Цитатник Англофила по выходным - 28: Письма Стэнли Кубрика
Британский телеканал More4 с 15 по 25 июля показывает "Сезон Стэнли Кубрика" ("Stanley Kubrick Season"), приуроченный к 80-летию со дня рождения выдающегося кинорежиссера. Сезон этот открылся показом документального фильма "Stanley Kubrick's Boxes". Название фильма - это отсылка к тем 100 ящикам с документами, которые вдова Кубрика передала (безвозмездно) лондонскому University of the Arts, где этот The Stanley Kubrick Archive теперь и находится, доступный для изучения.
А в прошлое воскресенье я обнаружил в газете Sunday Telegraph четырехстраничную вкладку с заголовком The Stanley Kubrick files. Публикация включала обширное интервью с вдовой Кубрика Christiane, фотогалерею (откуда я и позаимствовал кадр из "Лолиты" и фото мастера, сделанное примерно в те годы), а также подборку писем режиссера (обнаруженных в тех самых boxes). В данной цитатной рубрике я приведу три письма, относящиеся к периоду работы Кубрика над фильмом "Лолита": одно - адресованное ему Лоуренсом Оливье с объяснением мотивов отказа сниматься в главной роли, второе - Питеру Устинову (которого он рассматривал в качестве кандидата на эту самую роль после отказа Оливье), и наконец третье - исполнительному продюсеру фильма с объяснением мотивов отказа сделать фильм более пикантным. Ну а другие письма, охватывающие 40-летний период, можно почитать по приведенной ссылке.
The letters of Stanley Kubrick
LOLITA, 1962
(with James Mason as Humbert and Sue Lyon as Lolita)
Olivier, who had originally agreed to star as Professor Humbert Humbert if he could co-write the script, pulls out of the entire project.
December 15, 1959 To Stanley Kubrick from Laurence Olivier
Having scrutinised the book curiously and intensely during the last week I do not feel my mind grasping a film conception of the subject and I therefore don’t feel that I can very well bear the onus of the responsibility of partnership in the script of a subject concerning which strong doubts are so uppermost in my mind. These doubts come from a conviction that the chief merit in the book lies in the author’s brilliant original and witty descriptive powers and I can’t see how this particular virtue is photographable. I fear that told in terms of dialogue the subject would be reduced to the level of pornography to which I’m afraid quite a few people already consign it. I could not guarantee to myself that I would be much use in getting it right and therefore cannot feel that I should guarantee to you that I would play the part whatever happened. Full of admiration as I am for the book my faith in it as a film subject is shaky.
Kubrick outlines the project to Peter Ustinov, perhaps with a view to casting…
May 20, 1960 To Peter Ustinov
I think the most important thing to say about Lolita is that it is a love story. A sad tender eventually heart-breaking story of passion-love. Humbert’s love is a passion-love. It is in the tradition of the middle ages, the tradition of courtly love, a love that is at once scandalous, masochistic and tortured. It is a very different love than the modern ideal, where the values are placed in “maturity”, “togetherness” and “health”. The literal meaning of the word passion will quickly suggest how far from the modern ideal it is. The passion-lover is sick with his love. His passion fills his entire being to the total exclusion of everything else. He expects his mistress to make him suffer and submits willingly to her cruelty and enslavement... the censorship thing does not concern me very much. The film will be fairly innocent as far as what the eye will see.
And Kubrick shows that he is against “sexing up” the film for more liberal European audiences.
October 3, 1961 To Eliot Hyman, Lolita’s executive producer
Dear Eliot, RE: Addition Humbert crawling into bed segment. Needless to say the confusion and chances for screw-ups don’t seem to balance the questionable gain of the sequence. The people who will be disappointed that Lolita is not a filthy picture with slobber love scenes, semi-nudity and outrageous postures will not be appeased, while on the other hand there are some people who will be horrified, shocked and offended by this sequence which is not in the same genre of the film. Artistically it contributes nothing that would otherwise be lacking. I would strongly recommend that we drop the idea.
The Kubrick Site
А в прошлое воскресенье я обнаружил в газете Sunday Telegraph четырехстраничную вкладку с заголовком The Stanley Kubrick files. Публикация включала обширное интервью с вдовой Кубрика Christiane, фотогалерею (откуда я и позаимствовал кадр из "Лолиты" и фото мастера, сделанное примерно в те годы), а также подборку писем режиссера (обнаруженных в тех самых boxes). В данной цитатной рубрике я приведу три письма, относящиеся к периоду работы Кубрика над фильмом "Лолита": одно - адресованное ему Лоуренсом Оливье с объяснением мотивов отказа сниматься в главной роли, второе - Питеру Устинову (которого он рассматривал в качестве кандидата на эту самую роль после отказа Оливье), и наконец третье - исполнительному продюсеру фильма с объяснением мотивов отказа сделать фильм более пикантным. Ну а другие письма, охватывающие 40-летний период, можно почитать по приведенной ссылке.
The letters of Stanley Kubrick
LOLITA, 1962
(with James Mason as Humbert and Sue Lyon as Lolita)
Olivier, who had originally agreed to star as Professor Humbert Humbert if he could co-write the script, pulls out of the entire project.
December 15, 1959 To Stanley Kubrick from Laurence Olivier
Having scrutinised the book curiously and intensely during the last week I do not feel my mind grasping a film conception of the subject and I therefore don’t feel that I can very well bear the onus of the responsibility of partnership in the script of a subject concerning which strong doubts are so uppermost in my mind. These doubts come from a conviction that the chief merit in the book lies in the author’s brilliant original and witty descriptive powers and I can’t see how this particular virtue is photographable. I fear that told in terms of dialogue the subject would be reduced to the level of pornography to which I’m afraid quite a few people already consign it. I could not guarantee to myself that I would be much use in getting it right and therefore cannot feel that I should guarantee to you that I would play the part whatever happened. Full of admiration as I am for the book my faith in it as a film subject is shaky.
Kubrick outlines the project to Peter Ustinov, perhaps with a view to casting…
May 20, 1960 To Peter Ustinov
I think the most important thing to say about Lolita is that it is a love story. A sad tender eventually heart-breaking story of passion-love. Humbert’s love is a passion-love. It is in the tradition of the middle ages, the tradition of courtly love, a love that is at once scandalous, masochistic and tortured. It is a very different love than the modern ideal, where the values are placed in “maturity”, “togetherness” and “health”. The literal meaning of the word passion will quickly suggest how far from the modern ideal it is. The passion-lover is sick with his love. His passion fills his entire being to the total exclusion of everything else. He expects his mistress to make him suffer and submits willingly to her cruelty and enslavement... the censorship thing does not concern me very much. The film will be fairly innocent as far as what the eye will see.
And Kubrick shows that he is against “sexing up” the film for more liberal European audiences.
October 3, 1961 To Eliot Hyman, Lolita’s executive producer
Dear Eliot, RE: Addition Humbert crawling into bed segment. Needless to say the confusion and chances for screw-ups don’t seem to balance the questionable gain of the sequence. The people who will be disappointed that Lolita is not a filthy picture with slobber love scenes, semi-nudity and outrageous postures will not be appeased, while on the other hand there are some people who will be horrified, shocked and offended by this sequence which is not in the same genre of the film. Artistically it contributes nothing that would otherwise be lacking. I would strongly recommend that we drop the idea.
The Kubrick Site