The director Kirk Douglas called a bastard: “We had lots of fights”
Professional tensions can often lead to excellent results on-screen, which was very much the case for an adversarial relationship that spanned years and ended up handing Kirk Douglas two of his greatest movies and most memorable roles.
One of the biggest stars of Hollywood’s ‘Golden Age’, Douglas was also among the first A-listers who sought to broaden their horizons by taking control of their own destiny. He founded independent production company Bryna Productions in 1949, which gave him greater freedom to dictate his own career.
Having been suitably impressed by The Killing, Douglas played an integral part in making Paths of Glory a reality. Although Stanley Kubrick had already purchased the rights to the novel and written a screenplay, almost every major studio had turned down his offer to make it into a feature film.
However, when the script caught Douglas’ attention he signed on to play the lead role and help produce, as well as getting the film set up at United Artists, who’d distributed all but one of Bryna’s first five features. The end result was arguably the genesis of what would soon become Kubrick’s signature style, and they’d reunite for the filmmaker’s next project.
They regularly butted heads on Paths of Glory after disagreeing on the narrative and thematic direction of the film, so it was almost inevitable the same thing would happen again on Spartacus. After exhausting himself shooting the title character’s crucifixion scene, Douglas was left enraged after Kubrick attempted to remove the majority of the actor’s closeups, where he ended up throwing a chair at the director.
Kubrick also hated the iconic “I am Spartacus” scene, and the pair ended up arguing so often and getting so worked up that by Douglas’ own admission, his wife suggested they attend therapy together to try and smooth over their issues. Funnily enough, they never worked together again after that, but the legendary star would never be foolish enough to let the bad blood detract from his frenemy’s talents.
Not that he wouldn’t acknowledge the reputation that followed Kubrick throughout his days, as he explained to Variety. “Difficult? He invented the word. But he was talented. So we had lots of fights, but I appreciated his talent,” he offered before doubling down on his appraisal. “He was a bastard! But he was a talented, talented guy.”
The line between genius and madness has often been described as a very thin one that’s borderline imperceptible to the human eye, and there are few auteurs in cinema history to have lived up to that sentiment more than Kubrick. He and Douglas made magic together, but the danger that things would boil over into confrontation was always bubbling just underneath the surface.
