Heh. No, at the time, I didn’t know. I figured that out after I found out about the musical. Did everyone else find out about the book from the movie?
(My understanding was that Doctorow was not happy about the movie, and liked the musical much better, so I never did see the movie. Although I believe I read this in some sort of promotional material for the musical, so I should probably take that with huge heaping spoonfuls of salt.)
That doesn’t make it not true. It’s in Goldman’s first memoir Adventures in the Screen Trade. I might have some of the details wrong but I am fairly sure the basics are right. The screenplay that didn’t sell came first. The movie was released after the book showed that it was popular. I think it started originally as bedtime stories for his kids but I might be conflating a couple of stories there.
On an unrelated note, Adventures and the follow up Which Lie Did I Tell are really interesting books.
I don’t know anyone besides myself who read (or even heard of) The Last Detail before the movie came out. Also don’t know if book sales took off after the movie either but they had to improve at least a little.
It’s been a while since I read Adventures in the Screen Trade, but IIRC the problem wasn’t that the screenplay didn’t sell. The problem was that it DID sell, but the studio that owned the rights to The Princess Bride decided not to make the movie. I think the person who originally made the decision to purchase the screenplay left/died, and his successor didn’t see anything to gain by going forward with a project that had been someone else’s idea. Anyway, Goldman was eventually able to buy back the rights and sell the script to another studio.
I don’t know at what point Goldman decided to write the novel. To the best of my memory he doesn’t say in Adventures in the Screen Trade. I don’t think he even specifies that he’s talking about The Princess Bride, although it seemed clear to me that this was what he was referring to. It’s my recollection that he says in Adventures in the Screen Trade that he doesn’t think the script in question will ever be produced. Checking on Wikipedia I see that Adventures in the Screen Trade was published in 1983 and the film version of The Princess Bride was released in late 1987, so he couldn’t have said anything in that book about the production or release of the movie.
It was it Which Lie Did I Tell then (I read them back to back so that makes sense that I got it confused, I know it was in one of them), and I think you are right, he sold it but it wasn’t made.
Anyway, it would have been a more interesting story if I had remembered it better.:smack: