For two decades, writer/director James Bridges and his films zeroed in on events and emotions that were affecting America. Yet while elements of his films have become enshrined in our cultural lexicon, and his name graces one of the screening rooms at UCLA where he once taught, awareness of the films themselves and his auteurship has dissipated in the decades since his untimely death from cancer at 57 in 1993. Throughout this first half of November, the New Beverly is bringing his films back to reacquaint audiences with one of the more empathetic observers of a generation.
Arkansas-born James Bridges made his way to Hollywood in 1956 with acting aspirations, and amassed small roles in genre fare before switching focus to writing after meeting actor/producer Norman Lloyd. Bridges would adapt several short suspense stories for “Alfred Hitchcock Presents,” which led to a 1963 Emmy nomination for his take on Ray Bradbury’s “The Jar,” and a 1966 Edgar award for scripting “An Unlocked Window.” (Anyone who’s seen that classic episode to this day still must get chills upon hearing, “You’re such a pretty nurse, Rita.”) His first directing job was a 1966 stage production of The Candied House, written by his lifetime companion Jack Larson. After scripting well-received projects as The Appaloosa and Colossus: the Forbin Project, Bridges would make his first feature in 1970, The Baby Maker, from his own original screenplay. He would direct 7 more films and pen 4 for others during his career.
Bridges on Unwanted Prophecy
Our tribute begins with Bridges’ fourth and most lauded film, 1979’s The China Syndrome, on Friday, November 5th & Saturday, November 6th. Writing in collaboration with T.S. Cook and documentarian Mike Gray, Bridges imagined a cautionary tale about the safety of nuclear power plants and the corporate impulse to publicly deny dangerous conditions, modeled on events that happened in the Dresden plant outside Chicago. Initially, several pundits for the industry decried the film’s assertions as fiction and slander. Twelve days after its release, the Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania suffered a partial meltdown and resultant radiation leak that mirrored the film’s fears, and increased public interest in seeing it. Walter Cronkite expressed interest in interviewing Bridges on the convergence, but the publicity-shy director declined, not wishing to give the appearance of using a national disaster to promote himself. The China Syndrome would go on to be nominated for the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, and receive 5 Academy Award nominations, including Best Actor for Jack Lemmon and Best Actress for Jane Fonda.
Bridges on Destructive Quests
Monday, November 8th offers two mid-’80s Bridges stories, each in their own ways about characters pursuing a greater unknown that could very well lead to their own downfall. In Mike’s Murder from 1984, an ordinary woman (Debra Winger) who maintains sporadic contact with a former fling learns he has been murdered after he reached out to her for help, and in the course of piecing together the life he kept hidden from her, she becomes vulnerable to the same darkness that consumed him. And in Perfect from 1985, a reporter for Rolling Stone (John Travolta) has spent so much time delivering dirt on the beautiful people, that when he becomes enamored of a wary aerobics instructor (Jamie Lee Curtis), even as he tries to help tell her truth to the world, he is likely only abetting another betrayal. Both films feature music from great artists of the ‘80s: John Barry provides score for Mike’s Murder while songs and compositions by Joe Jackson (who had completely scored an earlier edit of the film) play throughout, and Perfect offers high-energy hits from Jermaine Jackson, The Pointer Sisters, Wham!, and other MTV faves.
Bridges on Life Crossroads
Tuesday, November 9th & Wednesday, November 10th show the bookends of Bridges’ directorial career, his 1970 debut The Baby Maker, and his 1988 finale Bright Lights, Big City. On paper, they are a study in contrasts – Maker was an original screenplay inspired by an acquaintance of his, whereas Bright Lights was a best-seller adaptation initially set up with Smooth Talk writer/director Joyce Chopra, who was unceremoniously dropped by the studio after a week of shooting, with Bridges hired in a rush to rework the project before an impending DGA strike. However, the films ultimately prove to have their own interesting symmetry. Maker presents a loose-living hippie (Barbara Hershey) who must seriously reassess her choices when she agrees to carry a child for an affluent couple. And Bright Lights covers a week in the odyssey of a New York magazine fact-checker (Michael J. Fox) addicted to the good life, as his imploding relationships and buried trauma send him to his own point of reckoning. Both films even feature an irresponsible confidante of their protagonists named Tad! The films are also vibrant snapshots of their production eras, with Maker featuring psychedelic visuals from the Single Wing Turquoise Bird light show collective, and Bright Lights pulsing with a thumping soundtrack of ‘80s dance music from Prince, New Order, Depeche Mode, Bryan Ferry, and M/A/R/R/S.
Bridges as Cultural Influencer
Just in time to get a jump on the weekend, Thursday, November 11th, serves up Bridges’ arguably most impactful film, 1980’s Urban Cowboy. After the phenomenal success of John Badham’s Saturday Night Fever, Paramount sought to find another project that could put John Travolta in a setting full of music and local color, and like that earlier film, this screenplay was borne from a lifestyle article about working class types finding escape and drama at a nightclub, in this instance country star Mickey Gilley’s huge namesake venue in Pasadena, Texas. And again, toxic masculinity, marginal fame, and upward mobility are the dominant themes, as Travolta’s oil worker rushes into marriage, and just as quickly sees it deteriorate from his jealousy and competitive nature, while attempting to be the best mechanical bull rider at the honky tonk. While Cowboy was not the box office smash that Fever was, it was one of the Top 15 hits of the year, increased sales of western-themed fashion, inspired hundreds of bars and roadhouses to install their own mechanical bull rides, and its soundtrack album spawned 6 Billboard Top 40 hits, 3 of which also went to #1 on the Billboard Country chart.
Bridges as Open Book
James Bridges almost never gave interviews during his life; as Jack Larson told the Los Angeles Times in 2011, “He said the films speak for themselves.” But to close out our tribute, on Tuesday, November 16th & Wednesday, November 17th, we’re pairing his second and third films, each of which offer a glimmer of insight into the quiet creator. 1973’s The Paper Chase was adapted by Bridges from legal scholar John Jay Osborn Jr.’s fictional memoir of student life at Harvard Law School, and featured stage producer John Houseman as the imperious Professor Kingsfield, a performance that won Houseman an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, and made the onetime Orson Welles associate a familiar presence in film, television, and commercials to the end of his life. Houseman had been an early supporter of Bridges, seconding his hiring for the Alfred Hitchcock television series, and his presence in the film, particularly as the subject of rebuke from its protagonist, suggests a polarity of respect vs. personal rebellion, as the young filmmaker was making his own way in a new era. 1977’s September 30, 1955, addresses the date of the untimely death of James Dean, and how it directly impacts young super fan Jimmy J. (Richard Thomas), a college student in Conway, Arkansas, a character that Bridges acknowledged was modeled on himself and his own snap decision to move to Hollywood in the wake of Dean’s passing. And similar to Paper, in a bit of returning a favor through casting, Collin Wilcox, who had memorably appeared in the Bridges-scripted “The Jar” on “The Alfred Hitchcock Hour”, plays Jimmy’s mother.
Take some time to visit with the filmography of James Bridges, and his stories of big thoughts and hard choices, this November at the New Beverly.
