The “very special filmmaker” Martin Scorsese recommended to Roger Corman
Martin Scorsese might just be the most well-known filmmaker of our current age.
Whether that’s down to the endearing TikToks he was forced to star in recently alongside his daughter, or because Margot Robbie’s performance in The Wolf of Wall Street will always be one of the greatest displays of on-screen charisma, magnetism, and star quality in this century, is anybody’s guess. But the fact of the matter is: if Scorsese talks, you listen.
A recommendation between friends can be the catalyst for an entirely new passion. After all, don’t we forge greater connections when there’s a shared interest to carry a bond from happy acquaintances into a real, trusted friendship? If the local postman recommends you a 1990s body horror, you might guffaw and close the curtains come every delivery day. If your friend recommends the same film at the pub, you might put it on that very night, intrigued as to what it reveals about your friendship, your tastes, art, and yourself in general.
The Silence of the Lambs filmmaker Roger Corman was lucky enough to exist in Scorsese’s immediate orbit, and thus was permitted a recommendation or two from the genius behind Taxi Driver. And when Scorsese was asked, he knew just the guy. Scorsese previously revealed, “When Roger Corman called me to ask if I had any young directors I could recommend, I immediately thought of Jonathan Kaplan.”
Scorsese continued, “He started for Roger with Night Call Nurses, worked his way up to Truck Turner with Isaac Hayes (produced by Roger’s brother Gene), then he moved on to make a series of excellent pictures including Over the Edge, Heart Like a Wheel, and The Accused, for which Jodie Foster won an Oscar.”
In this case, the recommendation was the one thing that led to the rest of Kaplan’s life. He finished his classes with Scorsese at NYU and moved to Los Angeles to take part in what his daughter would call the “Roger Corman school of filmmaking”.
Kaplan wowed audiences with his first work for Corman, the sex comedy Night Call Nurses. Subsequently, throughout the 1970s, he would direct seven more features, including The Student Teachers, The Slam, Truck Turner, and White Line Fever.
Scorsese also noted that the young Kaplan had a real zest for cinema. He named Kaplan as “one of the most passionate” of his students, alongside Allan Arkush, Jon Davison, and Joe Dante. He added, ” I liked Jonathan so much as a person, and early on I could see that he was quite a filmmaker — his student picture Stanley was really striking.”
Scorsese couldn’t think of enough kind words to describe his once student. When Kaplan died in August of this year, Scorsese was gutted. “It really saddens me to know that Jonathan is gone. He was a very special filmmaker and a wonderful human being,” the Killers of the Flower Moon director lamented. At least Kaplan and Corman, who also passed in 2024 at the age of 98, will be together again, some place far from here.
