The full oral history story of the making of Stanley Kubrick’s horror masterpiece The Shining.
With thanks to Tim Pelan for sharing this video on his fantastic website: Cinetropolis.
You may recall we previously brought you news of The Elstree Project, an oral history project designed to record, preserve and share the memories of people who have worked at the studios of Elstree and Borehamwood. Well, one of their interview docs, a 55 minute film on the making of Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining has been uploaded to Vimeo, and we have it for you here. It features contributions from Christiane Kubrick, and nine crew members who worked on the film at Elstree.
Interviewed are:
Brian Cook – 1st AD
Jan Harlan – Producer
Christiane Kubrick – Wife of Stanley Kubrick
Mick Mason – Camera Technician
Ray Merrin – Post-Production Sound
Doug Milsome – 1st AC and Second Unit Camera
Kelvin Pike – Camera Operator
Ron Punter – Scenic Artist
June Randall – Continuity
Julian Senior – Warner Bros. Publicity
The interviews in this film were recorded over a period of three years, and with eight students getting the chance to gain live work experience as part of their undergraduate degree course in Film and Television in the School of Creative Arts at the University of Hertfordshire. The film has been made as part of The Elstree Project which is a partnership between Howard Berry of the University and Bob Redman and Paul Welsh MBE who run the volunteer group Elstree Screen Heritage. —Staircases To Nowhere: Making Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining
A 1983 Playboy interview with Stephen King, about his young hungry days before he was published. In the same interview with Playboy in 1983, Stephen King stated:
“The real problem is that Kubrick set out to make a horror picture with no apparent understanding of the genre. Everything about it screams that from beginning to end, from plot decision to the final scene — which has been used before on The Twilight Zone.”
Source: cinetropolis.net
August, 1980 American Cinematographer magazine interview with Steadicam inventor and operator Garrett Brown regarding his experience filming The Shining.
February, 1976. Producer Jan Harlan writes to Stanley Kubrick and speaks passionately about a new piece of technology so impressive that it could lead to “shots which would not enter your mind otherwise.” That invention was the now-ubiquitous Steadicam, and Harlan was right to be so impressed. Indeed, Kubrick shared his enthusiasm, so much so that the Steadicam was used extensively and to great effect in his next movie, The Shining — most notably the smooth tracking shots in the hotel’s corridors — and in every film of his that followed.
February, 1976. Producer Jan Harlan writes to Stanley Kubrick and speaks passionately about a new piece of technology so impressive that it could lead to “shots which would not enter your mind otherwise.” That invention was the now-ubiquitous Steadicam, and Harlan was right to be so impressed. Indeed, Kubrick shared his enthusiasm, so much so that the Steadicam was used extensively and to great effect in his next movie, The Shining — most notably the smooth tracking shots in the hotel’s corridors — and in every film of his that followed. —Shaun Usher, Letters of Note
In 1974 Stanley Kubrick receives a print of the 35mm demonstration film shot with the original prototype of what would later be called the “Steadicam”. Kubrick’s telexed response is reprinted below:
VIA WUI +
CINEDEVCO LSA
HAWKFILMS ELST
TO ED DI GIULIO
2# 11 74
DEAR ED, DEMO REEL ON HAND HELD MYSTERY STABILIZER WAS SPECTACULAR AND YOU CAN COUNT ON ME AS A CUSTOMER. IT SHOULD REVOLUTIONIZE THE WAY FILMS ARE SHOT. IF YOU ARE REALLY CONCERNED ABOUT PROTECTING ITS DESIGN BEFORE YOU FULLY PATENT IT, I SUGGEST YOU DELETE THE TWO OCCASIONS ON THE REEL WHERE THE SHADOW ON THE GROUND GIVES THE SKILLED COUNTER-INTELLIGENCE PHOTO INTERPRETER A FAIRLY CLEAR REPRESENTATION OF A MAN HOLDING A POLE WITH ONE HAND, WITH SOMETHING OR OTHER AT THE BOTTOM OF THE POLE WHICH APPEARS TO BE SLOWLY MOVING. BUT MY LIPS ARE SEALED. I HAVE A QUESTION: IS THERE A MINIMUM HEIGHT AT WHICH IT CAN BE USED?
BEST REGARDS, STANLEY KUBRICK
HAWKFILMS ELST +
CINEDEVCO LSA
The Steadicam and The Shining
In constant use for almost a year, this Academy Award-winning camera stabilizer lends great fluid scope to Kubrick’s ultimate horror film.
by Garreth Brown, American Cinematographer, vol. 61 issue 8, August 1980
Source: lettersofnote.com
Screenplay for the deleted original ending of The Shining. When the film was first released, a hospital epilogue was located between the shot of Jack frozen in the snow and the long dolly shot through the lobby that ends on the July 4, 1921 framed photo.
Kubrick decided to remove the scene very shortly after the U.S. opening, dispatching assistants to excise the scene from the dozens of prints showing in Los Angeles and New York City. All known copies of the scene were reportedly destroyed, although it is rumored that one surviving copy may exist.
Very little remains of the hospital epilogue beyond some continuity polaroids, costumes, and 35mm film trims housed in the Stanley Kubrick Archive. Evidence of just how late in the process the scene was removed lives on in the form of two actors listed in the end credits, despite the fact that they don’t appear in the finished film: Burnell Tucker in the role of “Policeman” and Robin Pappas in the role of “Nurse”.
It’s also important to note that this was likely not the exact scene that Kubrick shot; since the scene no longer exists, it’s impossible to know how exactly it played. Even the many people who saw the epilogue when The Shining was first released have varying recollections of the exact details. Clearly, the final text about the Overlook’s history was an idea omitted during the writing process.
Kubrick’s co-screenwriter on The Shining, Diane Johnson, had this to say about the deleted epilogue:
Kubrick had filmed a final scene that was cut, where Wendy and Danny are recovering from the shock in a hospital and where Ullman visits them.Kubrick felt that we should see them in the hospital so we would know that they were all right. He had a soft spot for Wendy and Danny and thought that, at the end of a horror film, the audience should be reassured that everything was back to normal.
Title page of a manuscript of Stephen King’s novel of The Shining. This copy bears the book’s original title, The Shine.
Stanley Kubrick’s handwritten notes on the front include:
Wendy could be “strong”. Get satisfaction from Jack’s failure and problems. She doesn’t leave him because she “needs him”. She needs to feel his weakness and frustration.
Previously on Cinephilia & Beyond:
A 1983 Playboy interview with Stephen King, about his young hungry days before he was published. In the same interview with Playboy in 1983, Stephen King stated:
“The real problem is that Kubrick set out to make a horror picture with no apparent understanding of the genre. Everything about it screams that from beginning to end, from plot decision to the final scene – which has been used before on The Twilight Zone.”
Prop scrapbook from The Shining.
The scrapbook is filled with yellowed newspaper clippings chronicling sordid events from the Overlook Hotel’s past, as well as violent crimes in the Colorado area.
One page bears the handwritten phrase: “And they took his balls with them” - a line lifted straight from Stephen King’s novel.
Many of the articles in the scrapbook were written by journalist Alexander Walker. Walker wrote for The Evening Standard, and was also a friend of Kubrick’s. Kubrick gave Walker copies of the Rocky Mountain News and other local Colorado newspapers on microfilm, along with a microfilm reader, and had Walker study the language and details of real articles so he could compose fictitious articles for the scrapbook.
This scrapbook figures prominently in the novel of The Shining, though it appears very little in the film. A number of sequences were shot with the scrapbook, including a scene where Jack finds it in the hotel basement, and a later scene where Jack shows the scrapbook to Wendy. Both scenes were deleted from the finished film.
Original scrapbook stored in the Stanley Kubrick Archive in London.
“Chapter Forty-Three: Drinks on the House” from Stanley Kubrick’s copy of Stephen King’s pre-publication manuscript for The Shining. Kubrick’s notations can be seen throughout, handwritten in red and green. He has underlined ideas which interest him, as well as speculated about how to potentially visualize various passages. At one point Kubrick writes, “This could be like the Trip sequence in 2001”.
“This could be like the Trip sequence in 2001”. Stanley Kubrick cinephilearchive.tumblr.com/post/359810639…
— LaFamiliaFilm (@LaFamiliaFilm) November 18, 2012
Source: theoverlookhotel.com
A page from Stanley Kubrick’s pre-production notebook for The Shining.
Kubrick’s handwritten note says:
Danny Vision I
Sees blizzard. ”To deep
signs
Wendy’s room. J breaking door
Redrum
snow swirling in a broken window
take your medicine
boom boom
hand over bathtub (217?)
danny crouched in a hallway
The shape with the mallet
Tiny red eyes glow in the dark
All this will be much clearer visually and should probably not be so complete!?
Polaroids shot by Continuity Supervisor June Randall during production of The Shining, including images of actors Norman Gay, Shelley Duvall, and Scatman Crothers. These black-and-white photos were shot throughout filming to notate positions of props, set dressing, and states of costumes.
Stories about the making of The Shining by the people who helped make it. Those interviewed are listed below. The stories are extracts from full-length interviews with each of the contributors about their careers working at studios in Elstree and Borehamwood, and form part of “The Elstree Project” - a collaboration between Elstree Screen Heritage and the University of Hertfordshire. This work has been done on a voluntary basis with student volunteers and staff giving up their own time to help preserve the legacy of the “British Hollywood”. Contributors to this film are: Ron Punter - Scenic Artist, Props Department, Kelvin Pike - Camera Operator, Mick Mason - Camera Technician, Julian Senior - Publicist, Warner Bros. and June Randall - Continuity
To find out more about the project, visit: theelstreeproject.org
With thanks to Lee Unkrich for sharing this video on his fantastic Shining website: theoverlookhotel.com
Source: vimeo.com
As Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining is rereleased nationwide, Kubrick’s producer Jan Harlan discusses the genesis of this ‘symphony in schizophrenia’.
Source: bfi.org.uk
Source: nevpierce.com
