— Ch. 1 · The Screenplay That Never Was —
Apocalypse Now.
~5 min read · Ch. 1 of 6
John Milius wrote the first draft of Apocalypse Now in 1969, just months after being rejected from military service due to asthma. He received fifteen thousand dollars from Francis Ford Coppola to develop the script, with a promise of another ten thousand if the project moved forward. The screenplay was originally titled The Psychedelic Soldier before settling on Apocalypse Now, a name inspired by a button badge popular among hippies that read Nirvana Now. Milius based the character of Willard and some aspects of Kurtz on a friend named Fred Rexer, who claimed to have witnessed Viet Cong hacking off villagers' arms. Scholars found no evidence to support Rexer's story, yet it became part of the film's lore. Milius wrote over one thousand pages across ten drafts, incorporating ideas from Michael Herr's article about Khe Sanh and films like Dr. Strangelove. Warner Bros.-Seven Arts acquired the rights in 1969 but put the project into turnaround. George Lucas worked with Milius for four years developing the film while simultaneously working on Star Wars. They intended to shoot the movie using sixteen millimeter cameras and real soldiers during the war itself, with an estimated budget of two million dollars. Safety concerns from studios and Lucas's growing involvement with American Graffiti caused them to pause production indefinitely.
Typhoons And Heart Attacks
Principal photography began on the 20th of March 1976, when Coppola and his family flew to Manila to begin filming. Typhoon Olga struck just days later, destroying forty to eighty percent of the sets at Iba and forcing production to shut down on the 26th of May 1976. Dean Tavoularis remembered that rain fell so hard visibility turned white outside, bending trees at forty-five degree angles. The Playboy Playmate set was completely destroyed, ruining a month of scheduled shooting. Most cast and crew returned to the United States for six to eight weeks while others stayed behind to rebuild. Production costs climbed two million dollars over budget within six weeks, prompting Coppola to file a five hundred thousand dollar insurance claim. He took out a loan from United Artists conditional on generating over forty million dollars in theatrical rentals or facing personal liability for all overruns. When Marlon Brando arrived three months late, he was significantly overweight and unprepared for the role. Coppola dressed him in black clothing and used another actor as a body double to hide his weight. Martin Sheen suffered a near-fatal heart attack on the 5th of March 1977, struggling to walk a quarter mile before reaching help. His brother Joe Estevez filled in for scenes requiring close-ups until Sheen recovered enough to return on April 19. By then Coppola admitted he could no longer distinguish which footage belonged to either brother.