often shot on location. He shot on location a lot with non-professional actors, but I know it was a challenge to find a hospital, in part because there was hesitation [from mental health professionals] about the novel.

Yes, definitely, and as it turned out, this was the hospital that Ken wrote about. We were lucky, the hospital had a couple of empty wards. But the State [of Oregon] was nervous. We had many meetings to make it happen. And actually, I remember explaining to them how movies work, “Listen, we can go to the State of Washington and do this, but we are going to use the elements of the book that refer to Oregon and the Oregon State Hospital. We’re going to call it the Oregon State Hospital, even if we shoot in Washington, and they would get all the financial benefit.”

So, they thought about that for a while and then said yes. And, of course, in the end it was a wonderful feather in their cap. 

Obviously, a picture shot in LA would have been cheaper than putting everybody on location and all that. But we all thought we wanted to keep creating this environment, you know, in this specific world, and even to the point with some of the actors that they began to sleep in their beds on the set at night. We had a certain type of environment that I thought would be seen, reflected in the film. That kind of feeling won’t unfold if people just clock off and go home every night, back to their own lives. 

Just a couple more quick questions. One is in terms of talking about difficult decisions and conversations you faced as a producer. I imagine one was with your father about the casting of McMurphy, because, obviously, the role had been very important to him. I think Kesey even praised him in the role. Kesey saw the production in New York, even though it did not run very long. 

In terms of telling your father he was not going to be McMurphy, I suspect Saul probably left it to you to tell him?

[laughing] Yeah, yeah, he did. At the time Dad took it okay. I mean, he was going to get a production credit, and he got half of my back end. I teased him for many years that he made more money with me than on any picture he had ever done.

For a little while, though, he did place that decision [not to cast him as McMurphy] on me. But I said, “Wait a minute, Dad, you know, since when does the producer make that decision? It’s the director’s decision.” And it had been 13 or 14 years since he had bought the rights to the novel. Dad was almost in his 60s when we were casting it, and you know it was just a different generation. So, I think he understood. On the other hand, I certainly understand now, after my career, how seldom it is that you get a really good part. And he definitely knew that was a great part. Over the years he would needle me about it!

But, for the first screening, I took him up to Berkeley [where Fantasy Films/Fantasy Records was headquartered] to see it, and he was very laudatory of Jack – he said he did a great job. And, of course, you know, the nicest thing for me was he looked at me in a whole different light.

He must have been very proud. I mean, it’s an amazing project and really well executed.

One of those things you just would not think about your own son. I have a young son, now 24, who’s involved politically. He’s got a show on Sirius radio and a podcast. And I’m just really shocked at how good he is! I look at him, and I can’t believe it’s my son, but I guess there’s an element of that. 

Anyway, casting can be funny. Before we settled on Jack, Miloš came back and said, “Burt Reynolds!” Miloš said, “He’s got cheap charisma!” As a producer, you’re thinking about it. . . 

Don’t tell Nicholson, but it could have worked, I think. Maybe not as well, but I think Reynolds could have done it, in a somewhat different mode, the physicality of the part and all . . . 

And then, of course, we were sorry that Brando and Gene Hackman turned it down.

Yeah, Saul Zaentz, in an interview, talked about Hackman’s agent’s slow walking your interest in him. He would have been very good for the role, too, but, of course, it changed movie history to have Nicholson in it.

Yeah.

One quick question about the Hauben script. One thing I noticed in the revisions to the scripts was that Hauben really raised the profile of the games in the plot, like the basketball games. I don’t know if you remember, it ends up kind of structured around the basketball games, and then card games, and I thought it was a pretty inspired insight into the novel. The novel, obviously, is much more sprawling and has many different aspects that could never make it into the film. But I think in the Hauben revisions, the games really came out. I was wondering if you and Saul discussed that with Hauben, because I thought that was actually an important insight into the way that you could structure the screenplay. Finding a reduced but effective structure is exactly what Kesey couldn’t do when he tried to adapt it – he couldn’t let go of his own inventions.

Yeah, that is right.

For the film, and it works really well, because these scenes are kind of fun and cinematic in a refreshing way. The games offer an important break from the group therapy scenes.

Yeah, exactly.

And then, obviously, with basketball, Nicholson is clearly having a good time, similarly with Martini and the card games. It probably wasn’t that easy to shoot. I think the monopoly game was particularly challenging, because you had to control all the little pieces on the board.

[laughing] Yeah, don’t eat it, Martini! I think it was especially Miloš’s work on the scene – we worked on those carefully. The one big debate we did have with Miloš was about the fishing trip. He was resisting doing the fishing trip, and we didn’t know what to do. I remember that I said, “Whatever you do, we gotta get out, we gotta get out of the prison, get out of the hospital!”

Because they had been shooting almost 10 weeks at that point, right?

Yeah, so Saul and I are thinking that we have to get out. Everybody needs it. And then it turned out to be a great sequence, although painful because half of the actors were New York actors, and they were just so seasick. Danny [DeVito] was just about crying, you know, having to go out on the water the next day, just so seasick. But it worked out great.

Did you have any trouble getting time off from The Streets of San Francisco to do the film?

That’s kind of amazing. I left the show. I think that was again one of those very fortunate things, because by the fifth year of the show, I was going back and forth from San Francisco to Oregon. And, so, Karl Malden and our producer of Streets [Quinn Martin] let me go while still under contract. They knew how much I was working on Cuckoo’s Nest, how involved I was in it. And I tell people today that I do not know anyone who would let you out of a contract like that.

And Streets of San Francisco was a phenomenal benefit to me in terms of producing. I was shocked at how much I had learned, after four years straight of doing the show. 

Streets was shot on location, too. I think there were the green shoots of a better kind of TV in the 70s, as with Mary Tyler Moore. And I think shooting on location makes a huge difference. I agree that it fundamentally changes the performances. Even the light looks different, and certainly the architecture does.

And you learn discipline because we were having to do 6-day weeks on location, eight and a half months straight. You were really on your game, each week dealing with a new guest star, a new director, and directing some of them myself. I was very pleased and surprised at how much I knew by the time I came to work on Cuckoo’s Nest.

And you worked with Karl Malden right, who was, of course, one of the great actors. 

Yes, my mentor.

Just to conclude, is there anything you particularly want to have remembered about the film, at its 50th anniversary?

A lot of movies are made in 50 years, and I think Cuckoo’s Nest still stands out, for a lot of reasons. It’s also just a reminder of what an independent film can do, when you don’t have the authorities looking over you and homogenising everything – you’ve really got a vision, so it is a reminder of that. I just turned 80 . . . 

Congratulations!

And, looking back, it was a phenomenal beginning for my career. Between Cuckoo’s Nest and Streets of San Francisco, I was very, very fortunate.

Looking back, reading about it, it really made me realise how many different threads have to come together to make a project like that work and have that kind of impact.

Exactly.

A lot of luck, but you know, kudos to you and Saul for handling it all, especially as first- or second-time producers. And it has really aged well, I think, in part because of the realist approach. I don’t think a surreal psychedelic version of it, which was on the table with Kesey’s screenplay, would have survived this long.

It didn’t need that. There is too much heart to it. And you know what happened under the Reagan administration when we got rid of our psychiatric hospitals and threw mental health patients onto the street and then into prisons. 

Mental health professionals still talk about the film, still screen it, which, if you consider how it is 50 years old, is pretty amazing. It really was this kind of watershed moment in the understanding of mental health. You can see in the actor interviews how humbled they were to be involved in the production in general, which they adored. They seem humbled just being around the hospital and seeing the patients and the struggles they had. 

Thank you for talking about it and congratulations on the 50th anniversary! The film really has had an amazing legacy, in many different ways.

Endnotes