Kubrick's 'Dr. Strangelove' Rules for Trusting Your Gut

I don't know about you all, but my household was all over that Complete Kubrick collection from Criterion when it was announced. And it is beautiful. All of Stanley Kubrick in gorgeous 4K? Say less.

But now we're getting even more Kubrick in the form of TCM's podcast, The Plot Thickens, which is wholly focused on the auteur this season. The newest episode came out this week and focuses on Dr. Strangelove, but the whole season has been a delight so far (including stories of Kirk Douglas and Kubrick clashing over Spartacus).

In February 1959, Kubrick is in the middle of a poker hand with $3,000 on the table when Kirk Douglas calls to offer him the sword-and-sandal epic. Douglas has just fired Anthony Mann and is offering $150,000. It became a fraught production from there. Douglas ignored Kubrick's script notes and sided with Dalton Trumbo, so the finished film basically belonged to Douglas. They even fought on set.

Dr. Strangelove was Kubrick's first studio film as both director and sole producer. It also grew out of his nuclear fear, which was strong enough that he nearly moved his family to Australia.

Actor Sterling Hayden is quoted on the episode.

"I remember Stanley said to me in London, he said, with that little twinkle he gets in his eye, with a cigarette drooping in one corner of his mouth, he said, 'For the first time,' he said, 'I'm doing precisely what I want to do with nobody else, nobody.'"

You can listen in full below, but we've also pulled our favorite lessons, which include what writers and directors can learn from how Kubrick made decisions once he had full control, from the script to the set to the edit.

- YouTube youtu.be

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