Michael Douglas, Milos Forman, Louise Fletcher, Jack Nicholson and Saul Zaentz celebrate their 1975 Oscar sweep for One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest.

From filmbug.com

“I holed up in the Chelsea Hotel in Greenwich Village, he recalls, sleeping 23 hours a day. My close friend Ivan Passer, another Czech filmmaker, would visit a psychiatrist, tell him my symptoms, and then come back to my hotel to relate what the doctor had said.”

Forman was close to a nervous collapse in 1973 when he got a package from Michael Douglas and Saul Zaentz containing a copy of Ken Kesey’s hit novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.

This apparently jinxed project had been turned down by all major Hollywood studios: “Who wants to go see a film about a bunch of loonies?” Douglas and Zaentz asked Forman if he would be interested in making a film of the book. “Of course I said yes. I loved the novel from the start and thought it would make a wonderful movie. This showed me that it’s much more comfortable to slip into a state of acute depression here than back home. In Prague, if the government says, ‘no-you can’t make this film,’ that’s it. But in America, if one studio tells you ‘no,’ the next day comes along Michael Douglas and Saul Zaentz who say, ‘yes-we want you to make this film.”

When Milos Forman came to Oregon to shoot One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest, he was following in the footsteps of three of his new colleagues.

Star Jack Nicholson had just finished directing his own Oregon film.

Producer Michael Douglas had just finished starring in his own Oregon film.

Father Kirk Douglas, who gave the film rights to Kesey’s novel to son Michael, began his own producing career years before with his own Oregon film.

Total number of Oregon filmmakers working on Cuckoo’s Nest: 4 (counting Milos himself)

Kirk Douglas was miffed, and no wonder. It is easy to see why Kirk Douglas saw himself as Randal P. McMurphy, the man who challenges his roommates in the looney bin to think for themselves. As a producer, Douglas defied industry practice in 1960 when he openly credited blacklisted Dalton Trumbo with authorship of the screenplay for Spartacus, a decision widely viewed as bringing an end to the blacklist all together.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Spartacus was the ninth film made by Kirk Douglas’ Bryna Productions company. The Indian Fighter, an Oregon film, was the first.

The screenplay for One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest was written by industry legend, Bo Goldman. Here Goldman drinks coffee in Salem’s Oregon State Hospital, where most of One Flew over The Cuckoo’s Nest was shot. The man beside him I believe is Michael Douglas, who co-produced with Saul Zaentz.

Nobody likes it when the producer visits the set, which is why Michael Douglas is trying to make himself invisible by looking as if he is tremendously interested in whatever Bo is saying.

One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest was nominated for nine Academy Awards, and made a clean sweep of the top five: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Actor and Best Actress.

Based on a book by an Oregon author, and shot on location in the Oregon State Mental Hospital, Cuckoo’s Nest is the most widely recognized Oregon film.

Click here to view the embedded video.

A star is born! That’s Jody Foster riding a circus lion in Southern Oregon. This completely implausible and uninspired children’s film also stars Michael Douglas.

What is this film about? Everyone knows you can’t run away with a circus lion. Jody Foster was mauled by her co-star during the production, and has said in interview she still has scars from the stitches — in her neck– today.

This is why you don’t want your kids to star in movies with lions. However Jody survived and now owns two Oscars.

I hereby claim Napoleon and Samantha as an Oregon film, based on its location shooting.