MovieChat Forums > Cradle Will Rock (2000) Discussion > Orson Welles actually wrote the script

Orson Welles actually wrote the script

posted 16 years ago by mandrake62
4 replies | jump to latest

Orson Welles was trying to get this script produced back in the 80s. There is a famous story about Welles being turned down by Steven Spielberg. Welles even pandered a bit by offering to include Amy Irving (Spielberg's girlfriend at that time) in the film. Later Spielberg paid $50,000 the remaining prop sled (Rosebud) from the Welles film Citizen Kane. Welles commented bitterly that Spielberg would pay $50,000 for that old prop but not for his original script (Cradle Will Rock).

Robbin's seems to have been given full credit for the script due to some technicality in the Writers Guild rules for assigning credit. Does anyone know more about this?

[–] fshepinc 15 years ago

Orson Welles wrote a script for a film version of the Marc Blitzstein musical, The Cradle Will Rock, and was unsuccessful in getting it produced. The Tim Robbins film does not use any of Welles' script, so the lack of a credit for Welles is not a technicality -it's the simple truth. Tim Robbins wrote the screenplay for his film, incorporating snippets of Blitzstein's work, which are duly credited at the end of the film.

Some of the confusion stems from the title. The original musical was called The Cradle Will Rock. The title of the Robbins film is Cradle Will Rock (no "the").
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[–] netshopper-2 13 years ago

Is it the same story or same themes?

[–] BestOfAllPossible 13 years ago

The story in the Tim Robbins movie is based on actual events surrounding the original production and performance of Marc Blitztein's musical The Cradle Will Rock. Orson Welles was the original director of that musical. He then adapted the script from the musical (which you see pieces of in the Tim Robbins film) for a movie. The movie he presented to Spielberg was a film of the Blitztein musical which the Tim Robbins film is about.

[–] Can_a_bitch_get_a_donut 10 years ago

The film is not based on Orson Welles's script The Cradle Will Rock, which was to be an autobiographical account of the play's production. It went into pre-production in 1983 with Rupert Everett on board to play Welles before the backers pulled out and the production collapsed.[2]

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