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Robert Towne, who won an Oscar for his Chinese district original screenplay and was nominated for his The last detail, the shampoo And Greystoke scripts, died Monday at his home. He was 89.
Public relations agency McClure & Associates announced the news on behalf of Towne’s family.
Towne has also won BAFTA, Golden Globe and WGA awards for Chinese district, the 1974 thriller set in Los Angeles and starring Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway. It was one of three Writers Guild Awards he won during his career, along with Shampoo and the drama series Mad Men. He was also nominated for The last detail (1973) and Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes (1985). He received the Guild’s Laurel Award for best screenplay in 1997.
Born November 23, 1934, Towne made his screenwriting debut in the 1960s. The Last Woman on Earth before writing for television series in the early 60s, notably Beyond reality, the man from UNCLE And The Lloyd Bridges Show. He later worked with Roger Corman on films such as The Tomb of Ligeia (1964) and later co-wrote with Sam Peckinpah the 1968 film about the Mexican Revolution Villa walks, with Yul Brenner, Robert Mitchum and Charles Bronson.
Towne made some changes to the script The Godfather and a few other important films of the time, but his breakthrough came with The last detail. This military drama stars Nicholson as a marine assigned to escort a new recruit (Randy Quaid) to prison after being court-martialed for a minor offense. It also stars Otis Young, Clifton James and Carol Kane. The film would spawn the script that would define Towne’s career the following year.
Directed by Roman Polanski and produced by Robert Evans, Chinese district tells the story of the wars over water rights in California in the early 1900s. It was nominated for 11 Academy Awards, including Best Picture, but only Towne would win amid the dominance that year of another Paramount Pictures classic, The Godfather 2.
When it was created, Chinese district seemed like a dream project. As Peter Bart wrote in a 2020 column for Deadline, Nicholson — then a rising young star — had developed a friendship with Towne during production of Easy Rider and then asked him to create a Raymond Chandler-style detective story for him. Towne took the idea to Evans, then head of production at Paramount, who was eager to expand his portfolio as a producer, with additional compensation.
Although Evans wanted to collaborate with Towne and Nicholson on his first solo production, there was a catch: he didn’t want to make a film about China or Chinatown. Towne patiently explained that Chinatown was just a “state of mind,” whose intricacies involved incest, murder, and a plan to steal a city’s water supply.
Without moving, Evans ordered Towne to give up. Chinese districtoffering instead a salary of $175,000 to accommodate Gatsby the magnificent. Towne angrily pointed out that a screenplay based on the Gatsby novel would be even more confusing than Chinatown.
To prove his point, Towne turned his back on Paramount and borrowed $10,000 to rent a bed-and-breakfast cabin on Catalina Island, where he began writing. Although he relished his freedom, it proved illusory.
Over time, Towne had to rework his story, drawing on the advice of a series of opinionated contributors. First there was Nicholson, who had ideas about the characters but felt the details of the dialogue were irrelevant. Then there was the Polish-born Polanski, who admitted to being baffled by the subplots of Los Angeles politics. Finally, there was Evans, who found the narrative impenetrable.
A recurring point of disagreement: violence. Two years earlier, Polanski had been the victim of the murder of his pregnant wife Sharon Tate by the Manson family, and he now insisted that the violence in his new film be explicit, not implicit. “If a filmmaker tries to avoid upsetting people, that would be immoral,” he said. Even the physical fight between Nicholson, as Harry Gittes, and Dunaway, as Evelyn Mulwray, would be explicit in its execution.
After filming was completed, further disagreements arose. The ending was rewritten and the original music was scrapped. Nicholson felt that the overall “look” of the film was “too shiny.” When the film was finally screened to critics, the doubts were allayed. The reception was enthusiastic and the film was instantly declared a classic.
Towne then co-wrote with Paul Schrader The Yakuzas, Crime drama by Sydney Pollack starring Mitchum, Ken Takakura and Brian Keith.
His next film was also a commercial and critical success. Shampoo (1975), starring Warren Beatty as a Beverly Hills playboy hairdresser who dreams of opening his own salon. The cast also includes Julie Christie, Goldie Hawn, Lee Grant and Jack Warden.
During the 1970s, Towne also worked as script doctor on Beatty’s directorial debut. Heaven can wait, as well as other scenarios, including Orca, Missouri Breaks And The parallax view.
Towne then wrote and made his directorial and producing debut with Personal recordThe 1982 sports drama starring Mariel Hemingway and Patrice Donnelly as lesbian athletes trying to make the U.S. Olympic team is, much to the dismay of their coach (Scott Glenn), named one of the 300 greatest sports films of all time by the AFI.
Towne continued to write screenplays throughout the 1980s and 1990s, including 1990’s. Chinese district following The Two Jakes, again with Nicholson. He wrote the screenplay for the 1984 Tarzan tale Greystoke with an eye on management. But the poor financial results of Personal record led Warner Bros. to hand over the reins of direction to Hugh Hudson, who had just won the Oscar for best picture. Chariots of Fire in 1981.
Towne was angered by this decision and his name was removed from the Greystoke Screenplay — choosing instead to credit the screenplay to PH Vazak, his dog. The film went on to earn an Oscar nomination for Adapted Screenplay for “Vazak,” the dog. This was the first Oscar nomination for a Tarzan film.
Information regarding a celebration of life ceremony will be announced at a later date.
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Peter Bart contributed to this report.