Earthblog

A Conversation with Gary Burden and Ed Pressman
Interview by Todd Simmons
Tuesday, 08 June, 2010
Look for this interview in Matter 13: Edward Abbey.

The Monkey Wrench Gang as a novel stirred up a revolution and became a classic. The film version of the novel is developing a similar, almost-mythological history.  Robert Redford, Sean Penn, and Matthew McConaughey are part of the on-going history. Optioned since it was first published in 1975, the book has almost been made into a film ever since. I spoke with the two men who are currently working to get the film made: Gary Burden, the famed counter-cultural artist who’s worked on album cover art for artists such as Neil Young and My Morning Jacket, and Ed Pressman, who’s worked on films such as Wall Street, Reversal of Fortune, and Thank You For Smoking. Overly generous and forthcoming, the two men showed remarkable dedication to a controversial and difficult novel-to-film adaptation. With these two men on-board, my summation is this: Hayduke will live! (on the big screen).

Todd Simmons: Thanks for taking the time to talk with me about The Monkey Wrench Gang. Considering how long this film has been in the works, are you waiting until the public can’t stand it anymore, and then that’s when you’ll release the film?

Gary Burden: That’s it, we’re holding back. We could’ve put this film out ten years ago…

Ed Pressman: Walter Salles is going to do the movie, but we’re still trying to find a screenwriter to match his vision. We’re getting very close.

TS: All the information that can be found online has Catherine Hardwicke directing, and William Goldman writing the screenplay?

EP: That’s all in the past. Catherine would still like to do it, but she’s gone on to do Twilight and other things, becoming a very hot director.  Walter Salles really wants to go back to the original source, to the book. Having read the script and read the book, he still feels the book hasn’t been captured the way he sees it.  I think he’s right.

TS: Did he feel a certain element was missing, or just an overall feel?

GB: Walter really has turned up something that most people have missed—he’s going for the humor first, and the message second. Most people are so overwhelmed by how Ed Abbey targeted the problems in the environment, and how people were dealing with it, but I’m quite sure that Ed intended this to be a comedy. Most people want to preach about the environment. I think Walter’s idea is right up Ed’s alley, and I think it is the best way to present this material. I think if you get people laughing, then they’re much more receptive to any ideas you may want to lay on them. I think it’s brilliant that he saw that. He wants to do it more in the style of a Coen Brothers, or Terry Southern—just make it a wacked-out, absurd comedy. Certainly that is there in the book, but no one has mined that approach. I think it’s absolutely what we’ve been waiting for.

EP: Terry Southern, who’s not around anymore, or Buck Henry, who wrote some of the great, sophisticated, politically engaged comedies—Shampoo, The Graduate... anyway, I think that’s the spirit of the book.

TS: Who do feel will be the hardest character to cast?

EP: In the beginning the prototype for Hayduke was Jack Nicholson, and as the years went by, it evolved as such that some of the actors who we thought would be Hayduke are now ready to play Doc. I remembered when Dennis Hopper wanted to direct it; his first thought for Hayduke was Jim Carrey. When Catherine came on board to direct, Jim really wanted to do the role, but Catherine thought at that time—it was a few years ago—he was too old to play Hayduke.  He was trying to convince her that he could act ten years younger than his age.  The prototype for me is still the young Jack Nicholson that we knew from Easy Rider.

GB: I agree with that, or maybe from the next generation, Sean Penn.

EP: Yeah, he was also interested in the role, but he’s probably more suited to play Doc, in terms of his age. We’ve been talking more about writers with Walter at this point…

TS: Hayduke is the central pivot to the book, so he seems like an important character.

GB:  The only actor that Walter mentioned was Sam Worthington, who is in Avatar. I’m not familiar with him, but that’s the only name that’s been thrown out so far.

TS: As far as the new script, are you setting any sort of timeline, or are you just letting the film evolve as it needs to evolve?

EP: Walter will be in LA this December [2009], and we’re hoping to narrow down a writer by the end of the year, and hopefully have a script at the early part of next year. It’s always been a film that we have to shoot in the spring or the fall, in terms of the seasons for

shooting in that area of the country. I would think that the target would be a year from now, in the fall, or if it’s delayed, the following spring. We’re talking about a Fall 2010 or spring 2011.

TS: Speaking of filming, do you feel like you’ll have a good working relationship with the National Park Service, or do you feel like you’ll need it?

GB: What we’ve come to realize, for a lot of reasons, is that we’ll try to shoot the whole film in New Mexico, and have a small, second unit that would go to Lee’s Ferry and Monument Valley and places like that. We’ve done three survey trips and have found every location in the book in New Mexico. The reason is partially financial because the state of New Mexico offers big tax breaks that will make it more possible to make the film.

EP: One of the things to bring up is the importance of the musical artists who’ve committed to working with us, and have been for some time now.

GB: There’s a long list of people. Well, I’m in the music business, and have been for the last forty years. I’ve worked with everybody from the Doors to Crosby, Stills, and Nash. I still do all of Neil Young’s artwork. Now I’m working with younger artists like Conor Oberst from Bright Eyes and Jim James from My Morning Jacket, so all of those guys are into the project.

TS: Was that the Monsters of Folk album?

GB: Yeah, I did that artwork as well. Actually Jim and Conor were on the rafting trip with Ed Pressman and me that we did with Ken Sanders last spring down the Rio Chama. They’re all part of a new generation of musicians and songwriters that get this book.

EP: Even Bob Dylan wants to be a part of it.

TS: I remember reading about Abbey denouncing Dylan back in the day, but I don’t know if that’s true or not.

GB: I think it is true. I’ve heard it enough times. Ed Abbey was a pretty cantankerous guy and I think his musical tastes went more toward classical music and country and western. I think he thought Bob Dylan was some sort of poser… he didn’t get him. He actually made fun of him, the way he talked. Nonetheless, Bob did actually read the book for me—it took him six months to do it, but he did read it—and he was so pleased with it that not only did he offer to do some music but he also offered to do a cameo, which is pretty cool. With all due respect to Ed Abbey, I think Bob Dylan would bring something to the film. He certainly would bring an audience to it, much like he did in Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid.

TS: Describe your aspirations for the film—commercial, artistic, revolutionary?

GB: To change the world, no big thing.

EP: My son is a junior in college, and his generation looks at the spirit we were growing up in, and in some ways the glamour and engagement that they missed, and I think the timing of this film is more important than it’s ever been, because the film could strike a chord with our generation and their generation in a way that films don’t often do. When Gary says change the world, I was in the movie business in ‘69 and the early ‘70s and the feeling was that films and music could change the world, and films were very engaged with political issues that studios nowadays shy away from. If it’s done with a sense of humor that Gary is talking about, I think it’s easy to be corny, and say it could be an Easy Rider for the 21^st century, but in the back of our minds, that is what we hope for.

GB: I think that is totally possible. Having been a part of the music business in the 1960s and 1970s I have no problem saying that what we all were doing contributed to changing the world—from stopping a war, to opening up opportunities politically and socially. From working with these young singer-songwriters, and knowing their friends and compatriots and how they all think, most of them are in their twenties, and I think there is a group of people now who are, if not exactly of that same mind, they are at least respectful of it. Todd, how old are you?

TS: I’m 34 years old, so I’ve been waiting for this film my entire life.

GB: That’s great, thirty-five years ago it came out.

TS: Are you going to try to set the film in the mid-to-late 70s? Ed wrote in the front of the book that everything in this book happened one year from today.

GB: It all happened one year from today. I think it’s important that it is set in the period, and not be made as 2010 or 2011, but to be in the 70s, for many reasons. First of all, the powers that be have always tried to stop this film from happening because they consider it to be a dangerous story that could incite riots or incite people to blow shit up, that kind of thing; that puts an additional difficulty on our being able to make the movie.  Whereas if it’s in the period, it’s almost like mythic in a way, like once upon a time this happened. If you tried to make it contemporary, it would somehow weaken it, that’s my opinion. Ed Pressman and I have always tried to keep it in the setting that Ed Abbey intended. Also, if you think about it, the thing that dates stuff that happens in that part of the West, are the pick-up trucks; I mean, Monument Valley and the river, they haven’t really changed since that time—of course there are more buildings and things, but really it’s sort of a timeless area.

TS: Since people readily confuse acts of sabotage with acts of terrorism, and since terrorism is more prevalent in people’s minds today, how will you address that issue, or will you even try?

GB: Ed Abbey was very careful about saying things or expressing through his characters that they were not violent people—except for maybe Hayduke. In fact, they were not terrorists, but amateur saboteurs who attacked the tools of terrorism—the bulldozers, and those things that have changed the world not for the better. It’s almost impossible to get away from it, and I think that contributes to a great extent to why this film has not yet been made, it is perceived by the powers that be as being very dangerous. In fact, it probably is. I know from Earth First! to ELF—they are inspired to a great extent by Ed Abbey and by this book. I think there is a way to make the point that they are saboteurs and not terrorists, although there will be a certain faction of the population that will never accept that, they will always think that it promotes terrorism.

TS: This book started a movement, and there aren’t a lot of novels out there that have started movements or revolutions. On the Road is another novel that started a movement, or captured a movement. Do you find it interesting that a couple of novels are making it to the big screen around the same time?

GB: Ironically, Walter Salles is the director of record for On the Road, and he’s going to direct that film with Francis Ford Coppola producing.

EP: What Walter did, because the film [On the Road] hadn’t happened yet, he decided to do a documentary basically tracking Kerouac’s journey that he took on the road, and filmed a personal documentary following the route. He’s actually done that, being frustrated trying to do the movie itself, he made his own version of it.

TS: As a director, is he particularly drawn to revolutionary narratives, does that fit his worldview?

GB: If you see other films of his, like Central Station or Foreign Lands or The Motorcycle Diaries, there is a political side to them, but not politics that get in your face. They are part of the story, in a good way. I think he’s a socially conscious guy, and a good person, and he sees things in the world, and he certainly brings them in. He’s a really political guy, in a quiet way.

TS: The Monkey Wrench Gang will certainly bring a lot of scrutiny to how we protect, conserve, and take care of our land…how controversial do you feel this film will be?

GB: I would say appropriately controversial. I think it will encourage people who are sympathetic to the Earth and want to protect Her, and I think it will encourage them in their efforts. And I think that people who believe the environmental movement is all bullshit, this film will give them material to argue their points. I guess that’s a good thing. If this movie did nothing but caused people to discuss the issue, then it will have succeeded in a big way.

TS: Ed, any thoughts?

EP: It’s actually asking the question, too, whether you are prepared or should risk injuring other humans in protection of the land, and I think there’s an internal debate between Hayduke and Doc about that question. The book to some extent addresses it, but raises the issue about how far you are prepared to push it. It’s ambiguous in a sense, because Hayduke is the hero, but Doc gets the girl.

TS: Ed, how long have you been involved with the film?

EP: Gary, how long?

GB: Ed’s been involved for fourteen or fifteen years, and I started twenty years ago, more or less. I remember when I first got involved. I’ve always loved this book and I watched what was happening with it.  I was not a filmmaker and I didn’t know much about that, but I always felt that someday it should get made as a movie, and in my own quiet way I started pursuing the rights. When they became available, I thought, well I’m going to try and get involved. I spoke with Jack Loeffler, an old friend of Ed Abbey’s, and people who were around Abbey, without really knowing his widow, Clarke. Prior to that I had wanted to make a film out of The Milagro Beanfield War, and I actually got the rights from John Nichols, the writer. Out of the woodwork came Robert Redford who as a front person had this person named Montezuma Esparza, and I relinquished the rights because there was a Chicano activist who wanted to make the film, so I acquiesced. I thought it was a good idea, so I backed out. Turns out it wasn’t Montezuma Esparza, it was Robert Redford. In the last throes of getting the rights to The Monkey Wrench Gang, after having big name Hollywood producers come after it, Robert Redford flew Ed’s widow up to Sundance and tried to romance her into giving him the rights, and in the end she gave them to me instead. Ever since then I’ve felt a huge responsibility to Ed Abbey who is, in a cosmic way, around me all the time. I had a mountain lion on the patio of my house one day…[laughter]…this is funny…during a period of time…[laughter]…when we were thinking about Matthew McConaughey to play Hayduke. It would have been expedient perhaps, because we could have gotten the movie made, and I had sort of gone along with that idea, and then this mountain lion showed up on my patio, and scared the shit out of me, and I thought that perhaps that was Ed telling me what a bad idea it was.

TS: Everyone thinks Matthew McConaughey would have been a bad idea.

GB: Sometimes you go, well shit, if it will help us get it made. Fortunately, Ed Abbey stepped into the picture and put the kibosh on that.

TS: Any last words on the film?

GB: It would be fair to say that both Ed Pressman and I have put our asses on the line for a long time for this film, and we are committed beyond a sane commitment to getting this made.

EP: I think some of the greatest films from fiction have taken the longest time; the prime example is One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. It took eighteen years from the time Kirk Douglas wanted to do it, to the time that Michael Douglas actually did produce it. I think The Monkey Wrench Gang is still my most personal commitment to seeing a film get made. We’re not like a studio, we can’t afford to commit so much time and effort and money to something unless we finally see it through.

This interview will be published in Matter 13: Edward Abbey.  Click here for more information about this upcoming book and the release party.