Jack Nicholson did not want to go to the Oscars. It was 1976 and he was nominated for best actor in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. But Nicholson wasn't feeling optimistic. In five years, he'd already been nominated five times. He'd also lost five times. And he told his producer, Michael Douglas (yes, the actor Michael Douglas), that he couldn't go through it again. "I remember how hard I had to persuade Jack to come to the ceremony. He was so reluctant, but we got him there," Douglas said in a recent interview with the AP. "And then of course we lost the first four awards."
Douglas continues: "Jack was sitting right in front of me and sort of leaned back and said 'Oh, Mikey D, Mikey D, I told you, man.' I just said, 'Hang in there.'" Douglas, of course, was right. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest would go on to sweep the "big five"—screenplay, director, actor, actress, and picture—the first film to do so in 41 years after It Happened One Night in 1934; only The Silence of the Lambs has done it since. That night was one of many vindicating moments for a film that no one wanted to make or distribute that has quite literally stood the test of time. Some standout details upon the film's 50th anniversary:
- It was the first film Douglas produced: The film adaption of Ken Kesey's countercultural novel was a defining moment for Douglas, a son of Hollywood who was stuck in television and got a lifeline to film when his father, Kirk Douglas, gave him the rights to the book.
- The cast: Danny DeVito was actually the first person officially cast. Douglas, who'd known him for nearly 10 years, brought director Miloš Forman to see him play Martini on stage. "Miloš said, 'Yes! Danny! Perfect! Cast!' Douglas said in his best Czech accent. "It was a big moment for Danny. But I always knew how talented he was."
- The shoot: They filmed on location at a real state hospital in Salem, Oregon. Everyone stayed in the same motel and would board the same bus in the morning to get to set. DeVito remembers he and the cast even asked if they could just sleep in the hospital. "They wouldn't let us," DeVito said. "The floor above us had some seriously disturbed people who had committed murder."
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- Credit due: One person Douglas thinks hasn't gotten the proper attention is producer Saul Zaentz, who died in 2014. His music company, Fantasy Records who had Creedence Clearwater Revival, funded the endeavor, which started at a $1.6 million budget and ballooned to $4 million by the end. He was a gambler, Douglas said, and it paid off.
- The dad angle: Whatever sour grapes might have existed between Douglas and his father, who played RP McMurphy (Nicholson's role) on Broadway and dreamt of doing so on film, were perhaps over-exaggerated. "McMurphy is as good a part as any actor is going to get, and I'm now far enough in my career to understand maybe you have four, maybe five good parts, really great parts. I'm sure for dad that was one of them," Douglas said. "To not be able to see it through was probably disappointing on one side. On the other, the fact that his son did it and the picture turned out so good? Thank God the picture turned out."
- 'It was a fairy tale from beginning to end': "I doubt anything else really came close to it," said Douglas. "Even my Oscar for best actor years later didn't really surpass that moment very early in my career."
- One more time in theaters: The film will be in theaters again on July 13 and July 16 from Fathom Entertainment. It's a new 4K restoration from the Academy Film Archive and Teatro Della Pace Films with an introduction by Leonard Maltin.
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