Reconstructing Strangelove by Michael Broderick

Author:Michael Broderick
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: PER004030, Performing Arts/Film & Video/History & Criticism, PER004020, Performing Arts/Film & Video/Guides & Reviews
Publisher: Spry Publishing LLC
Published: 2016-12-05T16:00:00+00:00

Letter from Stanley Kubrick to Peter George concerning plagiarism (Peter George Archive).

On 14 April 1962, a full six months before the first printing of Fail-Safe, an industry gossip article by ‘Whitefriar’ in Smith’s Book Trade raised plot and character similarities between Red Alert and Fail-Safe. When alerted to the clipping, George wrote to Kubrick asking his advice on whether he should take legal action, noting that Ace Books would cash-in on the controversy and reprint Red Alert in the US, even though his book was now ‘far removed’ from the current screen treatment.25 George also noted that Hutchinson Publishing (UK) made a deal with McGraw Hill (US) to publish Fail Safe in September that year. The next day George’s publisher, Tom Boardman Jnr, wrote to Kubrick enclosing the relevant clippings from Smith’s Book Trade. Boardman promptly contacted Hutchinson’s Managing Director, Robert Lusty, warning him of George’s dismay at Whitefriar’s allusion of plagiarism.26 The same day George forwarded to Kubrick Boardman’s letter to Lusty and outlined their legal strategy.27 Kubrick immediately replied advising George to acquire ‘a good plagiarism solicitor’ and take ‘the strongest possible legal action’ against Burdick and Wheeler.28

A week later Hutchinson’s Editorial Director, Harold Harris, blithely informed Boardman that he had simply purchased the UK rights to Fail-Safe ‘from a synopsis’ not having ‘seen a page yet’ but had been advised there was ‘little similarity’ between the two novels.29 On 15 May 1962 Boardman wrote to Kubrick, attaching a copy of his correspondence with Harris warning of legal action if Hutchinson published Fail-Safe. Boardman also enclosed his own précis of the similarities of plot between both books to Harris.30 These events, when coupled with the January 1962 exchange of literary materials between Harris-Kubrick and Burdick and Wheeler, and George’s own correspondence with the American authors and publishers, makes Wheeler’s 2000 assertion of ignorance of Red Alert/Two Hours to Doom implausible if not deliberately deceitful.

From June to October 1962, Kubrick and George continued to refine their screenplay, now re-oriented towards ‘nightmare comedy’. Legal correspondence between Kubrick and Louis Blau on 20 June 1962 has the project titled ‘Dr. Strangelove’.31 Concerned that Fail-Safe would soon be optioned for filming, Kubrick advised Blau that a game plan be devised for just such a contingency, should the rights be sold. In the meantime, the script went through continuous modification during this period.32 On 31 August 1962 the Kubrick and George final script was now formally titled and bound as DR. STRANGELOVE Or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The BOMB with the principal protagonists depicted as po-faced but playing for laughs while they prepared for global thermonuclear war.33 Meanwhile the novel of Fail-Safe had yet to appear in either the USA or UK but from mid-to-late October it was serialised in the Saturday Evening Post over three installments. The timing was fortuitous for the publishers as President Kennedy announced on 22 October 1962 the discovery of Soviet Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles (IRBMs) in Cuba and the superpowers lurched towards Armageddon.34

The book went into mass distribution shortly thereafter.

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