The Monkey King Script

Dr. Gonzo

New member
Hehehe... in that previous thread you just posted, a young Dr. Gonzo took some pictures on that last page that I forgot about...

Glad I wasn't "employed" back then.
 

Udvarnoky

Well-known member
Props on the ongoing archeology, Moedred. Every little bit counts.

You know, if Lucasfilm/Disney would just release all these unused screenplays in a handsome bound volume...I can guarantee them no less than like seven sales. They should really get on that.

Incidentally, looking at that script page, shouldn't there be a bullet point above Chris Columbus to account for whatever treatment/draft Diane Thomas turned in for Lucas for the "haunted castle" idea? I don't know if she ever actually contributed a complete screenplay before her death (or whenever Lucas pulled the plug on the concept when it was clear it wasn't turning Spielberg's crank), but she produced something, surely.
 
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Moedred

Administrator
Staff member
If we ever interview Rinzler that'll be one of the first questions, whether there was anything by or about Diane Thomas in the storage box. It's possible she was approached before her death and some have exaggerated her obituary, but no one wants to diminish her contribution.
 

Udvarnoky

Well-known member
At the very least she would have had some sort of story meeting with Lucas. Is there no official source that at least alludes to their collaboration? I don't own that giant Making Of book, for example. While details have always been scant, I could swear her name is dropped in at least one Lucasfilm-sanctioned overview of Last Crusade's gestation.

That "Raiders of the Lost Drafts" has a bibliography, but who's the source for this particular snippet?

Far from looking for the Holy Grail, Indy's next adventure was originally supposed to be a horror movie, 1930's style, set in a haunted house. This odd idea came from Lucas, who commissioned Diane Thomas, the writer of Romancing The Stone, to produce a screenplay. Thomas completed her first draft shortly before her untimely death in a car crash, but the script and the horror-movie idea were both scrapped. However, elements of it found their way into the opening sequence of the next shot at Indy 3 - Chris Columbus's failed (and fabled) Monkey King script.

EDIT: Joseph McBride's biography of Spielberg makes the same claim:

Lucas initially suggested making Indy III "a haunted-house movie." He had such a script written by Romancing the Stone screenwriter Diane Thomas before her death in a 1985 car accident, but, Lucas said, "Steven had done Poltergeist, and he didn't want to do another movie like that."
 
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Stoo

Well-known member
Moedred said:
http://www.aintitcool.com/node/186

I remember hearing about this script leak in 1996. It finally made it out of the depths of the internet in 1997... One could argue these days it takes longer.
I never visit the "Ain't it Cool News" website unless an Indy-related link is posted here at The Raven. Each time that I've clicked on whatever link, it always leads to some groan-inducing blog.

Ain't it unsurprising that this latest one was no exception:

INDY IV draft that will never be!!!
Published at: Oct. 24, 1997, midnight CST

"Remember how I told yall I was suppose to get a draft of the Indiana Jones 4 script? Well, I did today. It was written by Chris Columbus back in 1995 and it is his 1st draft. And it wasn't that bad, pretty good actually. Now for the bad news... It won't be the draft to make it on screen."

"Pretty good"?:confused: It is TERRIBLE! Thank G_d this never made it to the screen.

I'm still curious as to why the first leaked version was changed to say "Indiana Jones IV" with a date of 2/10/1995. Intentional rumour-spreading, perhaps?:confused:
 

Udvarnoky

Well-known member
Chris Columbus' draft is bananas, but often to entertaining effect. It would have been fun, that's for sure. And of course the version we have been critiquing all these years is his first draft - in most other cases like this, we have a later draft of the screenwriters' work.

Unless Spielberg is trying to spare Columbus some embarrassment - highly possible - he passed on the script for practical reasons and racial sensitivity concerns. That said, LucasArts designers probably agreed with the opinion that the script was terrible, because they vetoed the idea of turning the script into an adventure game and instead went on to make a game so good it's arguably superior to any of the actual movie sequels.
 

Kooshmeister

New member
In retrospect, I'm quite fond of the haunted castle sequence. I have no idea why, I just do. It isn't any crazier than anything else in the script, and it reminds me of a distaff version of The Stone Tape or something.
 

Alex Yeo

Well-known member
Wow! I just read a précis of this script, and… Wow! It’s insane. Super interesting to see how much of it was repurposed though in Last Crusade and even Crystal Skull. I wonder if any of it will turn up in Indy 5..?
 
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