Elliott Kastner

Early life and career

Kastner was born to a Jewish family in New York City. His father died when he was young, and he was raised by his mother in Harlem.

He attended the University of Miami and Columbia University. During the 1950s, he was stationed with United States European Command in Frankfurt and Paris.

Agent

Kastner worked in the mail room at the William Morris Agency in New York, becoming a literary agent. He moved to Los Angeles and became a talent agent at the Music Corporation of America (MCA). When that agency merged with Decca Records, which owned Universal Pictures, Lew Wasserman, the president of MCA, made Kastner vice president of production at Universal. He worked there for two years before becoming an independent producer.

Producer

Kastner's first film as producer was Bus Riley's Back in Town (1965) based on a script by William Inge and starring Ann-Margret and Michael Parks. Inge was so unhappy with the final result he requested his name be taken off the credits and the film was not a commercial or critical success.

Jerry Gershwin

Kastner then teamed up with producer Jerry Gershwin to form Winkast Film Productions, based at Pinewood Studios in Buckinghamshire. They wound up making eleven movies together, the first of which was the highly popular Harper (1966) from a novel by Ross Macdonald and directed by Jack Smight. The screenplay was written by William Goldman who had been talking to Kastner about a film of Goldman's novel Boys and Girls Together; Goldman suggested that the Ross MacDonald Lew Archer series would make a good movie, and Kastner bought the rights. Kastner then got Goldman to write a sequel The Chill, but it was never made.

Kastner's third film was Kaleidescope (1966), made in England, directed by Smight with Warren Beatty and Susannah York. Kastner and Gershwin raised the finance independently, and sold it to a studio, Warner Bros. "That was the beginning of producers taking control creatively by self financing", said his stepson Cassian Elwes, who later became a producer himself.

Winkast then made The Bobo (1968), starring Peter Sellers and his then-wife Britt Ekland, and Sweet November (1968), with Sandy Dennis. Both were released through Warners, but Sol Madrid (1968) was released through MGM.

Sol Madrid was directed by Brian G. Hutton who helmed Kastner and Gershwin's next film, Where Eagles Dare (1968). The producer had managed to persuade Alistair MacLean to write an original screenplay as a vehicle for Richard Burton (it was later turned into a novel). The movie was a big hit and led to Kastner adapting several other MacLean stories and working with Burton a number of other times. Other MacLean adaptations included When Eight Bells Toll (1971), Fear is the Key and Breakheart Pass (1975).

Less popular was The Night of the Following Day (1969) with Marlon Brando.

Burton was meant to star in Laughter in the Dark (1969) but was fired during filming and replaced by Nicol Williamson. Kastner had involvement in Man on Horseback (1969).

In the late 1960s Kastner wanted rock star Jim Morrison to play Billy the Kid in a movie adaption of Michael McClure's The Beard.

Later years

Kastner planned to make Nightwork from a novel by Irwin Shaw directed by Frank Perry but the film was not made.

He made Absolution starring Richard Burton.

Kastner independently financed Oxford Blues which he sold to MGM. Peter Bart, an executive at MGM at the time, called Kastner "a maverick filmmaker... a stooped, rumpled, wizened little man" who "had a reputation in the industry for coming up with deals that were far more intriguing than his movies. Though over the years he’d produced a couple of highprofile films... he’d also proven remarkably adept at funding obscure films that failed to find audiences." Bart claims the film was made for $1.8 million but Kastner sold it to MGM for $6 million, including his $1 million fee.

In the mid-1980s Kastner frequently worked with his step son, Cassian Elwes. In the 1970s he had mentored Arnon Milchan.

Kastner produced Heat from a novel by William Goldman starring Burt Reynolds. Robert Altman was going to direct but he and Kastner clashed and Altman left the project. Kastner replaced him with Dick Richards, who had directed Farewell My Lovely for Kastner, but Richards clashed with Reynolds and left the project during filming.

In 1987 Kastner and Andre Blay bought 70% of Cinema Group Home video. In the late 1980s he was going to make Jericho with Marlon Brando. Instead he made Angel Heart with Alan Parker. Parker called Kastner " an irascible gadfly in the film industry, having been involved with more films than Technicolor and outlived fifty studio heads and as many lawsuits. Many was the time I’ve seen him ‘work’ the tables in the Pinewood Studios restaurant on the way to the men's room. He usually stayed just long enough to blow his nose in your napkin, dispense some wickedly cynical aphorism about the movies and move on. There is an oft-told story that Marlon Brando finally said yes to doing Missouri Breaks because he could not face the prospect of Elliott Kastner, on his knees, crying in front of him one more time."

In 1988 he declared bankruptcy.

Family

He was married and divorced twice. In 1960 he first married actor Carolyn Hughes. He was the second husband of the interior designer Tessa Kennedy (m 1971), with whom he had two children, a son, Dillon and a daughter, Milica. He had been introduced to Kennedy by Warren Beatty.

"The marriage worked very well", says Kennedy. "For eight years we'd only spend three or four days a month together. It wouldn't have lasted more than a year if we'd been together because we're very different and volatile." Kennedy and Kastner separated in 1995.

He was also a stepfather to Kennedy's three sons from a previous marriage: film producer Cassian Elwes, artist Damian Elwes and actor Cary Elwes.

Death

Elliott Kastner died of cancer on June 30, 2010, in London at the age of 80.

Towards the end of his life he had approached David Thomson to see if he was interested in writing Kastner's biography. Thomson recalled: He was the way producers were once supposed to be—showily cynical yet deeply attached to his projects; absolutely aware that a producer had to make a lot of pictures before the trash and the triumphs got sorted out; belligerent but sensitive, tough-mouthed sometimes; arrogant and Cagneyesque, but very well read; devoted to writers and alert to children... He admitted he had been a scoundrel sometimes—you had to be—but he knew there was good work to show for it.

According to one obituary he: "Was noted for his skill in bringing together writers, directors and stars for generally commercial (though sometimes surprisingly cerebral) films. He excelled in literary adaptations, from popular works such as those of Raymond Chandler and Alistair MacLean to the more esoteric output of such writers as Iris Murdoch, Vladimir Nabokov and Edna O'Brien. He also favoured tales with strong, single-minded heroes and produced films featuring such actors as Marlon Brando, Paul Newman, Jack Nicholson, Robert Mitchum, Burt Reynolds and Richard Burton."

In 2014 it was announced a deal had been struck to release all of his films on DVD.

Filmography

He was a producer in all films unless otherwise noted.

Film

Miscellaneous crew

Thanks

The Children of Sanchez (1962)

Flight into Camden from novel by David Storey (1962)

Hanno's Doll with Jane Fonda and Stanley Kramer (1962)

adaptation of Boys and Girls Together (1966) – to be directed by Sydney Pollack

The Telephone Book an original script by Harry Cohn (1966)

Sard Harker based on a book by John Masefield

Fruit of the Poppy by Robert Wilder

Chow Charlie Baby based on novel by David Dodge

The Violent Land a western to be directed by Brian Hutton

Revolutionary Road based on novel by Richard Yates

musical adaptation of Treasure Island for Cinema Center Films (1968)

The Chill (1967) – sequel to Harper – at one stage to be directed by Sam Peckinpah

Rose of Tibet (late 1960s)

Hall of Mirrors (late 1960s)

Caribbean (late 1960s)

The Violent Land (late 1960s)

Hive of Glass (late 1960s)

Sard Harder (late 1960s)

Theatre credits

Two Weeks Somewhere Else by Herman Raucher (1966)

Marilyn! The Musical (1983)