How ‘The Color Purple’ became Steven Spielberg’s biggest challenge: “My heart beating at Mach 2”
One of the many reasons why Steven Spielberg is one of the finest movie makers in history is his ability to take on not just enormous, family favourite blockbusters but also incredibly thoughtful, moving dramas – and do so to equal success and critical acclaim.
If director credits weren’t a thing you would be hard pressed to know that the man who directed ET, Raiders of the Lost Ark and Jaws is also the man who directed Schindler’s List, Lincoln and Amistad, but so deft is Spielberg at moving between genres, so deep is his understanding of cinema and audience, that he does it without issue.
In the mid-1980s, Spielberg was already world-renowned and riding the wave of a succession of iconic box office hits, including the Indiana Jones series and ET, plus he had also written the horror smash Poltergeist, produced the creature feature Gremlins and the action adventure The Goonies. He was in full ‘everything he touches turns to gold’ mode.
So to say it was something of a surprise that in 1985 he decided to direct a harrowing story of racism and incest set in the deep south of America in the early 1900s would be putting it mildly. A period drama adapted from a novel published three years earlier, it made a star out of its leading lady in Whoopi Goldberg, featured Oprah Winfrey and Lethal Weapon’s Danny Glover and was nominated for eleven Academy Awards, including ‘Best Picture’.
Spielberg, perhaps knowing he might struggle to be taken seriously with his background of summer blockbusters, brought in Quincy Jones to co-produce and to write the musical score, breaking tradition with Jaws and ET’s John Williams. Spielberg also waived his multi-million dollar salary and took the industry union minimum of $40,000 instead in recognition of the film’s difficult subject matter.
At the time of making the movie, Spielberg explained: “The Color Purple is the biggest challenge of my career. When I read it I loved it; I cried and cried at the end. But I didn’t think I would ever develop it as a project. Finally I said, ‘I’ve got to do this for me. I want to make something that might not be everybody’s favourite but, this year at least, is my favourite.’”
Spielberg, a film obsessive in his early years who was a devout student of movie-making from a teen, also referenced one of the greats in his reasoning behind why the film was such an undertaking for someone like him who had previously worked with more popular and accessible stories.
He added: “The Color Purple is the kind of character piece that a director like (12 Angry Men and Serpico director) Sidney Lumet could do brilliantly with one hand tied behind his back. But I’m going into it with both eyes wide open and my heart beating at Mach 2.”
On release, the film was another massive success for Spielberg, who could seemingly do no wrong. Aside from critical acclaim, it brought in almost ten times its budget at the box office and added another sizable string to Spielberg’s bow – allowing the public to trust him with far more serious material and laying the foundation to his directing the likes of war movie Saving Private Ryan and the slave ship epic Amistad. Another version of The Color Purple, a musical with Spielberg as a producer, was released in 2023.
Spielberg hasn’t directed a film since his autobiographical effort The Fablemans that same year. Still, he is due to direct an episode of a forthcoming TV mini-series about the life of Napoleon Bonaparte. He will have involvement in a project based on the character Steve McQueen played in the classic 1968 movie Bullitt.
