Shining: Why Jack Nicholson wanted to write this famous scene

Writer Jack Torrance, a recovering alcoholic, takes a job as a winter caretaker at an inn nestled in the Rocky Mountains, isolating his wife, their psychically enhanced young son, and himself from the rest of the world until the following spring.

However, when the first blizzard blocks the only road to the hotel, the evil and sinister energy inherited from the past dramas in the hotel resurfaces. And slowly but steadily drives Jack Torrance into madness…

Obviously, after reading these few lines, you should recognize the story of Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece, The Shining. Jack Nicholson is amazingly brilliant as the goalkeeper Torrance. Not only is he one of the most iconic characters of his rich career, but his achievements since then have transcended the simple confines of film, making him one of the scariest characters ever seen on screen.

However, after his release, shines It received fairly lukewarm reviews and even two citations at the Razzie Awards (Worst Actress for Shelley Duvall and Worst Director). Because it is not a film like others, it took time and thought to make it a true masterpiece.

Nicholson gets his hands dirty

It turns out that one of the most memorable scenes in the film was written by Jack Nicholson himself as an echo of a delicate personal situation he experienced at some point in his life. What is the scene in this case? The one where Wendy comes to see him in the great hall of the Colorado living room where Jack has taken up residence with his typewriter.

The tension on the stage is very palpable. The more Wendy questions him, the more Jack, with an angry temper that barely hides his old demons that haunt him, has no desire to answer, faltering, annoyed, with one-word answers. “Don’t be so excited!” He shoots his wife. It explodes:

-Wendy, I’m going to explain something… every time you come in here, you interrupt me, distract me, lose track of me, and I need time to pick up where I left off. was!!! do you hear me?

-Yes…

– We are going to make a new rule. When I’m here you can hear me typing, if you can’t hear me typing what I’m doing here means I’m working. It means “do not enter”. Can you put it in your head?

-Yes…

– Good! So why not get started right away and get out of here?

The scene in the video…

In this scene, Jack Nicholson shows that his character is already boiling inside and that it doesn’t take much to explode. In a very long and fascinating interview given by the actor New York Times In July 1986, Nicholson revealed that he had written the scene himself, based on his experience of divorcing his wife, to express his character’s frustration with Wendy. Nicholson was actually married to Sandra Knight and divorced in 1968 after six years of marriage.

“I was under the pressure of father and daughter. I accepted a job to play in the cinema during the day, and I wrote a film in the evening. I was in my little corner. And my lovely wife Sandra walked in and found herself face to face with this maniac. I talked to Stanley about that memory and we wrote that scene.”

Telling an anecdote to a reporter in the voice of his character Jack Torrance, he adds: “I remember sitting at my desk and saying to him, ‘Even if you can’t understand my typing, it doesn’t mean I’m not writing!’ I remember this crazy feud I had. Well, I finally broke up.”