The nightmare shoot that made Steven Spielberg wish he was on drugs: “A very bad experience”
Even though he burst onto the scene during the ‘New Hollywood’ era when such practices weren’t only the norm but encouraged from peer-to-peer, Steven Spielberg abstained from the drug and alcohol-fueled excesses of the era that so many of his contemporaries revelled in.
Whether it was actors, writers, directors, or producers, the 1970s were a hedonistic time in Hollywood where cocaine and champagne flowed like fine wine. Some of the most famous names of the era loved to party almost as much as they loved to crank out classic films, but Spielberg was always career-focused.
Ever since he was a kid, all he wanted to do was direct motion pictures. Once he managed to wedge his foot in the door, it was only a matter of time before the precocious wunderkind reached the top. That didn’t happen until Jaws changed the face of cinema in the summer of 1975, and it was hardly the easiest path to the summit for the wide-eyed youngster.
The future three-time Academy Award winner and highest-grossing director of all time cut his teeth on television, debuting with the middle segment in the three-part anthology horror Night Gallery, penned by The Twilight Zone creator Rod Serling.
“The script was terrible,” Spielberg admitted, with ‘Eyes’ starring Joan Crawford as a wealthy blind woman who blackmails a doctor into performing an illegal operation that gifts her with the peepers of a gambling addict who’s fallen on hard times. Still, all he wanted to do was direct: “I would have done anything. I would have shot the Universal directory if I had to.”
Even if he had the greatest screenplay in the world, Spielberg was still a 22-year-old rookie who’d never helmed a major production before, and he was the youngest person on set by far. He was anxious, nervous, terrified, and lacking in confidence, leading him to reveal that if he shared the proclivities associated with the time period, he’d have sought the sweet relief of medication, legal or otherwise.
“I don’t take drugs,” he clarified. “I never have. Or I would have used every drug under and over the counter at that time. That show put me through dire straits. It was good discipline, but a very bad experience.” It was a baptism by fire, especially when he had to win over the notoriously tetchy Crawford, and yet, Spielberg somehow managed to emerge unscathed on the other side.
For someone as straight-laced and generally wholesome as Spielberg to effectively say, “If I used drugs, I would have been rubbered out of my cupboard for the entire shoot” underlines just how much he struggled, and it was definitely in his best interests not to dabble for the first time when making his directorial debut.
Staying away from the pharmacy or illicit drug den was the right call, with ‘Eyes’ laying the groundwork for what would become one of the industry’s greatest-ever careers.
