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A script written by Anthony Shaffer and starring a horror icon and Edward Woodward was expected to be an ideal venture for filmmaker Robin Hardy while the filming of The Wicker Man over 50 years ago.

Even though today it is celebrated as an iconic horror film, the extent of misery it caused the production team has now been revealed in previously unpublished correspondence and script drafts.

The Storyline of This Classic Film

This 1973 movie revolves around a devout policeman, played by the actor, who arrives on an isolated Scottish isle looking for a lost child, but finds mysterious pagan residents who claim she ever existed. the actress appeared as an innkeeper’s sexually liberated daughter, who seduces the religious policeman, with Lee as the pagan aristocrat.

Creative Tensions Revealed

However, the working environment was tense and fractious, according to the letters. In a message to Shaffer, the director stated: “How could you handle me this way?”

The screenwriter had already made his name with masterpieces such as Sleuth, but his typed draft of The Wicker Man shows the director’s harsh edits to his work.

Extensive crossings-out feature Summerisle’s lines in the final scene, which would have begun: “The child was but the tip of the iceberg – the visible element. Do not reproach yourself, there was no way for you to know.”

Apart from Writer and Director

Tensions boiled over beyond the main pair. One of the producers commented: “The writer’s skill has been offset by a self-indulgence that drove him to prove himself too clever by half.”

In a letter to the producers, the director expressed frustration about the film’s editor, Eric Boyd-Perkins: “I believe he likes the theme or approach of the film … and thinks that he is tired of it.”

In a correspondence, Lee referred to the movie as “appealing and mysterious”, even with “having to cope with a garrulous producer, a stressed screenwriter and an overpaid and hostile director”.

Lost Documents Uncovered

A large collection of letters relating to the production was part of multiple bags of documents left in the loft of the former home of Hardy’s third wife, his wife. There were also unpublished drafts, visual plans, production photos and financial accounts, which show the struggles faced by the team.

The director’s children Justin and Dominic, currently in their sixties, used the material for a forthcoming book, titled Children of The Wicker Man. The book uncovers the extreme pressures on the director during the production of the movie – from his heart attack to bankruptcy.

Family Fallout

At first, the film was a box office flop and, following of its failure, the director left his spouse and their children for a fresh start in America. Legal letters show his wife as the film’s uncredited executive producer and that he owed her up to a large sum. She had to give up their house and passed away in 1984, in her fifties, battling alcoholism, never knowing that her film later turned into a global hit.

His son, a Bafta-nominated historian film-maker, called The Wicker Man as “the film that ruined our family”.

When someone reached out by a resident living in his mother’s old house, inquiring if he wished to collect the documents, his initial reaction was to propose destroying “the bloody things”.

But then he and his stepbrother Dominic opened up the bags and realised the importance of what they held.

Revelations from the Documents

His brother, a scholar, commented: “All the big players are in there. We found the first draft by the writer, but with dad’s annotations as filmmaker, ‘containing’ the writer’s excess. Due to his legal background, Shaffer tended to overwrite and dad just went ‘cut, cut, cut’. They sort of respected each other and hated each other.”

Compiling the publication has brought some “resolution”, Justin said.

Financial Hardships

His family never benefited monetarily from the film, he added: “The bloody film has gone on to make a fortune for other people. It’s beyond a joke. His father accepted five grand. So he never received any of the upside. Christopher Lee never received payment from it either, although that he did his role for no pay, to leave his previous studio. So, in many ways, it’s been a harsh experience.”