Schindler’s List remains one of the most significant movies in the history of cinema that portrays the ugly side of mankind. Director Steven Spielberg has acknowledged time and again that the film took a tremendous toll on both the cast and crew involved. Consequently, Spielberg had to decline to direct Denzel Washington in The Little Things to avoid going through a similar experience again.
Schindler’s List Made Steven Spielberg Go Into a Dark Place
The movie-making genius Steven Spielberg once created a film called Schindler’s List, which will always hold significant importance in the history of cinema. This movie portrayed the chilling truth of the world during the Holocaust. Being Jewish himself, Spielberg was deeply affected and taken to a dark place while making the film.
In addition to the emotional toll, the struggle with the studios on how to make the movie, or whether to make it at all, added fuel to the fire. Thus, the director relied on Saturday Night Live and Robin Williams for a bit of laughter. He revealed at the Tribeca Film Festival as reported by USA Today,
“Robin knew what I was going through, and once a week, Robin would call me on schedule and he would do 15 minutes of stand-up on the phone, and I would laugh hysterically, because I had to release so much,–But the way Robin is on the telephone, he’d always hang up on the loudest, best laugh you’d give him. He’d never say goodbye, just hang up on the biggest laugh.”
The emotional toll also made him question whether it would be the last film he would ever direct, given his mental state after completing the project. However, he was wrong, eventually, he found hope and his film went on to change the world.
Steven Spielberg Was Force to Say ‘No’ to This Dark Denzel Washington Starrer
The movie that was finally released in 2021, The Little Things, was years in the making. Its initial draft was penned by John Lee Hancock back in 1993. He then approached Steven Spielberg with the script, hoping that Spielberg would eventually direct it. He revealed to Collider,
“Steven really liked A Perfect World, my script for it. And so, before we ever went into production on A Perfect World, he came to me and said, ‘Let’s do a blind picture deal. … Let’s just do it at Warner Brothers. Something for you to write and meet to direct.’ … So, we started pitching ideas back and forth.”
He continued by stating,
“I came up on this one, I can’t remember exactly when, and fell in love with it. The twists and turns. I wrote a long outline and then talked to him on the phone about it after he read it. And I think I faxed him the outline. … He really liked it. He said, ‘This is really, really good storytelling. It’s just too dark for me right now. I’m finishing Schindler’s List. I can’t live in this dark world again.’ And I understood that completely.”
However, the toll taken by Schindler’s List and Spielberg’s mental state at the time compelled him to reject the movie. And Hancock completely understood his reasoning and thus decided to direct it himself.
