'Hook', Screenwriter, J.V. Hart

0:09Jawad MirWelcome back, everyone, to another episode of Kingdom of Dreams Podcast: The Making of Stories. I'm your host Jawad Mir again. Today, another repeat guest, screenwriter JV Hart. I had him last year, I think it was mid last year, for Bram Stoker's Dracula, and it was one of the most watched and listened, episode of on our podcast to date. And today I have him for Hook, which was directed by Steven Spielberg, starred Dustin Hoffman and Robin Williams. I love talking to JV Hart, which you'll find out in this, podcast as well. He just has this amazing ability of telling stories, and I can just sit back and relax and get inspired and listen to him. So without further ado, here's my conversation with screenwriter JV Hart. Well, good to have you again. We talked a few months back about, Bram Stoker's Dracula. It was a great conversation. We had a lot of people watching it and listening to it, and today we're talking about Steven Spielberg's Hook, which I hadn't seen for a long time, and I just finished watching it this morning, so I woke up a little early just to kinda refresh my memory.

1:12Jawad MirAnd, yeah, so we're here to talk about that. I really enj… enjoyed it. And, you know, I've read a lot about it, that how, there's a lot of pro… obviously, you know, the budget was over, and Spielberg, even as recent as 2012, wasn't really happy with the way Hook came out. I don't know how much of it is true or not, but…

1:32J.V. HartIt's all true. It's, like, when you said Steven Spielberg's Hook, I was gonna correct you. It wasn't his Hook.

1:37Jawad MirOkay.

1:37J.V. HartIt was Jay Hart, Jay Hart, age six year old Hook. And, it didn't, Steven has gone out of his way to say, you know, disparaging comments about it in spite of its success.

1:52Jawad MirOkay. Well…

1:53J.V. HartThat, in fact, I have the, right here I have the 1990 script that I wrote before Steven got involved and before Dustin and Robin got involved, when it was just a development deal that Nick Castle and I was on the back burner at Sony when we were doing it. So, you can call it Steven Spielberg's Hook. He won't appreciate it, and I don't appreciate it.

2:16Jawad MirI…

2:16J.V. HartIt's, it's, it's a shame because all the people that worked so hard on that film, all the talent, all the crew, the distribution, marketing people who knocked themselves out for that film. And then, he says he doesn't, it's, you know, he doesn't like it. Now, you can be disappointed in your work, you know, and he had a real, he had a rough time making the film, a real struggle with the budget and the schedule, and he needed, in my opinion, he needed six more months with the script to affi… to totally make it his. You know? And I just read somepla… so there's a big interview that we just, on, for the 30th, and I read a piece that's where Steven was being interviewed, and he'd always wanted to make it a musical. He'd wa… excuse me. He wanted to make Peter Pan a musical. That had been in his, in his game plan for years. And he wanted to make, he, his first instincts for Hook was to turn it into a musical.

3:19J.V. HartAnd he actually had five or six songs written by Leslie Bricusse and music by John Williams. And I read where he said he should have stuck to his instincts and made it a musical. So maybe that would have satisfied. The musical numbers that they shot didn't fit. They didn't fit the tone, you know. But I think if he had to go back and do it all over again, he would make it a musical.

3:47Jawad MirRight. Going back to what I was saying about Steven Spielberg's Hook, it wasn't in a sense that it's his film. It's more like a, you know, you kinda come to terms with the marketing, the way films are promoted, like, you know, Spielberg's Jurassic Park. It's just one of those things that kinda stays in his head, in our head. But I do feel that, when I was watching Hook, I was just blown away by, especially, among many other things, the production design. Like, the amount of work that went into the sets and the costume and the detail. I mean, I have never seen anything like that before. Even films like Pirates of the Caribbean, like, you know, it was, it's just not there in any other film.

4:28J.V. HartWell, you can see it, you can see it again in, Wicked.

4:32Jawad MirI haven't seen the Wicked yet. I haven't…

4:34J.V. HartYeah. Jon Chu was a kid when he saw Hook, and he's the director of Wicked and, some, among other films. And he's Filipino. And Dante's role in that film inspired a ton of Asian, young people that had never seen, a young Filipino or young Asian actor in a big Hollywood movie. And he was so blown away by Hook, so, and Marc Platt, who produced Wicked, was at TriStar in those days. And, if you see Wicked, he built everything. I mean, they built everything. Not a lot of CG. They built it, and it was fr… and the production design was the, on Hook, was the brainchild of John Napier. Norman Garwood gets credit for being production design, but Steven brought Napier in to be, and gave him visual consultant. It was the only film John Napier's ever designed. He's known for Cats, Les Mis, Sunset Boulevard, Starlight Express. I mean, he reinvented the s… the Broadway sets as well.

5:48J.V. HartSo, when he came on the film, my wife and I were ecstatic. So were the kids, 'cause we had seen all of those shows and, just absolutely loved Napier's work. So, and I couldn't wait to meet him. So when I finally got to LA, when Steven said, "Come on out," they were way, they were already in full-blown pre-production. You know, and, I got to meet Napier, and we became great friends. And he said, "Come here." We had, they had a workshop and, you know, people were drawing and designing and sketching and what have you, and building models. And he took me over in the corner, said to us, "I want you to, I wanna tell you why I'm doing this movie." He said, "Steven's asked me to do films over the years, and I kept turning him down." He said, "Then I read your script. This one. Then I read your script, and I started drawing in the margins designs, you know, 'cause y… because the world you were describing I had not seen, but it made, it made so much sense.

6:52J.V. HartSo I'm here because of your script, not because of Steven Spielberg." and that, and that stayed with me throughout the entire production. And the sets were staggering. Our kids spent the summer on those sets. You know, it became a big deal in the business to get to go tour the Hook set. You know, you'd get a special pass, and they'd, you know, ask certain people in the cast or the crew to give the tours. We had everybody from Prince to Bruce Willis to, Cathy Rigby who played Peter Pan on, you know. I mean, every ma… every major movie star wanted to come to the set. Ricky Dreyfuss, was there, the day I was there. And, it, they were mind-blowing to go to and spend time in. There was such detail, and all kinds of places you could hang out and not be seen. You know, the pirate town was staggering. And I think Steven, that was, that gave it that stagey musical kind of feeling, you know.

7:55J.V. HartAnd I think that's what he was missing for himself was it should've been a musical. To be quite honest with you, when my family first saw the film, they wouldn't speak to me for two days.

8:09Jawad MirReally?

8:09J.V. HartThey knew what was missing in the script. They knew what had, they knew this script, and they knew what was missing. Now, the audience never knew what was missing, and it was a big lesson for me to the audience decides if we're a success or not. Not the filmmaker, not the writer, not the actors, not the production design. The audience is who determines whether or not we're a success. And so when we finally, the family, we started going to the, to the film playing here in New York in theaters and just go buy tickets and sit and be part of the audience. And the audience reaction was staggering. I mean, there were cheers and laughing and tears and, you know, applause at the end. So my kids learned, as did my wife, Judy, that it's the audience. And Steven made a great audience film, you know. Thank God for Michael Kahn, his editor, you know, who would keep me abreast on how he was doing with the structure and what have you.

9:19J.V. HartThe audience made that film a success. It's still, the audience made it a success, a success today. It's 35 years old, and it's still growing in terms of its audience. It's not gotten smaller. It's gotten bigger. And I think we're now in our third generation.

9:35J.V. HartI've got people that, I've got people that grew up with my kids that are now married and have kids. So there's grandchildren that are seeing the film because their parents saw the film. And my daughter Julia, who's a director and writer in her own right, she's done five, six films in the last seven, eight years, she and her husband, they have our two grandsons. She and her husband called us late one night here in New York, and they're in LA, and she was a mess. And she said, "Dad, you know, I haven't seen this film in years. It's so different when you're a parent and you have kids. It's a completely different experience." So it, Steven created something that is universal, that is everlasting, that's forever young, and preserves the great Robin Williams' performance, who's incredible in the film. Bob Hoskins, who became a great friend. They both did. Even my buddy David Crosby, you know. The performances in, that Robin gives, and Bob is sort of the glue, it's astounding.

10:44J.V. HartThere was only one person that could play that part, and that was Robin. It's the only time I ever wrote a script with a k… with an actor in mind. If you couldn't get Robin, don't make the film, you know. But, the audience has continued. It's blo… blows me away. You saw it last night. And, you know, we're actually doing a w… Jake and I, my son actually, who had the idea for Hook, actually have a new Neverlands project that we're working on that, we hope that BBC is gonna let us do. I'm gonna shut up. I'm, you pushed my button, so.

11:20Jawad MirIt's okay. No, I'm glad you're, you said what you felt because one of the things that you mentioned, excuse me. So when I saw Hook, I would guess probably '92, '93, couple of years after it came out, it was, yes, it was like a children's movie, right? Like Peter Pan, obviously I'd seen the Disney version that came out I think in '50s or '60s. But watching it this morning as a parent, I felt like I don't know why there is a dislikement for it, even many, from anyone, whether it's the people on who worked on it or audience, because it has such... I, Bob Hask… Hoskins and Dustin Hoffman for me were like, I felt like they were, you know, Smee and Hook because that to me, I mean, they've done amazing films That was their biggest performance and the way they embodied themselves into the characters. Obviously Robin Williams himself, that's, that's an obvious.

12:23Jawad MirBut the, it was just so well done, the music, the production design, the performances, the father-son relationship, everything. I don't know. I don't know why he, it's considered one of his least successful film by critics, by himself or whatever, but I think it's really up there. Maybe it's one of those film that needs, that's admired by time. But I…

12:45J.V. HartWell, it has been admired, it has been admired by time.

12:47Jawad MirYeah. Yeah.

12:47J.V. HartI mean, it is wildly successful. It made a fortune.

12:50Jawad MirYeah.

12:50J.V. HartAnd the a… its afterlife has been phenomenal. And you have to mention Caroline Goodall too, who played, Robin's wife, who played Moira. It was her first big role…

13:00Jawad MirYeah, she was amazing

13:01J.V. Hart... And she, and she's become a great friend, and she killed it. You know? I mean, he, Steven wanted to cast somebody that wasn't a movie star, that was a great actor, and he got Caroline, you know. But you're right, it's.. And the critics did not like it. They reviewed the budget, I think, and, it was the big, Sony's first big splash in Hollywood and it was a... It didn't open the way they wanted it, wanted it to open. Globally it did extremely well, and it's still doing well. The afterlife it's had is staggering. And I don't think it opened as the way Steven wanted it to open. I don't think it had the critical ac… acclaim that he'd hoped it would have. It was something that had been burning inside him for a long time as well as me, and Dustin, and Robin. We were all fathers. You know, we, and everybody had kids.

13:51J.V. HartAnd we'd grown up with the Disney version, you know?

13:55Jawad MirRight.

13:55J.V. HartAnd Mary Martin and Cathy Rigby in the Jerome Robbins musical. So to have a grown-up Peter Pan was a big departure, but it spoke to the fa… the fathers that we had all become. And I would never have written it if I hadn't had kids. I wouldn't have had the idea if it hadn't come from my six-year-old son then, you know. So yeah, it's it's a very different movie when you're grown up.

14:21Jawad Mir100%. You talked about it earlier, when we talked about Dracula, and you just mentioned now. If you can sort of walk me through the u… the genesis, which you just said that, you know, because of your son, and then how the script was not being purchased by studios. Just run that story by me.

14:38J.V. HartYeah.

14:38Jawad MirJust the pre-stuff.

14:39J.V. HartWell, the, m… most of my projects have not been easy to get done. We talked about Dracula, how many years I was on that, 1977 to 1991, trying to get it made.

14:51Jawad MirRight.

14:52J.V. HartWhen you have k… w… we had, Jake and Julia were, six and four. And actually Jake at age three... I mean, when you have kids, Peter Pan in the Barrie book and all the stuff about Peter Pan, i… i… unless you're just tone deaf and blind, you introduce your kids to the whole idea of Peter Pan and Captain Hook and Neverland and Tinker Bell and Lost Boys and y… you know. So, when we, I d… I took Jake at age three to see E.T., Steven.

15:28J.V. HartAnd it was the first, I think Star Wars and then E.T. Were the first grown-up movies he went and sat in my lap. And in E.T. There's a whole scene about Peter Pan, about the book. S… so we read the book. We sort of, we introduced J… Jake to the whole idea of the story afterwards 'cause he asked about it, you know. And we have a scrapbook around here somewhere, and one day Jake is doing one of those kid drawings, those three-year-old drawings that…

15:58J.V. Hart... That's better than Picasso but, you know, you can't sell it. And we're going, "Oh, Jake, that's really cool. What is that?" You know? "What's, what's it a picture of?" And he said, and it, and totally ident… identifiable. He said, "That's the crocodile eating Captain Hook." And we went, "Oh, yeah, I can see that." You know, I was like... And then he said, kinda going spiritual, he leaned forward and said, "But Captain Hook got away. The crocodile didn't eat him." And I went, "Whoa. Captain Hook is alive." And that began the whole stirring at age three about, okay, Captain Return, Revenge of Captain Hook. Captain Hook's not dead. What does that mean? And we kept going back and doing the same story. The Darling kids go back to Neverland. It's the same, you know, the same old, same old. And this is about three years, you know, where I was trying to figure out what... And Steven was trying to do Peter Pan too.

16:58J.V. HartYou know? So had, Co… Coppola. So had, John Hughes. The great John Hughes wrote a script about, Peter Pan in the 1940s or in World War II. It was in the zeitgeist. Michael Jackson wanted to do Peter Pan. It was in the zeitgeist.

17:19J.V. HartSo cut to age six, and I'm in need of a job. I'm at, you know, I need a gig. I mean, I've written a couple things and nothing's really worked. I was a development deal junkie. And we used to play a game at the dinner table, J… Jake was six, Julia was four, called What If. And the What If game was we would take a fairy tale and stand it on its ear. You know, what if the glass slipper broke? Or what if, what if, Prince Charming had bad breath and s… and Sleeping Beauty didn't wanna kiss him, you know? What would happen if the ring didn't fit on Frodo's finger, you know? What if, Harry Potter was a bad magician, you know, and only did bar mitzvahs and stuff, you know? So we did that. We played that What If game and spin, you know, stories. And Jake one night at the table said, "Hey, Dad, did Peter Pan ever grow up?" And, I, like the wonderful parent that I was, I said, "Nah, that's a stupid question.

18:24J.V. HartNo, Peter Pan never grew up. He was the boy who couldn't grow up." And then rather defiantly Jake said, "Yeah, but what if Peter Pan grew up?" Dead silence at the table, you know. And then boom, we all started riffing. I said, "Oh my God, that's..." We all, you know, that's exactly what the question to be asked, what if Peter Pan grew up? And, that night we cooked up a story, the whole family. You know, Jake and Julia, they're, they're creating, you know. And we figured that the worst thing we could do to Peter Pan was have him grow up to be a lawyer. We figured that would do it. You know, he would turn into an adult, he would forget how to fly, he would stop believing in fairies, all the things. He'd become a capitalist and, you know, like us and ambitious and greedy and, you know, just an adult and a lawyer. So I wrote a, I wrote a... That night we came up with the bones of the story, and I wrote a five-page treatment, The Return of Captain Hook.

19:29J.V. HartAnd Captain Hook was gonna come back and steal Peter's kids, which seemed the obvious revenge, you know. And 'cause that was 'cause I had, I had my two kids right there which were the templates for Jack and Maggie in Hook. A lot of the lines and stuff came right out of our experience with them as kids, you know. Even going to London. And I was terrified because Disney owned that territory. You know, Peter Pan was all over Disney. Plus they had a whole franchise on the Pirates of Caribbean, you know, they owned that kind of pirate thing.

20:12J.V. HartAnd I told my agent about it, at the time, and he said, "Wow, a grown-up Peter Pan." So we pitched it all over town, all over every studio, producers, a ton of people, and everybody passed. They... I didn't have a, I didn't have a big profile then. I wasn't like a big deal. I'm not big deal now, but I mean, the... I didn't have a bunch of produced scripts. So I was like, you know, "Well, it's a really good idea, Jim." But I had one executive, and it's a, it was a great pitch. I mean, it was very emotional and, the story about losing your childhood and discovering it back through your, through going in. And anyway, one executive said to me, "That's an incredible story, and I can see why you're so passionate about it." But he said, "I really don't think grown-ups can fly." That was his reason for passing, you know.

21:14Jawad MirInteresting.

21:15J.V. HartAnd if I could've gotten up and flown out the window and said, "Thank you very much," I would've, you know. But we got that over and over again. So it broke my heart, and I put it on the shelf, forgot about it. Lasse Hallström was gonna do a Peter Pan. There was another, John Hughes was gonna do it. So it was, you know, there was word, "Oh, they're gonna do it. You're too late."

21:33Jawad MirRight.

21:36J.V. HartAnd my kids and my wife would give me Peter Pan presents every Christmas and every birthday. It would just drove me crazy. You know? "Come on. Stop it. Just forget it." And then one, I had two producers, Gary Adelson and, I can't remember. They're on the... Craig. I can't remember his last name. I was writing a script for them at Sony, and they asked me, they said, "Do you have anything on your shelf that you love that you just can't get anywhere with?" I said, "Yeah, I do." And I took out my treatment and gave them my treatment, and they said, "This is fucking great." You know? And they introduced me to Nick Castle.

22:15J.V. HartNick had done a wonderful, very heartfelt film, The Boy Who Could Fly. It's about suicide, you know. And I loved, I had loved... He also did The Last Starfighter, which was a, was a very identical to the first script that I ever got to Spielberg and Frank Marshall back in '82. We never made it, but it was that, it was in that sci-fi vein. Nick read it and said, "This is great. Let's do it." Nick was like me. He had a, he had, he had a better profile than I did, but he wasn't an A-list director. I wasn't an A-list writer. And this read very expensive. So Jeff Sagansky, who was running TriStar, Nick had made a film there with, Gregory Hines called Tap. Modest budget, did well, and, Sagansky said, "Yeah, I'll give you guys a development deal. Sure. Here." Well, he threw us a bone. Not a lot of money.

23:16J.V. HartAnd just he was be… doing Nick a favor. So he and I disappeared for a year. Nobody knew what we were doing. My agent did. John Levin did. Nobody knew what we were doing. And at the same time I'm doing Dracula that nobody ever really passed on. We had that, we had that discussion. So I had Dracula and Hook that I was writing that nobody wanted to do for not a lot of money, and we were off the radar. So Nick and I had so much fun for a year. We had smoked cigars. We drank wine. We had good cognac, scotch. You know, I would go out and sleep on a friend's couch, and he and I would riff all day and into the night, and we finally came up with a draft. By this time, Sagansky was gone from TriStar, and Mike Medavoy came in, who had been a great agent and a, you know, a great producer and been in the business a long time. So we figured we would be doomed, you know, because usually a new executive comes in, they just clean house.

24:15Jawad MirYep.

24:16J.V. HartSo we turned in a revised, we turned in a... Nobody even read the first script we turned in. So, we said we wanna revo… we want to do revisions, so they, we, y… th… and so we turned in th-this script to my agent, John Levin, who flipped out over it. And he said, "This is amazing." And Mac Medavoy read it and went, "Wait a minute, what is this doing on the bottom of the pile of scripts that are in development? This is a, should be the biggest Christmas movie of all time." You know? And Nick and I were not, didn't have the cred to suddenly fit that vision that people were beginning to have. So, and I didn't, I didn't know what was going on at that time. I was barely able to make rent. I had to borrow money. The, they paid us so little, I had to borrow money, to make rent. And we were actually out in Wyoming staying with friends who had loaned us money to, so the kids could have something to do.

25:18J.V. HartAnd I remember we were at, we were in, Jackson Hole, and we were eating, lunch at Cadillac Jack's. I'm hoping the credit card goes through, you know. And in those days, you didn't have cell phones., And you had answering machines., So I would check in with my agent, with John Levin, once a week to see if there anything going on. You got, can I get work anywhere? You know. And, what I didn't tell you is while I was writing Hook and Director, the agency fired me. I was over 40. I'd not had a film produced. There was, they really didn't see any, there wasn't really anybody there that wanted to keep me hanging around, except for John Levin. And, my lawyers tried to get me a new agent, and everybody in town turned me down. You know, old guy, hasn't really b… doesn't really seem to have, be able to figure it out, you know.

26:21J.V. HartAnyway, I went down the stairs to the phone booth to check in my answering machine, and in those days you also had a telephone credit card. So you're going, "Yeah, put it on my credit card," you know. Charge it to... You had a number. And, the ph… the call went through, and usually when I called my agent, it's always, "He's in a meeting. He'll call you back." Or he, you know, "He's, he's out of the office. We'll try you later." This time, John got on immediately. I went, "Whoa." He s-s-say, "Hold on." and, we did the amenity. I started saying, "Hey, how are you?" You know, and he said, he said, "A very important director wants to do Hook." And I said, "We already have a director. We've got Nick." You know? "Are we making any movement on casting?" You know. And he said, "No. I'm telling you, a very important director wants to do Hook." And I said to John, "Well, if it's not Steven Spielberg, we've got nothing to talk about." And he said, "That's who it is."

27:22J.V. HartYou know, mic drop, phone like, blah. What? So I go back upstairs, and the kids are there, and Judy, they're all like, "Did John have anything, any news?" You know. And I sat down and tried to hold it together and said, "Yeah, Steven Spielberg's gonna direct Hook." And again, like, what? And to, you know... That changed, that changed our life instantly. I mean, it changed career, changed e… just because he was gonna do Hook. And we were all like, "Wow, this is great." Because Judy, my wife, had always known that when Steven found out about Hook, he would drop everything and do it. They'd known each other back in the day. And, that he'd stop everything. He was in the middle of Jurassic Park, and he was prep… prepping Schindler's List. Put him on hold, and what I found out, the problem was now we had Nick Castle, you know.

28:22J.V. HartAnd I'm, I'm, I'm torn and conflicted because I'm loyal to Nick. And they would probably have said, you know, I said, "They're probably gonna bring a bunch of other writers in and replace me anyway." you know, and we'll get our little deal and have our name on it and be happy. What I understood was that Medavoy liked the script so much, Levin took the script to Robin and to Dustin Hoffman. He literally physically delivered the script to Robin. They committed before Spielberg. I didn't know that. They had said, "We're, we're in." You know. And th… but they weren't gonna work with Nick Castle. You know, they wanted a, they wanted a big director. So my understanding is that Medavoy, apparently they had five directors they picked, and they were gonna go to submit the script to them for the weekend. They had to make their, up their mind that weekend, yes or no. I don't know who the five were, but I know that Barry Levinson was one, Dick Donner was one, Steven Spielberg was one.

29:27J.V. HartI'm not sure who the other two would have been, but Steven was the top of the list. And I was do… actually had written the script for Frank Marshall at that time, and was, and it was still not, it wasn't dead, but we were still friendly and kicking around, and his assistant, Mary Radford, had taken good care of me. And, Charles Vane was a producer on Nick and I's, project, and he was producing for Steven as well. And I, and Mary Radford kept saying to me, "I'm hearing a lot about Hook." You know, I said, "Yeah, Nick and I are doing it, and we're gonna have, you know, it's, we're gonna try to get it made." And she said, "No, I'm hearing a lot about Hook." So when J… when John Levin told me that on the phone, I didn't know any of this. And, I mean, literally overnight, things changed. You know, people in, at our s… kids' schools were rooting for us. They couldn't believe it was a fairy tale. You know, it was, it was unbelievable.

30:29J.V. HartSteven and I had known each other back at the very beginning of his career when I first moved to LA. He'd met Judy through Joan Darling, a wonderful actor, director, performer. So there was a history with Steven. He also knew about the project I had written for Frank Marshall, the sci-fi project. So when it came back around, he didn't know it was Jake's idea. And we spoke one day on the phone. He called to, 'cause, like, they were already positioning me to be replaced, you know. I c… I just knew it, you know, 'cause I didn't have, I wasn't, you know, I didn't mean anything. And they got rid of Nick, so why wouldn't they get rid of me? And in the call I had with Steven, I talked to him about it, the whole story of Jake, and he had no, he di… he didn't have any idea that's where this came from, and I think it changed his point of view on this as well, that this really had come out of our family, like him and his family embracing…

31:36J.V. Hart... Peter Pan. So they kept me around, gave me a big office. I went to work on the, rewriting the script with, Bruce Cohen was our s… second AD, our first AD who, you know, Steven was giving, but they were already in full pre-production, and they were re… And so they wanted a release date for Christmas. This was '91. They want… this was 1990.

31:59J.V. HartThey wanted it Christmas '91. So in the summer of 1990, they were already, they, I mean, John, everybody, they were building sets. They had stages when they brought me in. And, I got to work with Anthony Powell, great costume designer who'd been in a bunch of films with Steven. I got to work with John Napier. I got to work with all these incredibly talented people, and Steven was good about that. He just threw me in there. And he was, he was really dismantling the script and then trying to make it his, you know. That's when Malia Scotch Marmo came on. Dustin wanted, his own writer. He wanted Malia to come in and rewrite his stuff. So Steven was sort of obligated to have her, have the same role I did, and b… and more access because of Dustin. And it was, you know, it was pretty magic. I mean, I was working on Dracula, so the fact that they had other writers come in and working on Hook and I'd get the pages was okay with me, but the kids were over the moon, you know.

33:07J.V. HartI mean, imagine being six years old, and nine, they were six and nine at that point. No, Jake was 11, and Julia was nine. Coming to LA on spring break and going on the sets on the, where they, all the MGM musicals were made, and you walk on the, into Pirate Town in a pirate ship that, and the word spread very quickly that it was J… had been Jake's idea. So we had, we had a, you know, a jacket made for him that said Creator with a hook logo. And every day during shooting when Jake was around, Robin would come up to Jake and bow and go, "Thank you for my job, Jake Son. Thank you for my job, Jake. Thank you for my job, Jake." So the word had spread through the whole production that it was Jake's idea. Spielberg let him on the set. He would sit behind him, watch him direct. He'd stay there all day. Julia was allowed, too, but Jake is the one that really was the, he took this opportunity as age 11 and soaked it up.

34:08J.V. HartHe was allowed to go to dailies. Even the studio executives weren't allowed to go to dailies, you know. Steven really bent over backwards to make the family comfortable, you know. I would get script pages every, weekend for the sh… next week's shoot that had been revised by Malia or, I think Carrie Fisher came in and did some dialogue for Tinker Bell.

34:35J.V. HartBut I would get these pages from Kathy Kennedy from the office on Fridays, you know, to review. And, I would send Steven faxes on Sunday night with notes, you know. I got over the fact that I was, you know, the, I got over the fact that this is what happens. You know, you get a bunch of writers in. You got a director who's powerful. You know, he's trying to get it his way, and he's gotta shoot every day. So, and I would point out things to him that I thought he was missing or that don't forget this or who do you f… you know. And then Monday on the set, he would show up with my script pages with his notes on them and give them to Malia and say, "Go type this up for the, for the shoot today," not saying anything about me. And at first I was pissed off. And then I thought, "Wait a minute, it doesn't matter." It doesn't really matter where the good ideas come from or who has them, as long as it gets done.

35:36J.V. HartYou know, it's only, it doesn't matter what, about your ego or anything. So this went on for a while. And, Steven would never acknowledge. He never said, "Hey, good job," or anything, just, you know, "Here, Malia, type it. Here are my notes for the..." You know. And one day Kathy Kennedy, came, you know, motioned, "Come here, Hart. I wanna talk to you." And Kathy Kennedy is formidable, you know. I mean, she's done brilliant work with the Star Wars im… franchise and just, I mean, just incredible what she's done. And I said, "Oh God, I'm in trouble. You know, I'm gonna get decked or banned from the set or something." And she took me into her trailer and sat me down, and she said, "I know it's you." And I went…

36:29J.V. Hart... "I know it's you. I know what you're doing." And I'm going, "Oh, fuck." So, you know, yeah, and I'm gonna get trashed. And she said, "Don't stop." And that was the end of the meeting. That was the nicest thing she ever said to me, was, "Don't stop." And because the production was out of control, Kathy and Frank were doing everything they could to keep it Jerry Molen. I mean, it was, it was a monster production. And he had 34 Lost Boys to deal with, you know. It was a, it was a nightmare for Steven and a nightmare for the producers to even remotely stay on budget or on schedule. I just found my T-shirt, my Hook T-shirt for the 100th day.

37:12Jawad MirOkay.

37:12J.V. HartYou know, and then we went 120 days. That was unheard of, you know? And, so mu… I mean, it... And it all felt very magical, but I c… I knew from what I was hearing from Michael Kahn in the editing room that Steven was not, he was not getting what he thought he wanted to get. And, I so appreciate and so admire what a director has to go through. I watched him and Francis Coppola in the same two years, you know, and I watched two very different styles of directing. And I have such, I have enormous respect for what directors go through. You know, I don't care if they have 10 writers or one or whatever they do, whatever he or she has to do to get the film made, I'm all for. I asked Steven, I said, "What percentage of your, or do you get of what you want?" And he said, "When I first started out, I used to think I was getting 100%, maybe 90.

38:17J.V. HartAnd then a few years went by and I would settle for 70, you know. And then, you know, these last few years, if I get 30% of what I want, I have to accept that." And I'm going, "Wow." And a year later I asked Coppola the same, the same question, and he said every morning he wakes up when he's in the shoot and he says, "Who do I have to fuck, suck, or blow to get the, to get the what I want on the screen today?" So I have enormous respect for what they go through and what they have to put up with to get on the screen what's in their mind and what's on the page. I'm gonna have a drink now.

39:02Jawad MirWow. Sure, go for it. No, that's... I love talking to you, Jim, because you just go telling a story, and I'm just sitting and taking it all in that I've never heard before, and it's just, you know, being in the business myself, like, I'm just in a c… I have my imagination going wild when you're using words to describe what's happening. I'm literally visualizing…... Everything that you're telling me.

39:26J.V. HartYeah, so am I.

39:27Jawad MirAnd I, that's it. You know, and you're a screenwriter too, right? You're a storyteller. So I appreciate that because I, yeah, I'm taken on this journey and learning so much about Hook, you know. But in terms of... And what's so fascinating is that, life comes a full circle that how ET initiated this and Spielberg directed ET and he ended up directing Hook. Isn't that amazing? Like, that's just so cool, I think.

39:51J.V. HartIt is, and what we always knew, if I'd gone and pitched this to Steven, I would've had to sign a release that, you know, you, they may already have something in the works, what have you. I always go, "I hate those releases." If I'd have pitched it to him, he'd have said, "I'm already doing it. That's a great idea, but we're doing it." and that was why Judy said, "If he ever finds out about it, he'll drop everything." So the fact that we had a script already, you know, everybody thinks it was Steven's idea, you know, or that he c… he, you know, hired me to come write it. We had a script that went in the hands of Robin, Dustin, Bob, Caroline, you know, Steven, you know, the agency. We had a script. So they already had something that pretty, was pretty good. I read it, I read this, you watched the film, I read the script yesterday. We created all that, you know?

40:54J.V. HartSo, it was, it was as, it was as if the b… the, as you said, the all the, all the f… what is it? The forces of universe melded into one, you know…

41:10Jawad MirYeah

41:10J.V. Hart... Whatever it is that Dustin says, you know, or Crawford would go, "Everything meshed." The forces of the age was right. The I had kids was right. You know, all of us were in our 40s or 50s. It was the right time for the movie. And it was not a Peter Pan we'd ever seen. It was blasphemy. I was told, I was told, "You can't do a grownup Peter Pan. No. It's not, nobody's gonna... It's blasphemy." You know, you're... And I was. I was treading on J.M. Barrie's sacred ground, you know. And I, and the Barrie, the J.M. Barrie experts, the few that got ahold of me after the film, that there's more J.M. Barrie in Hook than there is in Disney's Peter Pan. The authentic Barrie, down to little minutia that we, mined with him. Even the last line. The last line, "To live would be an awfully big adventure," that's…

42:09Jawad MirYeah

42:10J.V. Hart... Not my line. "To die would be an awfully big adventure" is in the play… ... That Barrie wrote. "To live will be an awfully big adventure," Steven found. In reading the play, the very last thing that Barrie wrote was that, "No, to live will be an awfully big adventure." And my line was something like, "Today is the beginning of everything," blah. And Steven found that line, and it is a line that has become a mantra to millions. Yeah. So the fact that, you know, that he found that line and why he doesn't like the film, I, you know, it's the, I'm not... I know what he went through, and that's probably why. He went through the torture of the damned to get the film made. But, he found that line.

43:02Jawad MirYeah. To me, Hook, when I remember... So I had moved to Canada in 1990, March 1990. And I hadn't seen Peter Pan or any of the Disney stuff. So when I moved to Canada, I remember I saw Hook first…

43:16J.V. HartAh

43:16Jawad Mir... Before I saw Disney's Peter Pan.

43:18J.V. HartInteresting.

43:19Jawad MirAnd then, and then I saw Peter Pan, and I'm like, "Is there, like, a prequel to this movie? Where is the prequel to this movie?" You know, like the first part, like a... And obviously it's not there. So I al… you know, I didn't know about JM Barrie. I didn't know any of that.

43:32J.V. HartNo.

43:32Jawad MirSo for me, the world of Peter Pan was Hook first.

43:37J.V. HartYeah. R… Robin tells w… told me a story after, when Hook came out and everything, and he... And, even with a full beard, right, he d… I don't know what he did next. He did some… oh, maybe it was Awakening. No, not Awakening. Anyway, he did something with a full beard.

43:52Jawad MirAwakening. Awakening he did, with a full beard. That was Awakening, for sure.

43:56J.V. HartAnd he also the Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, where he played the psychiatrist.

44:02Jawad MirOh, Good Will Hunting.

44:03J.V. HartGood Will Hunting.

44:04Jawad MirBut that wa… that was later in the mid '90s.

44:05J.V. HartYeah, later.

44:06Jawad MirYeah.

44:06J.V. HartBut anyway, he grew a beard for something. And he, we would get together. Our families became close. And, he said that little kids would li… would look at him, and he would think he was from one of his other films. And so the kids would say, "You're Peter Pan." You know? And then we talked to them, same thing. They had not seen the Disney... They had not grown up on the Disney version or the musical. These are kids that live in other parts of the country.

44:36Jawad MirYeah.

44:36J.V. HartThat he was their first introduction to Peter Pan. You know?

44:41Jawad MirYeah.

44:41J.V. HartAnd that got him too, that wow, you know, that I'm their, the grown-up Peter Pan was their first introduction to the whole body of work that Barrie did. You know? And in a way it makes sense. You know? I had, when Bob died, w… our families had be… we're still, we're seeing them in London. We still stay in touch with the, with the fam… with L… the Linda and the kids and the grandkids. And, when Bob died, they had asked me to come speak at his memorial. Bob died and Robin died five months apart.

45:19Jawad MirYeah.

45:19J.V. HartIt was a terrible year to lose both of them. And, I was going to dive in the Caymans and then fly to London to meet Judy and Hoskins and speak at his memorial. And I go to, "I'm going to the Caymans tomorrow. It's my, it's my Neverland." so, and I got on, I got to the dive boat. We know, we've, I've known a lot of the people there for years, 'cause I've been diving there since '08. And the head of the dive group, Sharon, says to me, "You're gonna, you're gonna meet a Hook fan. He's a huge Hook fan. He can't, he's gonna be your dive master. He can't wait to meet you." And I had been wrestling on what to do about Bob. I didn't, what am I gonna say about Bob Hoskins, you know, without losing it? And what can I sh… what can I say about him? And, we get ready to go on the boat, and this barrel-chested guy about probably in his 20s, was shaped just like Hoskins.

46:26J.V. HartBald head, you know, young Vert… and he comes up on the boat. "Mr. Hart." You know? He, the, he was the Hook fan. And he told me the story that he, in those days, we, this is before, you know, streaming and all that stuff. He made his mother take him to see that film every weekend for six weeks…

46:48Jawad MirWow

46:48J.V. Hart... When it, when it opened. And she actually knitted him a sweater with the Hook logo on it that he would wear to the movies, you know? And he, when it finally came out on VHS, he wore his VHS cassette out. So he was diehard. And, Reggie. Reggie, his name is Reggie. And, we had a ball. We told stories, we talked, we did, we would do Hook lines and stuff, you know. And, I said, "Let's call your mother." So we on the boat. We finally had cell phones. We called his mom and took a picture of us together holding the... I had a, something w… I had brought some Hook DVDs or something. And said it, and he sent me a picture, she sent me a picture of the sweater that was, obviously wouldn't fit him anymore.

47:42Jawad MirYeah.

47:42J.V. HartBut, you know, when you, when you, when the f… when... And that's just one of hundreds of stories that are related to Hook. And when you get that kind of interaction with the audience, well, you're right, he's the audience. Reggie's the audience.

47:57Jawad MirYeah.

47:58J.V. HartIt's so satisfying and rewarding, and reminds you that you don't know what's gonna happen when you put one of these things out there. You know, Crawford used to say, "You write a song, you put on a song, it's like a paper airplane you throw off the Empire State Building. You don't know who it's gonna land and who's gonna read the lyrics." And over, and I think my kids started to see that. They started to see people gush over Hook. And also what their part, their role was in the whole thing. But Reggie was one of those unique stories that just, I mean, we're still in touch. He moved to Canada. He's a wreck diver up there. We're still in touch. And it was all because of that movie. You know? Over and over and over again it happens. Yeah.

48:43Jawad MirWell, that's, that's, you know… Beyond any box office, any critical review, I've heard so many stories from so many people on this podcast, like how it i… impacts people. Even the films that, you know, that I have directed, obviously not to a scale that you guys have worked on, you know, when you hear somebody from an audience, "Thank you for making it, and this has made me feel like this and this and this," like that's it. Like, that's what I, you know, what we…

49:09J.V. HartYeah

49:09Jawad Mir... I think we crave for that. We crave for that appreciation. And it's, it's so beautiful to hear those things because Hook, I mean, I do think Hook, because I saw it this morning again, it's like it has... You know, y… I'm thinking about all these things in my head that, especially like, you know, a guy who... You know, it's basically all of us. Like, when we're kids, we're very free and we express what we say, and then we grow up, and we become very kind of like, you know, by the society rules and everything. And then we don't live our lives the way we are supposed to be living, and that message in Hook is just one of the most... It's, it's a timely message. It, I think, will always remain there, because we get wrapped up in the rat race in the world and society, and it's all about living your life and enjoying.

49:57J.V. HartWell, then also, th… there's, I'll tell you another one more story. In the film…

50:02Jawad MirPlease do

50:02J.V. Hart... In the, in the script, we created a whole, in Wendy Wing at the, at the Great Ormond Street Hospital for Sick Children, which is where Barry gave his rights, so that there was a legacy of Peter Pan that would, you know, the playwright, the play, and the characters would gen… was supposed to generate revenues and royalties for the hospital. And, part of the... When we were gonna go to London for the royal premiere, I didn't realize at the time, but, they were actually building a new wing for the hospital that they were fundraising for. And they couldn't believe that the film, that I had, you know, created this whole fictional thing about Wendy and the, and the hospital wing and all that. They thought, they thought that I had, that I had known what they were doing and did it on purpose. No. It was all fiction. And so when we got there, the hospital wanted to give Robin and Dustin a tour, as part of it, 'cause the hospital, we finally got them the ri… rights to p… to participate in the film.

51:06J.V. HartThere was no w… there was no deal with the hospital to make the movie. So the royal premiere was w… was gonna give them 500,000 pounds towards the new Wendy Wing, which I had worked on very hard to make sure the hospital was taken care of. So the day of the royal premiere is also our daughter's 10th birthday, Julia, who was in London. My mother was with us, and all she wanted to do was go shopping, the Harrods and Ham… She wanted to go do stuff a 10-year-old girl wants. She didn't wanna go to her hospital. I said, "No, we're going. They've made a, you know, the... Our family's all here. We're, we're, they're being very kind to us. We're, we're gonna go with Rus… Dustin and Robin, and we're gonna go to the hospital." Well, it turns out it was an amazing, life-changing experience for Julia. It's, the, it's... There's no emergency room at Great Ormond Street. It is a court of last resort. I mean, the, you, there's no... You go there for treatment for cancer. They had a lot of burn victims from one of the c… the clashes in the Middle East.

52:09J.V. HartYou know, you, it's, it's an amazing hospital, and it's the first hospital where the parents could stay in the room with their kid. You could stay overnight. So they thought we were, you know, the, were, you know, the g… God's gift 'cause we had put the Great Ormond Street Hospital on the map all over the world with Hook, you know? We'd made, they'd made that connection. So we got to the, we did the tour, which was amazing. And we got to the end of the tour, and there was a corridor called the Peter Pan Hallway, which a father had come in and done a mural years ago because they saved his kid.

52:47J.V. HartAnd it was jammed with 200 kids in wheelchairs, gurneys, you know, canes, you know, IV drips stuff, and nurses. And it couldn't have been, it was about 12 feet wide and maybe 20 feet long, and it was jammed. And we were just like, "Whoa." And I watched Robin take Julia by the hand. Ah, sorry.

53:11Jawad MirIt's okay.

53:12J.V. HartAnd say…

53:12Jawad MirYou're making me emotional, too

53:13J.V. Hart... And say, "Let's go. Let's work the room." So D… Dustin was there, Robin. It took an hour to go that 20 feet. And I watched Julia's life change on her face before our eyes. There was one little boy that was in a full body cast laying flat with his head down, where he could, he could barely raise his head up. His IV drip was there, and he had a pirate flag on the IV drip, and an eye patch, you know? And, I watched Robin and Julia go over to him and talk to him for 10 minutes, you know? And then Dustin went back a year later and saw the kid, who was still in treatment, but he went back. And, it was, we were just like, "God." And nobody said too much about it. It was such an... Everybody had to go run and change clothes to go to the premiere. And nobody said a lot about it, but there was a great empathy.

54:13J.V. HartThe hospital people, Sir Anthony Tippett and Michael Sanderson and, the board and everybody, they were bl… thrilled that we had taken the time to go to the hospital. And that night, Julia goes to the royal premiere with Jake, and she gets to go in a Rolls-Royce with David Crosby and Jan, you know, and Jake Gyllenhaal. And they get the red carpet treatment, and yeah, they're g… they're being interviewed on the red carpet, you know, and everybody thinks Jake's Charlie Carsmo, so, you know, they think he's in the movie. It was Leicester Square. It was, like, huge. And, the after party was at Harrods. Dodi Fayed had been our host while we were there, dear sweet Dodi. And it's Julia's birthday. So for her 10th birthday she's in Harrods at the royal premier after party dancing with Robin Williams and having all this fun. They bring her a cake. Mohammed goes into the store and brings a big teddy bear out to give to Julia, and Jake goes, "Can he do that?"

55:14J.V. HartYou know, it's like everything incredible. So we get home like 1:00 in the morning, back to the hotel. And, Judy and I are like, "This is her 10th birthday. What are we gonna do for her 11th," you know? How do we top this?

55:28Jawad MirRight. Right.

55:29J.V. HartShe comes bouncing in at 1:00 in the morning wearing the ni… same nightgown that the, that Amber wore in the movie. That Anthony Powell had made a special one for her. And she said to us, she was wide awake, that, "I have made a decision about my life." And we went, "Oh, okay." She said, "I didn't wanna go to the hospital today. I wanted to go and buy toys and do stuff for myself with Mama." And she said, "Today I saw kids who may not have another birthday." Ah. And, they were all smiling and laughing and, excited, you know. And she said, "Can I raise money instead of getting presents for my birthday and give it to the hospital?" And we just went, "Whoa. Well, okay. Why not?"

56:30J.V. HartSo we came back to America and we started having screenings of Hook, for her birthday.

56:37Jawad MirWow.

56:37J.V. HartAnd she raised, I think, $1,000 that first birthday.

56:41Jawad MirWow.

56:42J.V. HartAnd a year later we're back in London for Dracula, another royal premier. And Judy calls Sir Anthony Tippett at the hospital, who was the general manager of the hospital, and said, "Listen, can we come by? Julia's raised some money on her birthday and she'd like to give it to the hospital." And Sir Anthony said, "She did what?" Said, "Well, she raised money on her birthday for the hospital. We, you know, she didn't... Gave up her presents." And he said, "Come by at 4:00." Judy and I was, I was off on something else. Judy and Julia went to, the hospital with a check, and when they got there he had arranged a high tea for her. The board of directors were all there. The head nurses, heads, you know, doctors, some of the kids, for high tea. They treated her as if she'd raised a million pounds. And Julia was going, "Wow, okay. This is cool." And Sir Anthony said, "Can you do this?

57:44J.V. HartCan you do this?" Says, "This is... No o… no kid's ever done this." and, they had a Peter Pan Birthday Club that was defunct and had some money in it in Am… in America. So he said, "Can you organize a charity around this kind of birthday giving?" So we said, "We'll try," and we did with Peter Pan Children's Fund. It's kinda defunct now, but for the next 10 years we were in 100 hospitals raising money for,.. A… and the deal was the kid gave the money to their hospital, in their children hospital in their, in their community. It didn't go to Great Ormond Street. They wanted us raising money in the name of Peter Pan, in the name of Gr… Great Ormond Street, but to make sure that the kid felt connected to the hospital in their community. And the hospitals loved it. Kid would show up with a check, they'd get a tour. We… they'd get a plaque. They, you know, we had people that had Peter Pan Birthday Club rosters in their hospitals. So for about, for about 10 years, we were in 100 hospitals all over the country, and even in Israel, and Canada, and Australia, and, you know, Africa.

58:51J.V. HartAnd that again is another thing that came out of the movie. You know, the, that spawned this whole philant… philanthropy in children. Now you'll see a lot of children's hospitals have these br… have these clubs where kids are the ones that are raising the money and giving it to the hospital.

59:10Jawad MirYeah. Yeah.

59:11J.V. HartSo, that was another kind of thing that grew out of the film that was unique to our family. It was our experience that happened. But our daughter, our son, you know, that, grew up with this project. And now my son is writing the Hook origin story with me. We've, we've written it. It was based on a book I wrote about young Captain Hook. And he's as old as I was when I wrote Hook. So now he's in his 40s having the same experience that he's grown up with. This has been part of his life since he was three years old. So it's the family curse and the family project, and, you know, we'll probably... We've got... We're trying to do another version of the Neverland that's more adult and little bit more dangerous and scary and horror, and it's got some horror in it. So a lot of stuff in Barry's never been dramatized or portrayed or even imagined that's in the book.

1:00:16J.V. HartNobody ever paid attention to it. The... So anyway, I just wanted to tell you the story about Julia and the Peter Pan Birthday Club. Jake had the idea for the movie. She had the idea for the charity to connect the people to the hospital. And, Sir Anthony's gone now. Michael Samuelson's gone. The people we worked with were all much older. But it was a real magic time. You know, Julia was, Julia was 10 years old, and until about age 17 or 18 she was actively involved. She was a public person and everything.

1:00:49Jawad MirThat's quite incredible, and I really appreciate you sharing something deep and personal. And I can see what Hook means to you more than just a film. Obviously, you've made that very clear. And it's amazing. And I, you know, when you were talking about the origin story of Captain Hook, as you were talking, the thing that, the thought that came to my mind was there's a line in Hook, from the daughter. What's her name, the character?..

1:01:22J.V. HartMaggie.

1:01:23Jawad MirMaggie, thank you. You know, she said, "You need a mommy very badly."

1:01:27J.V. HartYeah.

1:01:29Jawad MirAnd I am thinking in my head if that line has something to do with what you're working on. I would be interested to seeing that. And I'm not asking you, I'm just saying what I, what I think, what I was thinking. But is that something that's, you said in the beginning was BBC. Is that the same project, or?

1:01:45J.V. HartNo, that's n… that's the Never ones. The Hook origin story we s… we j… we, set up at Village Roadshow. And they've gone under, and so we're trying to get the rights back. We wrote the script, w… the year after the strike, we spent on the script. And it's f… follows young... I mean, i… in Barrie, again, it came from Barrie. The last thing you hear Captain Hook say before he jumps into the jaws of crocodile is floreat et nata, which means may eat and flourish. And, there's clues in Barrie that he was a student at Eton. And, Eton College was, is the oldest, it's, it's a boys prep school, you know. It's put out captains and kings and lords and governors and for five centuries. And I went back and did some research. Said, "That'd be cool." So Hook was, so young Hook, his name wasn't Hook. You know, young James was a student at Eton. How did he go from that world to becoming the most legendary pirate of all times, you know?

1:02:50J.V. HartWhat was that journey? And we did a, I found a, an essay that Barrie actually wrote, a speech he gave at Eton, 'cause he was always asked by Eton, "Did Hook go to Eton? What was, what's the story?" So he actually gave a speech and an essay called Hook at Eton. And it followed an old man coming back to the s… to the, to the alma, his alma mater, without identifying himself. Nobody knew who he was, except he was an Eton, what they called an Eton blood. He had his blues, his colors, his scarf and what have you. And he came back to s… to sort of take revenge on the school, c… for how badly he was treated there. And he ends up burning the library down so there'd be no record of him ever attending Eton, that he didn't exist, you know. So he didn't want his bad reputation to further besmirch the school. So I said, "Okay, there it is right there. Barrie said he didn't die, you know.

1:03:53J.V. HartThat he somehow escaped the crocodile and came back to Eton years later, for the annual ballgame between, Harrow and Eton. And, that was it. We got to write a p… a, how he becomes a pirate, how he gets to Neverland, how, why he, when he broke bad and why he broke bad. You know, he was madly in love. He had a great love of his life that was taken away from him, you know. And he kept losing things along the way that, you would understand why he became the very complex character that he is. You know. And not to burst your bubble, but I didn't write, Captain Hook for Dustin Hoffman. That wasn't at all who I had in mind.

1:04:40Jawad MirWho did you have in mind?

1:04:42J.V. HartDaniel Day-Lewis in Last of the Mohicans.

1:04:47Jawad MirInteresting.

1:04:47J.V. HartThat charismatic... If you read Barrie, he wasn't a foppish, you know, buffoon kind of

1:04:53Jawad MirYeah

1:04:54J.V. Hart... Over the top. You know, that's, that all came from the musical. If you read Barrie, he was a charismatic, complicated matinee idol who had fallen from grace, you know, who was now stuck with these idiot pirates. You know, but, that he was educated. He, you know, civilized and, he was i… intellectual and daring and dashing. He's somebody that could actually convince your son to leave you. I never believed that Dustin w… could take Jake away from me, you know. There was never any doubt in my mind that he, that, he would be somebody cooler than Dustin to win my son's allegiance, you know. But Dustin did an incredible job th… with…

1:05:41Jawad MirYeah

1:05:41J.V. Hart... His interpretation of the character. But that's not who I wrote. So I wrote the book about young Hook to get that out of my system, to write that dashing, daring, young... Timothy Chame… Chamalet would've been a perfect young Hook.

1:05:56Jawad MirYeah. Yeah.

1:05:58J.V. HartYou know.

1:05:58Jawad MirInteresting.

1:05:59J.V. HartBut that's what the, that's what the book's about, and it's just three, it was gonna be three movies. We'll see if we get to do the first one that follows him when he, where he finally ends up in Neverland. And you have a whole different understanding of what happens, of why he's in Neverland and why, and why he's there. So hopefully, we'll, you'll get to see that one.

1:06:19Jawad MirYeah. No, I'm gonna, I'm gonna actually, get the books, that you talked about.

1:06:24J.V. HartIt's not in print, but you can get it through Amazon. It's called Captain Hook…

1:06:27Jawad MirYeah

1:06:27J.V. Hart... The Adventures of a Notorious Youth.

1:06:29Jawad MirI'm looking at it right now.

1:06:30J.V. HartYeah.

1:06:30Jawad MirSo I'm definitely gonna take a read at it. But is the Neverland story, just to kinda wrap things up, the one that you talked about, BBC, is that something in the pre stage, or?

1:06:39J.V. HartYeah, we wanted to do it as a video game, so we contacted, Kim McCascall, who's a great gamer. I mean, she's a designer, great gamer. Scottish, lives in Scotland. And it's interesting. Again, Hook I didn't know who she was. And she sent me a video on Facebook Messenger, and it was a video of a 10-year-old kid in full pirate gear standing in front of an outdoor screening of Hook. A lot... They do it's a very popular film to show in the summer to, you know, parks and stuff. And this kid is right in front of the screen with his pirate gear on, and he's back to the audience, and he doesn't move for the whole film. She said he was mesmerized and stood there and watched the film, you know, like the screen. And so I looked up who she was, and I went, "Whoa, this is who we've been looking for. She's a great gamer. She loved Hook." Went on and on about it. So Jake and I teamed up with her to come up with a TV series about Neverlands that it doesn't have Hook or Pan in it.

1:07:48J.V. HartIt's, it's, you know, it's, it's exploring more and more what the mythology is and, kind of what the world that Barry had created. We hope we can do it at the BBC. We'll see. They've got it right now, and we'll, you know, we'll, we'll check it out. We originally wanted to do the Rufio origin story with Dante, but Steven said no. Everybody in, everybody in Amblin loved it, I mean, right up to the chairman of Amblin, but Steven said no. It's, anything that smacks of Hook, I don't think it has a chance there. So Dante wanted to do the origin story with Jake as an animated series so we could still use Dante's voice and keep him as young, you know, as he was as Rufio in the, in the film.

1:08:40Jawad MirYeah. That's amazing. I look forward to the Never Land and, obviously the origin Hook story whenever you guys are able to get the rights back because I think this, the watch… rewatching Hook today, brought back a lot of memories from the early '90s for me, too, and just the idea of... And I learned something from it today. I really did. So thank you.

1:09:04J.V. HartWhat did you learn? I'm curious.

1:09:07Jawad MirWell, it's a very obvious thing. It's like you just gotta let go and enjoy life.

1:09:11J.V. HartYeah.

1:09:12Jawad MirYou know? But sometimes we get caught. I mean, I, it's not that I'm not aware of it, but it's just sometimes you get so caught up that you try to hold yourself back instead of letting go in some scenarios, right? So yeah, there was a lot there. And obviously the father and son relationship, I have a son who is 15 now, and that's the toughest age, as you can imagine.

1:09:35J.V. HartYeah.

1:09:35Jawad MirRight?

1:09:35J.V. HartYeah.

1:09:35Jawad MirSo dealing with that, but trying to find the right balance of, you know, being assertive but at the same time being loving. So it's, it's, it's... Yeah. Thank you. Just wanted to say that. Thank you.

1:09:47J.V. HartWell, I just got, I just got something that I, that came to me today. It's a, there's a pirate ship. And the caption says, "Keep calm and be crazy. Laugh, love, and live it up because this is the oldest you've been and the youngest you'll ever be again." You know? And I'm, I'm now old officially, so, this was a good, a good message for me to get.

1:10:13Jawad MirWell, thank you for sharing that. And by the way, the way you tell stories J… Jim, you're not old. I'm just gonna tell you that right now. You're not. You're just still a kid to…

1:10:21J.V. HartTell that to my body.

1:10:23Jawad MirWell, yeah, I mean, but, you know, at least mentally. You know, sometimes people get old mentally even though when they're young.

1:10:30J.V. HartYeah.

1:10:30Jawad MirBut, you're still a kid. So I appreciate that. Enjoy Cayman Islands tomorrow.

1:10:35J.V. HartNow, it's, I'll s… you don't have to do anything with this, but if you want, I'll send you the 1990 draft of the script.

1:10:43Jawad MirI would love to read it, and I'll definitely…

1:10:44J.V. HartIt's in, it's in... I had to scan it in sections, 'cause I, my scanner's not big enough. A couple people asked me for it, and I don't know how you f… how you feel about this, but if anybody wants it, they can make a, if they make a donation, a cha… a tax-deductible donation, of like 25 bucks, I'll, I can email it to, anybody who's, who's interested in doing that. And I can tell you the charity that I would like to see supported.

1:11:15Jawad MirPerfect.

1:11:15J.V. HartI don't know what your stru… what your structure is or how you, what happens to your podcast or if you ever do anything like that.

1:11:23Jawad MirHonestly, Jim, all we can, we can do is we can, put it in the description when we post on social media. We can, whatever links that you want. I have no problem doing that.

1:11:32J.V. HartYeah.

1:11:32Jawad MirIt's not, you know, would love to do that because I would love to read it myself, too. And I'm sure there's…

1:11:37J.V. HartI'll send it to you. When we hang up, I'll send it to you

1:11:39Jawad Mir... Other people out there. Great. Awesome. And I'm gonna bug you about something else down the road because that story of the,.. Obviously, we're gonna talk about Contact sometime whenever you're available, but the fan of Hook that you were talking about…

1:11:52J.V. HartReggie

1:11:52Jawad Mir... Who's in Canada. Reggie. I'd love to have him on.

1:11:54J.V. HartReggie.

1:11:54Jawad MirI think it'd be fantastic.

1:11:56J.V. HartAh. He's great. He's great.

1:11:58Jawad MirYeah.

1:11:58J.V. HartHe'd be, he'd, he'd be a kick in the head for him. You know? Yeah, he left the Caymans and moved to nice cold Canada.

1:12:05Jawad MirWhich part?

1:12:06J.V. HartI'm not sure he's…

1:12:07Jawad MirYeah

1:12:07J.V. Hart... I think it's, I think it's the northeast. He's a, he's a wreck diver, so he dives in cold water. So I think it's the…

1:12:15Jawad MirOh, it's…

1:12:15J.V. HartIt's either Montreal or, it may be even further. It may be further east.

1:12:19Jawad MirNunavut. Maybe Nuna… oh, east or, like, east coast. Yeah.

1:12:22J.V. HartYeah.

1:12:22Jawad MirOkay.

1:12:22J.V. HartYeah.

1:12:23Jawad MirAwesome. Well…

1:12:23J.V. HartHalifax, something like that, so.

1:12:25Jawad MirYeah.

1:12:25J.V. HartLet me know when this is done.

1:12:28Jawad MirYeah. No, we're probably gonna put this up, in a day or two. But if you can send me the link of your charity and everything…

1:12:34J.V. HartYeah

1:12:34Jawad Mir... That you need, we can put it up in the description.

1:12:36J.V. HartYeah.

1:12:36Jawad MirJust whatever you need, we just copy and paste it.

1:12:39J.V. HartOkay. And, so what's your, what is your re… you said you had more reviewers, than you've ever done, whatever the last one we did. With Dracula, was that what we did?

1:12:47Jawad MirYes.

1:12:48J.V. HartWhat is y… what is your reach?

1:12:50Jawad MirIn terms of the reach, I'll be very honest with you. With our audio podcast, we get about 2,000 down… downloads per episode.

1:13:01J.V. HartRight.

1:13:01Jawad MirWith our YouTube, it's…... Dwindles. YouTube is just sort of there as a complementary thing. So with Dracula we got, I think close to the main conversation we had, we had about 8,000.

1:13:17J.V. HartRight.

1:13:17Jawad MirAnd then we made two clips out of it. One of them almost hit 10,000. And, the others are sometimes in 1,000 or, you know, 800. Sometimes they're 200. So it just varies. We try to promote it as much…

1:13:33J.V. HartBut this, but this is, this is just audio then?

1:13:35Jawad MirNo, this is gonna... I'm gonna, we're gonna put it up on…

1:13:37J.V. HartOh

1:13:38Jawad Mir... All of them.

1:13:39J.V. HartOkay. Okay. All right.

1:13:39Jawad MirSpotify, Apple, YouTube.

1:13:42J.V. HartOh, okay.

1:13:43Jawad MirAnd I think…

1:13:43J.V. HartI didn't…

1:13:44Jawad MirYeah

1:13:44J.V. Hart... See anything. Oh, it said recording. I see it. Okay, yeah.

1:13:46Jawad MirYeah. Yeah. It's, it's recording. So, but yeah, no, I, yeah, I loved it. I absolutely loved every second of the conversation with you, and I loved it with Dracula. And, I was anticipating something exciting, and it was beyond my expectations. So I appreciate that.

1:14:03J.V. HartWell, it's, it's, I... You got me wound up, I think maybe because Hook is in the air again, with all of the, with what's going on with Neverlands. Just like Nosferatu brought Dracula back, you know? Nos… the success of Nosferatu has had a huge impact on Dracula. You know?

1:14:23Jawad MirYeah.

1:14:23J.V. HartSpawned a lot of, a lot of the comparisons and people going back…

1:14:28Jawad MirYeah

1:14:29J.V. Hart... And watching Dracula and wanting to chat about it, what have you. So, we like this. Thank you for, keeping me, young for an hour.

1:14:41Jawad MirOh, no. Thank you. I appreciate it. Let… We'll talk again, I'm sure.

1:14:45J.V. HartYep.

1:14:45Jawad MirI'll enjoy your…

1:14:45J.V. HartI'll s…

1:14:46Jawad MirEnjoy your health.

1:14:47J.V. HartThank you, sir. And I'll let Reggie know…

1:14:48Jawad MirThank you

1:14:48J.V. Hart... You're gonna be looking for him.

1:14:50Jawad MirAbsolutely.

1:14:50J.V. HartAll right.

1:14:51Jawad MirThank you so much.

1:14:51J.V. HartBye-bye.

1:14:52Jawad MirTake care.