Original subtitles

I came to Midnight Express in a most peculiar way.

I'd been invited to New York in '76 to see the stage show of The Wiz.

They wanted to make it into a movie. It was U niversal .

I didn't like it, and so I had lunch with the Universal guys...

...and kind of said no, and walking back from lunch ...

...I was walking down Fifth Avenue, walked past the Columbia building ...

...and Peter Guber was coming out, and he said :

"I've got something for you ." And he went back upstairs...

...and he gave me the galley proofs of Midnight Express. . .

...the book that Billy Hayes had written with William Hoffer.

And he said , "Could you read it?"

So I read it on the way back, on a plane.

I talked about it with my then-producer, AIan Marshall ...

...who had done most of my work till then .

AIso, I'd spoke to David Puttnam , who I'd worked with also.

David Puttnam was about to go into business with Guber...

...quite coincidentally.

So I said , "Well , if you're gonna take the job at Casablanca--"

Which was Guber's company. "--then I'Il do the film ."

And suddenly, all three of us were involved , which was terrific...

...because we'd worked so successfully in the past.

What happened with the script was that...

...up to that point, I had written most of everything that I'd directed .

So, you know, it was-- I was used to doing my own screenplays.

I went to L.A. and Guber introduced me to this young man called OIiver Stone...

...who had not any film credits at that time...

...although he had written a couple of very good scripts.

Peter Guber had found OIiver.

I think had read Platoon...

...and liked Platoon and given OIiver the shot to do his fir--

I think, his first commissioned screenplay.

They flew me to New York, to the Mayflower Hotel ...

...where OIiver Stone was staying .

He was a screenwriter they hired to adapt Midnight Express into the script.

I didn't know him. He didn't have credits on much at all .

While we-- We sat in a room for, I think, about a week.

If you know OIiver, he has an immense amount of energy.

Back 30 years ago, he had even more.

So it's Iike being in a room with-- I n a washing machine, non-stop going .

I Iove it. For me, I just-- I Iove that kind of person .

And he's a brilliant guy, and he was fiery about this project.

I interviewed Billy Hayes in New York for several days...

...and we talked in a hotel , and I asked him every specific question I could ...

...and I got-- And he had written a book also. Was writing one.

So...

...when I went to England to write this, I was charged .

It was decided that he would come to London ...

...and he would begin writing the screenplay of Midnight Express...

...which he, in fact, did ...

...in the back office of our commercials company.

A Iittle office we had in Soho, in London .

He came over and wrote it with AIan .

I mean , more OIiver than AIan , but, obviously, he would call in Alan ...

...and they would discuss it each evening ...

...and then OIiver would come in the next day...

...and he would sit at a desk, and he'd write for, Iike, seven hours...

...at a time.

I believe still that the screenplay, the first draught...

...should be written in a burst of the energy in which you see the movie...

...which is a two-hour time Iimit. It's got a clock on it.

And I think that if-- I try to write it in six weeks...

...and I wrote the first draught in six weeks, actually, to the day.

But, of course, with AIan , he was pretty tough ...

...and I was a young , struggling screenwriter...

...and he was an established d irector at that time.

So I had-- He made me work in the back of his office...

...which Iooked Iike a Dickens-- Charles Dickens' Scrooge office with no light.

To be quite honest, I think most of us thought:

"Well , Iet him write the first draught"...

...and then I would get on and write the screenplay.

That really was, basically, what we were thinking .

And that was the kind of working assumption for about three months.

Then the moment I absolutely remember...

...is that OIiver delivered to me and AIan simultaneously--

And probably AIan Marshall .

--His first draught.

And I sat in my office--

I was in-- My office was in Soho Square at the time.

--And sat down and read it.

Literally, in a sitting . It was a real page-turner.

It was a wonderfully, energetically written script.

And thinking , "Jesus, this is actually very good .

He's very, very good . This is very, very, very good ."

And at the end of it, I picked up the phone to Alan , and I got through ...

...and he said , " I know, I know, I know. I know what you're gonna say.

It's great, isn't it?" I said , "Yes, it's great."

We all kind of read it--

AIan Marshall , David Puttnam and myself-- within a space of five minutes.

You know, we all called one another, and it was a terrific script, actually.

The first time I read the script, I couldn't put it down .

It was a magnificent script.

You know, it was heavy...

...but it was certainly a page-turner.

The screenplay had a volatile energy. Really had a dynam--

It was, Iike, a new energy at that time. It was more rougher, it was rawer...

...and vital .

It was angry too.

It was angry about, at that time, what I perceived to be a system of injustice...

...not just in Turkey, but everywhere in the world .

But Turkey did stand in for me...

...in my passionate heart, for the rest of the world .

The original screenplay...

...was in a number of different prisons.

It followed , quite closely, the book.

And the first changes that were made from the notes...

...that came from me and from the studio and from Guber and Puttnam ...

...were really to conflate the prisons. Make the prison one prison .

Because, by going to this island prison , and then he--

I n the original screenplay, he swam to a fishing boat...

...and that's how he escapes.

It Iet off the pressure cooker by--

And most of the characters that you created--

Hamidou , the prison guard , and Max, John Hurt character.

--Were suddenly not there in our story.

So we kept it all in the same prison .

And that was the big change into the second draught.

AIthough it was a cracking script...

...there were fundamental things that we wanted to adjust and change.

But there were two more draughts.

And a number of things were changed whilst we were filming .

It was quite organic. It gradually changed , little bit by Iittle.

And we started shooting in September of '77.

The studio were very, very keen on Richard Gere in particular.

He just had a very successful movie, I think called Bloodbrothers.

But it-- It had been very good , and he'd got terrific reviews.

And a whole series of meetings occurred ...

...between AIan Parker and Richard that I set up.

I met with Richard Gere about twice, and I wanted him to read the part.

He refused to read . He didn't wanna read .

There was kind of a Iine that if you were a young actor who had made it...

...you don't have to read anymore. He didn't Iike doing cold readings.

So I couldn't commit to him , he didn't commit to us at that moment in time.

We'd also cast and screen-tested a number of people...

...and that included Sam Bottoms, who was very good ...

...Dennis Quaid , and Brad Davis.

I had seen Brad Davis. He'd come in Iate one day.

He knocked at my door two hours after he should have been there...

...at the end of the day. He was completely covered in grease.

H is VW had broken down on the way from his home in North Hollywood ...

...and he read ...

...and I was always impressed by him .

I mean , he had such passion for the piece, and he was very vulnerable...

...almost like a wou nded animal , really...

...and so keen and so anxious to play the part.

It's fantastic for a director to have somebody who wanted to do that badly.

Brad Davis was an unusual fella.

He was made for that role, you know.

I've seen so many people that have come along , and then one role--

And that's the role of their Iife.

It's the 1 5th picture they've done, or the 1 0th , or the sixth .

That was the first real one he did , and that was it.

It was another scary element for the studio...

...because they eventually went with an unknown ...

...and when you have, almost, a first-time studio director--

That was the first studio film he did . He did a Iittle independent film.

--And a first-time screenwriter...

...now a first-time actor...

And then there was a problem of selling Brad Davis.

And for some extraordinary reason ...

...Dan Melnick, and particularly David Begelman--

This is while Begelman was still there...

...before Begelman was forced to step down from the studio.

--Got this obsession that Brad had-- Was cross-eyed .

It was an absolutely extraordinary series of conversations.

"The kid's cross-eyed , he's not attractive enough ," et cetera, et cetera.

I Iiterally had to go to an optician to have Brad's eyes tested ...

...and a Ietter from the optician saying in no way at all was he suffering ...

...from any form of astigmatism or anything else. We took that back.

And I got on with the rest of the casting ...

...in Los Angeles and New York...

...mostly for the American parts.

Randy Quaid , obviously, I met here in Los Angeles.

John H urt was one of the first people we cast...

...who plays Max-- I've met in London .

--And he really wanted to do the film , and that was easy.

John H urt was a very early and very easy decision .

I remember that I had the job of-- A happy job of persuading him .

And he said this, so I can .

He says that I sat down with him and said :

"John , how would you Iike to be nominated for an Academy Award?"

And he said , "What?" I said , "If you do this, you will be."

And he was, so that was nice.

But it was an obvious stand-out part for him .

He was perfect. And he-- I think he loved it.

How it came about, to start with ...

I was approached by David Puttnam .

And he said there's a film that I might be interested in doing .

I said , "Oh , really? What's that?"

I said , "Who's gonna be directing?" And he said , "AIan Parker."

And I said-- I mmediately, I said , " I'II do it."

He said , "What do you mean? You don't want to see the script?"

"No, no, no." I said-- I'd just seen some shorts by AIan Parker...

...because I was part and parcel of producing a film ...

...called Little Malcolm and His Struggle Against the Eunuchs...

...which turned out to be handmade film .

It was done by George Harrison .

And I'd seen these three Iittle...

...films made by AIan ...

...which , I think, they were all to do with the Blitz in London .

And they were fabulous.

And I just said , "Well . . . ." At that stage, I said , "No.

If it's him , I want to do it."

I figured that there's-- He wouldn't want me to do it...

...if there wasn't anything-- If it wasn't worth doing .

If it wasn't something to get your teeth into, and I was dead right.

But it surprised Puttnam .

And it's the only time I've ever done a film which is sight unseen .

He came in with a beautiful drawing he made of the character, Max.

How he thought he should look, including broken glasses...

...with Band-Aids on the broken glass, and his whole look, actually, was--

He'd already figured out how he wanted to Iook.

It's exactly how he looked in the film , in fact.

The first screenplay was early part of '77.

I think in , like, spring . April .

I then started casting and Iooking for Iocations.

We went to five countries in Europe to look for where we might set the film .

We couldn't make the film , for obvious reasons, in Turkey.

I n fact, it was quite dangerous for us to go there.

Even for us to go and recce, which we did do.

We had to find a prison ...

...because we-- Or a Iocation ...

...that gave us this mediaeval feeling .

I n all honesty, we went to Istanbul ...

...and saw the real prison , Sagmalcilar...

...which is actually much more a German blockhouse.

We were originally, from memory, Iooking at--

We Iooked at a number of countries. Yugoslavia we looked at.

Israel , at one point.

But everywhere we went, the Turkish authorities who got wind of the script...

...got there ahead of us and managed to do a very good job--

Italy, we were gonna shoot in .

--Of making sure that permissions were withdrawn .

We ended up in Malta because it was run by an extraordinary...

...eccentric man called Dom M intoff...

...who wasn't gonna be told by the Turks about anything .

We were remarkably welcome in Malta...

...whereas we'd been literally...

...kind of eased off from our first-- I think our first three Iocations.

And although ...

...having been to Istanbul , it didn't Iook absolutely Istanbul ...

...it had that period feel ...

...that Istanbul has...

...and I found ...

...this yard , which was actually...

...a British Army storage facility.

I called up, and I said to Alan and Geoffrey:

"Get on a plane.

Come over here and have a Iook at this, and see what you think."

It was, architecturally, qu ite interesting .

It's kind of dusty, and it was made of this wonderful ...

...dirty, old , honey-coloured Iimestone. And it was--

It had seen better days.

It was rather shabby, and it was empty.

It was Iike a gigantic film studio that was ours.

And so I thought, "Well , this is a great space...

...in which to base the whole piece."

On the other hand , it didn't actually have a big open area, or kogus...

...where a lot of the scenes had been written for...

...and so we decided to build our own kogus...

...which we bu ilt with real Iimestone, intact...

...in the corner of the courtyard of this fort.

Geoffrey designed this building that--

He actually put a whole front onto an existing rear...

...so some of the Iittle cells and things were all in the original ...

...and then he built...

...the wash areas...

...and some other cells, and moulded them in perfectly...

...so it became like a real prison .

We built that, and it gave me staircases...

...and also the convenience to be able to shoot, really...

...and the whole crew could be in there.

It was a film set, really, and yet, it was made with real materials.

The cell block...

...that Hamidou comes down when he walks down the stairs...

...and beats Billy on the back with the baton ...

...that was all there.

It was-- Geoffrey obviously put in the iron ...

...the metal bars and stuff Iike that for pulling him u p...

...by his feet and stuff like that...

...but the actual Iocations, even when they go down into the--

Down the well , that is a real well .

We shot that for real . I nto the water, we shot that for real .

It was an amazing find .

When I first step onto the set at Malta, I was overwhelmed ...

...by the reality, for me, of, again , the Turkish guards with the uniforms...

...and the kids running around , and the dogs, and--

While it wasn't my particular prison , it was Istanbul , in a way.

It was other prisons that I had been in and seen and so on .

I didn't particularly Iike sitting on the bunk...

...in my cell , as it were.

That was a little too close. That was a little weird .

And then we went across the road to another facility...

...and found the wheel that they walked around in the wr--

He walked around in the wrong direction .

You must go the other way.

The arrest and the capture was--

And the bus ride were all done in Malta Airport.

We took over the airport.

I think we got it for two nights to shoot the scene.

They were very good . We had good help from the Maltese government...

...in allowing us to, ostensibly, close down the airport.

We just redressed it to Iook a little Iike Istanbul Airport...

...and shot the scenes.

I was Iucky when I started the film . I some had familiar faces around me.

Most importantly, of course, I had AIan Marshall and David Puttnam ...

...who were gonna be the hands-on producers there in Malta with me.

Peter Guber was in Los Angeles.

And also, I had-- AImost the entire crew...

...were people that I knew from making commercials...

...which I'd been doing for a few years before making the film.

They'd worked with me on Bugsy Malone.

The cinematographer, Michael Seresin , who is hugely important to me...

...Geoffrey Kirkland , production designer...

...and Gerry Hambling , the editor.

They had all worked with me...

...and , in fact, went on to do many, many films with me Iater.

So that, plus almost everybody, from the makeup and hair...

...to the first assistant director, had worked with me before.

It was kind of necessary, because it was pretty hard .

Going in , it was six-day weeks. Sometimes we did seven-day weeks.

It was a three-week period . Nobody got a day off...

...which was kind of hard , particularly as it's a very dark subject...

...and it-- Very humid and hot...

...filming in a prison .

It's not the best of things in an island , which is just really a rock...

...in the middle of the Mediterranean with two restaurants.

The bar at the H ilton was the only pleasure anybody had .

So we had Michael , and we had our operator...

...we had our focus pullers.

We knew everybody on the crew, and everybody came from the U . K.

The crew was very tight, very together.

It really was like a family.

And one of the things I like about making a film on an island ...

...is that it, particularly, some-- And I Iike Malta.

It's big enough to be able to be separate when you need to be...

...but it's small enough to make everything feel very familiar...

...you know? And ...

So therefore-- And everybody, everybody in the crew...

...to the humblest carpenter...

...was involved .

Everybody was involved in it.

And that was a great deal to do with Alan .

And Alan Marshall as well , you know.

They were very...

Brought everybody together.

That was what the Friday-evening party was all about, really.

And everyone was invited . Everybody went up to Alan's place.

And they're there till dawn .

Dancing . We danced and we danced and we sang and we danced ...

...and we drank, and we had a fantastic time.

Biggest challenge was, it was a depressing film to make.

You know, we were shooting in a prison .

And going to work there everyday I found awful , actually.

And we-- There was a kind of cu mulative depression ...

...that seem to build itself up, and it was very, very hard .

It was a brutal movie...

...so, in that respect, again , another, you know...

Sometimes the actors...

...got, shall I say, overzealous with their particular roles...

...but, you know, it--

Eventually, it--

It was a hard film ...

...because of the story line, because of the conditions...

...and it was very hot. We were working--

Malta gets very, very hot during the period of time that we were shooting ...

...so we were always in the 90s, and it was pretty stifling ...

...in some of these areas.

I say, "We worked Iike dogs, and we played hard ."

Great. I mean , it was a terrific experience.

We had absolute nightmare the first three days' rushes.

We'd all decided the film would be underlit and be very kind of murky.

And it so happened the first three days' rushes...

...were in jail sequences...

...and we just undercooked it...

...and they were too dark.

I would say something Iike two--

Two of the first three days were unusable.

And we were in the shit.

We managed to make sure the studio never saw them .

I , Iiterally, I'm afraid , sort of falsified production reports...

...to the sense that we were-- Keep going .

And with a sort of an enormous effort on the part of the crew...

...by the end of the second week, we caught up.

And the studio never knew that we had to reshoot a whole Iot of sequences.

Now, I would argue, today, it wouldn't happen ...

...because they'd have the rushes immediately, on--

Probably online.

Someone would be Iooking at them , and someone would be saying ...

...in a sheer panic, at the end of two days:

"Get rid of the cinematographer. Fire the--"

AII that stuff would be going on .

I n those days, you had , at Ieast, that kind of pause in the moment...

...to actually correct things.

And as a producer, I've always believed ...

...the first week will always be chaotic.

It cannot not be.

And you've only got the second week to sort it...

...because by the time you get into the beginning of the third week...

...you establish rhythms. Shooting rhythms. You establish patterns...

...which become almost all but impossible to break.

So your second week, for a producer, is your moment of crisis.

You either sort it or you bug it, really.

And I had both . I've sorted it...

...and I've also had times where I haven't sorted it, and we bug it.

And through an enormous effort of will , remarkable, actually--

I think we may have worked on the Saturday. Probably did .

--In a space of five, six, seven days...

...we managed to catch up two full days' shooting .

That was the closest thing to a real crisis.

The time was very different in the mid-'70s.

Today, you can stream the dailies.

Today, I could be sitting in this office, Iooking at the dailies...

...that are coming from UIaanbaatar stream to me...

...and I can look at them almost through the camera.

Back then , you had to Ioad the dailies on a horse and buggy...

...and you had to take them to the pier and put the sails u p...

...and sail them to London and get them printed .

If you wanted them brought to the States to Iook at them ...

...again , another courier would have to take them by plane...

...and land in Los Angeles, go through customs...

...and by the time you got them, the film was over.

You wanna make an adjustment? They've struck the set. The cast had--

Was into another movie. So it was very difficult.

I got sacked for three days haltway through the film ...

...because we were sending-- We were showing rushes to the studio.

And we sent them the scene in the shower, you know.

When Billy turns away.

And you know, this is 1 977.

That was felt to be too close the knuckle and--

"No one wants to watch a fucking gay movie. This is crazy."

You know, "You guys are nuts."

And I was fired .

Now, this was not quite as awful as it may sound .

I'd actually had enough of Malta by this time.

Six weeks of crappy food and depressing atmosphere.

I was fired all the way to Rome.

I sat in a hotel room in Rome for three days, waiting to be unfired .