Gary W. Goldstein, Author/Producer: This isn't a negative, it's just
to be expected the studio would bring in other writers.
Film Courage: Three Thousand was initially in a kind of a one-room scenario? Maybe a hotel room?
Gary: It was in a hotel, very simple locations,
it's all a little bit of a jumble. If I had to go back and parse what was this
piece there or that piece there but fundamentally the bulk of the original story took place in
a very limited environment. there was a car there was a street that was a hotel it was not
extravagant and so once it went to the one producer or the the head of the studios they
said can you lighten it up on a disney scale this is a four we need a seven and so then you
added these side characters and maybe well the characters most of the characters were there
there was the hotel manager there was kit the best friend there was an elevator a lot of the
a lot of the infrastructure if you will was there but it did get expanded there
wasn't a big party scene perhaps there wasn't there were certain things that didn't exist
or that we're dressed up shall we say I don't I don't remember that we had quite so showy a
sequence on rodeo drive that sort of thing so yeah it it definitely evolved the beautiful thing was
my my my job was clearly to discover and and launch and protect great young writers
and I knew that when we were having that conversation with disney
that it was really imperative so the only the only condition I really had was
not about story it was really about protecting jonathan and the condition that we put on it was
he has to be guaranteed the first rewrite because I had such faith in him that he would break the
back of this and turn it exactly into the proper that like the best version of its comedic self
knowing the the and this isn't a negative it's just to be expected the studio would bring in
other writers jonathan had no never been produced he wasn't well known and so he committed the first
rewrite we delivered the first rewrite and long before it was delivered I was getting calls from
agents saying gary they're reaching out to us for our clients for potent potentially hiring
our clients for to do a rewrite and I said I know it's okay thank you for letting me know
but it's absolutely to be expected and they did there were three other writers who came in and
the first one I won't mention the name because I was not a fan of the work at all
it was unnecessarily it was actually surprisingly dark and I wasn't a fan of the writing
but they brought in another writer bob garland who was from the electric horsemen wonderful
new york-based writer and he polished up all the business dialogue that was sort of his mission
and the final writer barbara benedict who was a beloved and very sought after script doctor
came in and did the final rewrite and I would describe her work as bringing it back as close as
possible to the rewrite jonathan had delivered to the studio sort of brought it full circle
yeah we were very we're very fortunate this the the integrity of the script was in full tact
there was a fair amount of gary marshall is he had that gene that magical gene
of finding the heart of everything that he his legacy is so profound both in on the big
and small screen right he just had that gift and so our our arrangement with him was yes
we're shifting this from a drama to a comedy but we're doing it quickly and we're moving and so
once one take is scripted and then improv and which was consistent with his style he gave
his amazing director to watch you learn a lot watching gary marsha what
when I got to watch him work he gave enormous freedom to everyone on the set not just the talent
he invited participation at every conceivable level he gave actors the freedom to riff and
and and find the moment and lean into it if you will so it was it was an extraordinary the set
was a really really exciting place it was a small small budget by studio standards we were way way
down that register and there was a lot of freedom because a we had gary marshall b we were such
a small budget they weren't paying the kind of attention that they do to some of the bigger films
but it was a it was a truly wonderful time so that one connection at the sundance lab
kind of led to it how did you how did it's forgive me I'm sorry her name one
more time michelle satter michelle satter okay sorry about that how did michelle
i'm not sure how I originally met michelle it might have been through some of her staff for
being at sundance I used to go every year to the in the early years to the sundance film festival
so I don't really my memory doesn't stretch back that far
but michelle was someone that as soon as I met her I just recognized this is a wonderful person and
really frightfully smart and and and I've always been incredibly grateful because in fairness
sundance did I don't think they really got the proper public acknowledgement for the role that
they played in the evolution or development and the possibility of that particular film
interesting but it was but it was a key moment certainly it brought it brought it to the
forefront of people's attention what were some of the lowest moments you faced trying to get pretty
woman made or Three Thousand made at whatever evolution it was at oh gosh it every film has its
peaks and valleys sometimes the valleys outnumber the peaks or so it seems at the time
if I look back and think from the time I held a first draft script
in my hand at the time we were actually shooting a film it was only three years
and in the timeline of many films that's not very long it's actually quite wonderful but during
that time there were moments when it seemed when vestron declared they were going into bankruptcy
that was there was a lot of strain because if the script was if we didn't get a turnaround on it if
we didn't actually paper and buy out the script get it back it would have been buried forever
that's what happens when you go into bankruptcy right it gets locked up
so there was a lot of I was I was really concerned about the project at that point
that when we optioned it to new regency I wouldn't say there was a low point there was a frustration
not anyone's fault but it's not always easy to put films together and get them
on track toward production so it got stalled and so that would be more frustr
frustrating over a sustained period of time than it was upsetting or a low va a low point
richard I was so convinced that richard was right for this that when he said no to the project
which happened as I recall both at vestron and then when we were for some reason I had this crazy
idea that when we were at new regency we should offer it again new environment but same reaction
and I understood it richard's a wonderful super educated professional great he's fabulous
but he is a sophisticated and he has a a different taste being the guy in a romantic comedy wasn't
necessarily the high point of his on his wish list it was almost contrary to the things that he was
most attracted to edgy darker more sophisticated projects so there was no surprise there
the surprise was that he we we eventually succeeded in getting him but I would say
another low point might have been when we first were setting that we set it up at disney
and I saw all of the people cycling through perhaps the lowest point for me
I should have been the happiest because I had a major studio I
had a major director I was like oh my gosh we have succeeded and yet
I had a really strong inkling about what this project wanted to become and the
casting that was necessary to get there and to me the cast was julia and richard
and I didn't have to be 100 right about that but but it's a sliding scale there's a sort of palette
of colors if you will and as I was watching all these other actresses and actors come through some
of them were just meetings because they were too big to audition they were just big names
there were meetings they were auditions some were screen tests and as I watched some of these
meetings and auditions and certainly the screen tests I felt my it was like my heart
hurt I had my heart set I just I trusted my gut I've always trusted my gut on casting
and it's not that I'm right it's just a gut I knew what the film could be with richard and julia
and if I couldn't have one or the other or both
we'd do the very next best thing but when I saw some of these screen tests and auditions and they
were so the far side of dare I say the vision that I had for it or that jonathan and I had for it
there were moments when I felt I was seeing the premature death of my film of the film
and and I couldn't help but feel anxious and sad and like we we've we've got to
find a solution here again the god smiled we got our dream cast and it all worked out.
I think part of the lesson there is you really have to know when and how to speak to an issue
and speak up to the right people at the right time and really try and influence the outcome
and then when the film hit theaters how surprised or not surprised were you with
the crowd's reception well it's always a surprise people always say did it was a hit
the answer is no of course not we were actually our reputation when we were shooting was oh that
little film in trouble we were again a very small batch by studio standards we were turning it from
a comedy from a drama to a comedy we were it was known that gary marshall god bless him was going
to be doing a lot of improv so it wasn't like there was oh my gosh that film is going to be
amazing no we were like almost more like an experiment than a film in many people's eyes
we did a number I forget the number we did a few test screenings in outlying areas of la
and held focus groups afterward and with each successive screen test
the first one or two were like okay okay that's good but I'm nervous but as we got audience
reaction in what was working and what they loved about it and we kept throwing more humor into it
the the reactions where you're standing in the back of the theater at darken theater
and you've got a full theater and you're you're you're just on pins and needles waiting to see
are they going to laugh in the right place are they going to laugh in the wrong places are
they going to understand what's going on are they what's the word of mouth as they exit the theater
and you're watching their body language literally are they sitting up and the latter test
certainly by the last test screen but i'd say the last couple of test screenings
the audience was you couldn't have asked for a better reaction
at that point I wouldn't say oh my gosh we have a hit no we were hopeful we were going to live
because the patients are going to live when it came out and did the business that it did
which was back then in 1990 march of 1990 we came out and it did like 11 million and changed the
first weekend that was a wow the fact that it went up a little bit like 12 million the second week
that told us oh gosh we have the best thing in the world going for us word of mouth
people love it and they're talking about it
and I don't remember precisely but that film lived actively in theaters I was
it's at least half a year I think it was actually slightly longer which of course would never happen
today even back then it was an anomaly to have a a an active theater presence for that duration but
I think even more surprising than that looking back is it's over 30 years later 31 years later
and it's finding new generations of audience around the globe
it is a film that you it's like a machine that just keeps churning out joy right and
so to be associated with something like that is really quite phenomenal it's a blessing and
who could have guessed at that for all of the
reviews positive was there any criticism of the film of the subject matter I was I don't recall
that there was any negative there might have been but I can't I can't recall that what I do remember
was on the eve of releasing that film the thing that had I don't think I was alone in this
there was a certain nervousness about putting a film out into the world where the role this lead
character is a working girl and she's young when I met julia she was 18 when we shot the film she was
21 or so and she was a very youthful energy right so she was this here's this young beautiful girl
who's a working girl and as much as we tried to paint the right version of that picture carefully
I was really concerned because it was a time of great feminism the glorious steinems of the world
were on the front pages and I thought we were going to get pilloried I thought there was a
good chance that there would be a lot of pushback that people would be upset with us how dare you
and to my great surprise that never it never came to be those very people that I was most
nervous about embraced it so I was actually even more than the critics I was concerned about some
big public figures who were leading the feminist movement at the time and
we might have stepped on we might have hit the wrong chord here but again that
the thing that really un was underlying this story it's pygmalion it's cinderella it's a
it's eternal right it's a dreamscape and it's a beautiful love story and
so much so that it that that I guess it overrides whatever sort
of socio-political instincts of the moment might be present but yeah no the embrace was
I might have selective memory but the embrace seemed fairly complete
if it had been released now let's suppose have been made in 2020 2019 pre-pandemic
do you think it would have received the same a claim would there have been would there have
been people that had issue with certain things that I think I think not okay it's very hard to
say what might have been in some ways I think the original story might have been better received in
the 2020s than than the version we made but I don't know I don't know I think there's something
as I said I think there's something predictably eternal about our love of
story and the way we react to story in certain archetypes and certainly romance in general
so I don't know but I think I think that we live in a time when people are certainly more critical
and that film might not have fared the same.