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A script crafted by the acclaimed writer and featuring Christopher Lee and Edward Woodward was expected to be an ideal venture for director Robin Hardy during the filming of The Wicker Man more than half a century ago.

Although today it is revered as an iconic horror film, the extent of turmoil it caused the film-makers has now been revealed in newly discovered correspondence and script drafts.

The Storyline of The Wicker Man

This 1973 movie centers on a devout policeman, portrayed by the actor, who travels on an isolated Scottish isle looking for a missing girl, but finds mysterious pagan residents who claim the girl was real. Britt Ekland was cast as the daughter of a local innkeeper, who tempts the religious policeman, with Christopher Lee as the pagan aristocrat.

Creative Tensions Revealed

However, the working environment was frayed and contentious, the documents show. In a message to Shaffer, the director wrote: “How dare you treat me like this?”

The screenwriter was already famous with acclaimed works like Sleuth, but his typed draft of The Wicker Man reveals Hardy’s brutal cuts to the screenplay.

Heavy edits feature the aristocrat’s dialogue in the ending, which would have begun: “The girl was but the tip of the iceberg – the visible element. Don’t blame yourself, there was no way you could have known.”

Apart from Writer and Director

Conflict escalated outside the writer and director. A producer wrote: “Shaffer’s talent has been offset by a self-indulgence that drove him to show he was too clever by half.”

In a letter to the producers, Hardy expressed frustration about the film’s editor, the editing specialist: “I believe he likes the subject or approach of the film … and feels that he is tired of it.”

In a correspondence, Lee described the film as “alluring and enigmatic”, even with “having to cope with a garrulous producer, a stressed screenwriter and a well-paid but difficult director”.

Forgotten Documents Uncovered

An extensive correspondence relating to the production was part of six sack-loads of documents left in the attic of the old house of the director’s spouse, Caroline. Included were previously unseen scripts, visual plans, on-set photographs and budget records, many of which show the challenges faced by the team.

The director’s children Justin and Dominic, currently in their sixties, have drawn on the material for a forthcoming book, titled Children of The Wicker Man. The book uncovers the intense stress faced by the director during the making of the movie – from his heart attack to bankruptcy.

Personal Fallout

Initially, the movie was a box office flop and, following the disappointment, the director left his wife and his family for a fresh start in the US. Legal letters show Caroline as the film’s uncredited executive producer and that he owed her as much as £1m in today’s money. She was forced to sell the family home and passed away in 1984, in her fifties, suffering from addiction, never knowing that her film later turned into a global hit.

His son, an acclaimed documentary maker, described The Wicker Man as “the movie that messed up my family”.

When he was contacted by a woman living in the former family home, asking whether he wished to retrieve the sacks of papers, his initial reaction was to propose destroying “the bloody things”.

But then he and his brother examined the sacks and understood the significance of what they held.

Revelations from the Documents

His brother, a scholar, said: “All the big players are in there. We discovered 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 ‘edit, edit, edit’. They sort of respected each other and hated each other.”

Writing the book provided some “resolution”, Justin said.

Financial Hardships

His family did not profit financially from the film, he added: “The bloody film has gone on to make a fortune for other people. It’s unfair. His father accepted five grand. Thus, he missed out on any of the upside. Christopher Lee never received any money from it either, although he performed the film for no pay, to leave Hammer [Horror films]. So, in many ways, it’s been a very unkind film.”