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Mar 18, 1988 · DeWitt Bodeen, who was a principal screenwriter in the film versions of "Cat People" and "Billy Budd" and later wrote movie-related books, died Saturday of bronchial pneumonia at the Motion...
DeWitt Bodeen (July 25, 1908 — March 12, 1988) was an American film screenwriter and television writer best known for writing Cat People (1942). Biography [ edit ] Born Homer DeWitt Bodeen on July 25, 1908, in Fresno , California , [1] he began his career as an actor and wrote more than 20 plays before entering the film business.
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- Cat People Began as A Title Without A premise.
- Ironically, Val Lewton Was Afraid of Cats.
- Numerous Set Pieces in Cat People Were Recycled from Other Films.
- Cat People Was One of The First Horror Movies to Use The "Jump Scare."
- Cat People Director Jacques Tourneur Was Nearly fired.
- Several Details About Irena's Backstory Were Omitted from Cat people.
- Elizabeth Russell's only Line in Cat People Was Dubbed Over by Simone Simon.
- The Preview Screening of Cat People Was Preceded by A Disney Cartoon.
- Cat People Inspired Some Surprising Fan Mail.
Thanks to Citizen Kane and other expensive bombs, RKO was teetering on the brink of financial ruin in the early 1940s. To help turn things around, the studio decided to emulate Universal Studios, which had found sustained success with lucrative monster films such as Frankenstein (1931), The Mummy (1932), and their sequels. In 1942, RKO turned to Va...
According to his wife, Ruth Lewton, “Val hated cats! Oh gosh, I remember once, I was in bed and he was writing—he used to like to write late in the night. There was a catfight outside, and the next thing I knew, he was up at the foot of my bed, nervous and frightened. He was very unhappy about cats. I think it stemmed from an old folk tale he remem...
Hampered by a shoestring budget of just over $141,000, Lewton made sure to cut corners when he could. The stone wall from Cat People’s famous bus scene had previously appeared in 1939's The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and the vast staircase in Irena’s home was originally built for 1942's The Magnificent Ambersons, Orson Welles’s second movie. And the ...
The bus sequence is easily the most iconic moment in Cat People, and for good reason. The scene finds Alice Moore (Jane Randolph) being pursued down an empty New York street by a jealous Irena Dubrovna Reed (Simone Simon). In the piercing darkness, Alice can’t see exactly who or what is following her, but she hears the clicks and clacks of oncoming...
Although Lewton produced Cat People and it was universally seen as his baby, he didn’t direct it. To sit in the director’s chair, Lewton recruited his good friend Jacques Tourneur, who had become a legendary figure in the annals of both horror and film noir cinema. However, four days after Cat People started shooting, Tourneur was almost firedwhen ...
As film historian Greg Mank notes on the DVD commentary, early drafts of the script called for the womanizing psychologist Dr. Judd (Tom Conway) to learn that Irena’s father had died when she was very young and that when her mother passed away, the dying woman transformed into a panther. Furthermore, Lewton and scriptwriter DeWitt Bodeen thought ab...
For the café wedding reception scene, Tourneur and Lewton wanted to hire an actress with a vaguely feline appearance. This eventually led them to B-movie veteran Elizabeth Russell, who found out about the job opening while she was on a double date. One of the participating men on the date was Peter Viertel, a prominent screenwriter, who told Russel...
Cat People was the first motion picture that Val Lewton had ever been put in charge of. So just as you’d expect, he was a little nervous at the first public preview screening. Held inside RKO’s Hillstreet Theatre in Los Angeles on October 6, 1942, the event started off on the wrong foot. Somebody at the studio had decided to amuse the crowd with a ...
Numerous viewers thought the exchange between Irena and Russell’s exotic cat lady was laced with sexual tension. According to Bodeen, “Some audience members read a lesbian meaning into the action. I was aware that could happen with the café scene, and Val got several letters after Cat Peoplewas released, praising him for introducing [lesbianism] to...
May '24. Apr '24. Mar '24. > Name Word. Search. David Harbold, 76, of DeWitt, Iowa, died Saturday, May 18, 2024, at home. Arrangements are pending in the care of Schultz Funeral Home, DeWitt. View. Diane Christensen, 87, of Calamus, Iowa, passed away Wednesday, May 15, 2024, at Wheatland Manor, surrounded by her loving family.
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DeWitt Bodeen was an American screenwriter and film historian. His career as a screenwriter spanned the 1940s to early 1960s. He also wrote books and articles on film history and personalities.
