Quote:
Originally Posted by Spike Marshall  I was actually wikipediaing the production of the film, after the docs on the special editions skirted over that period, and I came across an anecdote about one of the studio rewrites being done without Burton's knowledge and the cathedral set getting built without the director knowing leading to Burton having to create a finale on top of the cathedral on the fly. Of course the veracity of that statement is in question, but the film does occasionally feel like you have four or five different visions of the same basic story all trying to fight with each other.
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This is true. In the book "Hit & Run" which details Jon Peters and Peter Gubers' rise in Hollywood (most of their downfall came with Last Action Hero opening the week after.. JURASSIC PARK!) there's a section that talks about that very thing (and Jon Peters driving Tim Burton out of his mind while screwing Kim Basinger out of her mind!)
From the book
"Originally, the plot called for Vicki Vale to die at the end of the movie. Jon recognized that audiences would be horrified. Without telling Burton, who liked the original approach, Jon started working out last-minute revisions. The Joker would take Vicki captive and drag her up the cathedral bell tower stairs. Batman and Vicki would end up hanging off the tower by their fingers in a gothic cliffhanger finish. The specific action had not yet been delineated but the broad strokes of the idea were clear enough - and Burton hated the change...
Because of the final-hour change, the sequence had to be largely improvised, which terrified Burton. "Here were Jack Nicholson and Kim Basinger walking up this cathedral, and halfway up Jack turns round and says, 'Why am I walking up all these stairs? Where am I going'" Burton said later. "And I had to tell him that I didn't know. The most frightening experience of my life. I knew they had to go up to the bell tower and they better do something up there. That was always a given. But what? Help me! Help me!"
Jon hired stunt doubles to play the Joker's heavies and maximize the mayhem. Meanwhile, Burton focused on getting some kind of footage with the lead actors that he could cobble into a coherent sequence. He was ultimately pleased with Batman's climax, but he doesn't recommend that kind of last-minute hysteria. "There was just no time for me to work on it," he says. "I was basically reacting to other people's ideas and then trying to come up with stuff on my own. Hollywood is very control-oriented place, and if people want to feel in control, a very easy way to bring control back to yourself is to create chaos. Because if you're the one creating chaos, then you're the one who has to fix it. And on some level, that may be true with Jon."
Here's one where Jon Peters pissed off Jack Nicholson.
"Money was also the issue in a flap over the top-of-the-line black leather crew jackets, which displayed the Batman logo on the back. Nicholson had made a verbal agreement with Jon to split the cost of the jackets over and above the $10,000 allotted in the budget. But when a bill arrive for $100,000, Jon reneged.
Batman's production manager, Nigel Wool, told Nicholson that it would cost him $90,000 to cover the cost. Nicholson stormed over to Basinger. "Tell that guy whose cock you've been sucking for the past six months that he's an asshole for not paying for the jackets!" he snapped. That, at least, was the story that made the rounds in Hollywood for months."
Here's my favourite..
"On Monday morning, the trades trumpeted joyful news: Batman had taken in $42.7 million at 2,100 screens, breaking ever record in motion picture history. Within ten days it grossed more than $100 million, another record.
In predictable Hollywood style, a chorus of voices claimed credit. The loudest was Jon Peters, who blustered to anyone who would listed that he had written, directed, cast and singlehandedly marketed the film."
