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A script written by Anthony Shaffer and featuring Christopher Lee and the lead actor was expected to be an ideal venture for filmmaker Robin Hardy while the filming of The Wicker Man more than half a century ago.

Although today it is revered as a cult horror masterpiece, the degree of turmoil it brought the film-makers has now been uncovered in newly discovered correspondence and script drafts.

The Storyline of The Wicker Man

This 1973 movie revolves around a puritan police officer, played by Edward Woodward, who travels on an isolated Scottish isle in search of a lost child, but finds sinister local pagans who claim she ever existed. Britt Ekland appeared as the daughter of a local innkeeper, who tempts the religious policeman, with Christopher Lee as Lord Summerisle.

Production Conflict Revealed

But the creative atmosphere was tense and contentious, according to the letters. In a letter to Shaffer, the director stated: “How could you treat me like this?”

The screenwriter was already famous with acclaimed works like Sleuth, but his typed draft of The Wicker Man reveals the director’s harsh edits to his work.

Extensive crossings-out include Summerisle’s lines in the final scene, originally starting: “The girl was but the tip of the iceberg – the part that showed. Do not reproach yourself, there was no way for you to know.”

Beyond Writer and Director

Tensions boiled over beyond the writer and director. A producer commented: “The writer’s skill was marred by a self-indulgence that drove him to show he was overly smart.”

In a note to the producers, the director expressed frustration about the film’s editor, Eric Boyd-Perkins: “I believe he likes the theme or style of the film … and thinks that he has had enough of it.”

In a correspondence, Christopher Lee referred to the film as “alluring and mysterious”, even with “having to cope with a talkative producer, an underpaid and harassed writer and an overpaid and hostile director”.

Forgotten Papers Found

A large collection of letters about the production was among six sack-loads of documents left in the loft of the former home of the director’s spouse, Caroline. There were also previously unseen scripts, visual plans, production photos and financial accounts, which show the struggles faced by the film-makers.

The director’s children Justin and Dominic, currently in their sixties, have drawn on the material for a forthcoming book, titled Children of The Wicker Man. The book uncovers the intense stress faced by the director throughout the production of the movie – including a health crisis to bankruptcy.

Personal Fallout

At first, the movie failed commercially and, following of its failure, Hardy abandoned his spouse and his family for a fresh start in the US. Legal letters reveal his wife as the film’s uncredited executive producer and that he was indebted to her as much as £1m in today’s money. She was forced to sell their house and passed away in the 1980s, in her fifties, battling alcoholism, unaware that her film eventually became an international success.

Justin, a Bafta-nominated historian film-maker, described The Wicker Man as “the movie that messed up our family”.

When someone reached out by a resident who had moved into the former family home, inquiring if he wished to retrieve the documents, his first thought was to suggest burning “the bloody things”.

But afterward he and his brother examined the sacks and understood the importance of what they held.

Revelations from the Documents

His brother, a scholar, commented: “Every key figure are in there. We found an original script by Shaffer, but with dad’s annotations as director, ‘controlling’ the writer’s excess. Because he was formerly a barrister, he tended to overwrite and his father just went ‘cut, cut, cut’. They sort of loved each other and hated each other.”

Writing the book has brought some “closure”, Justin stated.

Financial Struggles

His family never benefited monetarily from the film, he explained: “The bloody film has gone on to make so much money for others. It’s beyond a joke. His father accepted five grand. So he never received the profits. The actor never received any money from it either, despite the fact that he did his role for no pay, to get out of his previous studio. Therefore, it was a harsh experience.”