“Fiercely unpretentious”: Stanley Kubrick’s surprising list of favourite TV shows
Known for his cinematic mastery and grand cinematic scope, few filmmakers can compare to Stanley Kubrick, the fascinating mind behind such baffling classics as 2001: A Space Odyssey and A Clockwork Orange. Despite passing away back in 1999, shortly before the release of his final film, Eyes Wide Shut, his work remains a benchmark of quality that every 21st-century director has strived to match.
If anyone has achieved such heights of cinematic scope and narrative ambition, only two candidates come to mind: Paul Thomas Anderson and Denis Villeneuve. While the former is known for his intricate and deeply human tales like There Will Be Blood, which is reminiscent of classic Hollywood flicks, the latter matches the scale of a Kubrick film, with Dune: Part II having shades of 2001’s size.
As one of cinema’s most influential minds, it’s no surprise that his own inspirations are rather eclectic, pulling from a wide range of sources from across the world when listing his favourite movies of all time. Inspired greatly by European cinema, Kubrick praises the likes of Federico Fellini and Ingmar Bergman, gushing over the beauty and virtuosity inherent within each of their respective films that would change the texture of cinema across the continent.
Naturally, then, you’d expect his favourite TV shows to reflect this same range of tastes. However, it seems as though the opposite is true, with the master filmmaker considering TV as a far different medium to that of cinema. Despite his stature in the industry, writer Michael Herr, who co-wrote Kubrick’s 1987 Vietnam War movie Full Metal Jacket, called the director “fiercely unpretentious”.
Penning a personal reflection on the filmmaker in Vanity Fair, Herr recalled that, in the years that followed Kubrick’s departure from the USA in 1968, the director “had relatives and friends send him tapes of American television—N.F.L. games, the Johnny Carson show, news broadcasts, and commercials, which he thought were, in their way, the most interesting films being made”.
Clearly a little homesick for the country he had left behind, Kubrick indulged in some of America’s greatest sitcoms, with Herr recalling, “He was crazy about The Simpsons and Seinfeld, and he loved Roseanne,” explaining that the Clockwork Orange director thought “It was funny and, he believed, the most authentic view of the country you could get without actually living there”.
Herr’s words about the director would eventually wind up in Kubrick’s personal biography in 2000, with the pair becoming close friends shortly before the latter’s death in 1999.
Take a look at The Simpsons’ tribute to the great filmmaker and most unlikely greatest fan in the video below.
Stanley Kubrick’s favourite TV shows:
- Roseanne (Matt Williams, 1998-2018)
- Seinfeld (Larry David, Jerry Seinfeld, 1989-1998)
- The Simpsons (James L. Brooks, Matt Groening, Sam Simon, 1989 -)
- The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson (Bobby Quinn, 1962-1992)
