In 1958, Stanley Kubrick wrote a movie specifically for Kirk Douglas. He “didn’t like it”, and that was the end of that
Stanley Kubrick wrote a screenplay in 1958 for Kirk Douglas, hoping to work with the actor again after *Paths of Glory*. Douglas disliked it, and the project was dropped, leaving the pair with just two films together: *Paths of Glory* and *Spartacus*.
The unmade film, *I Stole $16,000,000*, was based on the memoir of Herbert Emerson Wilson, a First World War veteran who became a safecracker and led a gang that robbed armoured trucks, bank vaults and department stores. Wilson claimed the gang stole $16 million; he was also convicted of murdering an accomplice. Kubrick later said Douglas’s rejection ended the project, but did not explain what he disliked about the screenplay.
In short
- Kubrick wrote a crime screenplay for Kirk Douglas in 1958.
- Douglas disliked it, so the film was never made.
- It was based on safecracker Herbert Emerson Wilson’s memoir.
Explained simply
Stanley Kubrick was a film director and screenwriter, while Kirk Douglas was a leading Hollywood actor. They first worked together on Paths of Glory, a film about soldiers facing a military court during the First World War, and later made Spartacus together.
The proposed film was based on Herbert Emerson Wilson’s memoir. A First World War veteran, Wilson became a safecracker and led a gang that robbed armoured vehicles, bank vaults and shops; he claimed the gang took $16 million and was convicted of murdering an accomplice.
The project offers a glimpse of a film the two men considered after their first collaboration. It also draws on the real-life story of Wilson, whose claims about the scale of the thefts and conviction for murder form part of the book’s background.