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Two decades after Milos Forman directed Amadeus, the source of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's genius is still a mystery to him, as is the confirmation that Antonio Salieri did kill Mozart out of jealousy. None of these concerns, however, interest Forman. He is justly proud of having created a movie that is an authentic cinematic masterpiece.
Amadeus set a new standard for historical films and became one of the most honored films of the 1980s. Forman won the DGA Award for Theatrical Direction. The film itself won seven Oscars, including one for Forman's direction.
"This is not a documentary. When you are constructing a drama, all you have to do is be faithful to the spirit of the facts," Forman said following a special screening of Amadeus: The Director's Cut at the DGA in New York on October 1. "I think Peter Shaffer (who adapted his play for the screen) was faithful to the spirit of the facts."
The screening, co-sponsored by the DGA and Warner Home Video, coincided with the release of the special-edition DVD and features approximately 20 more minutes of footage. The film can also be seen in this version as it should be seen: in a theater.
Warner Home Video also gave a party at Shelley's before the screening where several of the film's actors were reunited with Forman — F. Murray Abraham (who won the Best Actor Oscar for his role as Salieri), Christine Ebersole, Jeffrey Jones, and Cynthia Nixon. Also on hand was the film's producer, Saul Zaentz.
Following the DGA screening, actor/director John Turturro interviewed Milos Forman and moderated the questions from the audience to the director.
Forman feels The Director's Cut is the way the film should have been released originally. "This was the original final cut which we all liked — Peter Shaffer, Saul Zaentz and myself — but 18 years ago we panicked and we thought it was a little too much to ask the audience to sit three hours for this film about classical music," he explained. "So I cut out [approximately] 15 minutes but now thanks to DVD, I had a chance to put it back."
That Warner's restored the theatrical version is "icing on the cake and makes me very happy."
Amadeus did not have one name star in the film, and Forman cast his actors from arduous casting calls and auditions over a four-month period. He told Turturro that he did not want actors associated with other parts to play Mozart and Salieri because he did not want the audience to be distracted from the basic drama. Oddly enough, the fact that Tom Hulce was known in the industry for director John Landis' megahit comedy National Lampoon's Animal House did not bother Forman because he had never seen that film.
"Tom Hulce was the most attractive actor for the role. He was the best," Forman explained. Abraham had appeared in a few movies previously, but he was known primarily as a New York stage actor. He originally auditioned for the role of Rosenberg, but Forman asked him to play Salieri opposite Hulce in the audition. Forman knew Abraham was his first choice.
Meg Tilly was the original choice to play Constanza, Forman revealed, however, an ankle accident prevented her from playing the role, and Berridge and another actress were selected from last-minute auditions. Forman thought he was being diplomatic when he told the loser that she was too beautiful to play Costanza, which caused Berridge to have mixed feelings about being the chosen one. But Forman said that Berridge was perfect casting because Costanza, a Viennese landlady's daughter, was a "street kid" and was therefore convincing as a fighter for her husband against poverty and enemies.
In his other films, Forman encouraged improvisation among his actors because he feels it increases the spontaneity of the performances. However, Abraham (at the party) remarked that improvisation was very limited in Amadeus because of the brilliance of the Peter Schaffer script. "Where we did improvise was in the final scene between Tom [Hulce] and myself. We improvised only because there were two cameras and we were really trusting the moment. Tom was playing a sick man, and he would drift into a real delirium, and he was really bold to trust me to stay with him. I feel it's really one of the best moments in the film between two people. Milos gets credit for allowing us to improvise."
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Jeffrey Jones, who played Emperor Josef II, agreed that there was not much improvisation in the film, a fact that Forman himself confirmed in response to a question after the film. "There was a lot of pre-production time, and so I met Milos numerous times before they started production. It was like a rehearsal period, and they had plenty of time to get the script in good order."
Forman discussed the screenwriting process during the Q&A session with Turturro. "The hardest part is the actual shooting," Forman said. "The most pleasant is the screenwriting and the editing because you have time to change things. You have time to think, time to play with it, to experiment when you are working on the script. When you are shooting, that's it. You say 'Cut. Next setting.' and that's it. You constantly suffer throughout the entire shoot with the doubts if what you and the people in front of the camera did was the very best you could do. You never are sure of that. "
Shooting in Prague during the Cold War was daring for the director. Forman had fled to Paris in 1968 when his native Czechoslovakia was invaded. "After I became an American citizen in 1977, I asked several times for a visa, but the Czech government always turned me down. So, I didn't hope that I would ever see the country again."
In the early 1980s, Prague was decided upon as the production location for Amadeus because Paris was too expensive and Budapest lacked the necessary uninterrupted 18th-century buildings. Prague retained the architecture of Mozart's time with unbroken 18th-century architectural continuity. This time, the Czech government relented and gave him the visa because it was a lucrative business opportunity for the cash-strapped government.
"The first visit, when we went there with Saul to negotiate, that was emotional for me." But, he divorced himself from any bittersweet or sad memories because he realized he wouldn't be able to concentrate on his work. "We knew we were being watched by the secret police all the time. It was fine with me as long as they didn't invent stories from informers. We didn't do anything subversive so I didn't mind. It didn't bother me."
Forman's agent, Robert Lantz, initiated the project with Forman in 1980. While Forman was in London casting Ragtime, Lantz invited him to see the first preview of Amadeus. He didn't know the theme of the play, and "that was my luck," Forman said, "because if I asked him and he told me, 'Oh, it's a new play about the composer,' I would have definitely said 'No'. I lived half of my life in a communist country. In communist countries they love to make movies about composers. Composers compose music and they don't talk subversive things. They were the most boring films I ever saw."
However, Forman was mesmerized by the play and told Shaffer that night that he wanted to direct the film. "It would be a wonderful drama even if it was not about Mozart and Salieri. But because it was about Mozart and Salieri, it was icing on the cake."
Curiously, Forman is not especially passionate about Mozart's music. Before he began work on the film, Forman regarded Mozart's music as fluffy. "Only by working on this film did I realize that he was as hardboiled as Beethoven."
Turturro commented that the music sequences are not just dropped in, that they "became the third character in the movie."
Forman agreed, saying that that he and Shaffer wrote the film script while listening to Mozart in chronological order.
Working with Shaffer was Forman's "happiest collaboration with an author of an original work. It's very difficult for an author, whose work whether it be a novel or a play is successful, to change anything." Shaffer completely understood Forman's decision that the play serve as "a springboard for a new film vision."
Turturro commented on what he felt may be a contradiction in Forman's directorial technique. "There is a high level of relaxation within a very structured environment," he remarked. "You really do feel that the people in your movies have a freedom of individual expression that you don't always see with someone who has a strong directorial hand."
Forman replied, "The best rehearsals are the times with actors before they get the part in readings. That's when they are most open to everything. They are vulnerable, and trying all kinds of things. Once they got the part, everything, directing has a tendency to go with what worked in the past. You have to cast right. If you don't cast right, you can do somersaults and usually it doesn't work."
Was Forman ever outvoted on an artistic decision by Zaentz or Shaffer? "If I was, then I've blocked it out of my mind," he replied. "It was a real creative partnership of all three of us."
When asked why he only has directed 11 features during a 40-year career, Forman replied, "When I finish a film, and the film is released, it's like your wife divorced you, and left you, yet you are still in love. It takes a little while before you fall in love again."
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