The Right Stuff is a 1983 American epic historical drama film written and directed by Philip Kaufman and based on the 1979 book of the same name by Tom Wolfe. The film follows the Navy, Marine, and Air Force test pilots who were involved in aeronautical research at Edwards Air Force Base, California, as well as the Mercury Seven, the seven military pilots who were selected to be the astronauts for Project Mercury, the first human spaceflight by the United States. The film stars Sam Shepard, Ed Harris, Scott Glenn, Fred Ward, Dennis Quaid, Barbara Hershey and Kim Stanley (in her final film); Levon Helm narrates and plays Air Force test pilot Jack Ridley.
The Right Stuff was a box-office bomb, grossing about $21 million (domestically) against a $27 million budget. However, it received widespread critical acclaim and was nominated for eight Oscars, including Best Picture, at the 56th Academy Awards, winning 4. The film was a huge success on the home video market. In 2013, it was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.""Library of Congress announces 2013 National Film Registry selections" (Press release). Washington Post, December 18, 2013. Retrieved: December 18, 2013. The film was ranked #19 on the American Film Institute's most inspiring movies.
The film was later expanded into its titular franchise, including a television series and a documentary film.
Plot
In 1947, over the Muroc Army Air Field in California, a number of test pilots are killed while flying high-speed aircraft such as the rocket-powered Bell X-1. After another pilot, Slick Goodlin, demands $150,000 () to attempt to break the sound barrier, war hero Captain Chuck Yeager receives the chance to fly the X-1. Yeager becomes the first person to fly at supersonic speed, defeating the "demon in the sky."
Six years later, Muroc, now Edwards Air Force Base, still attracts the best test pilots. Yeager (now a major) and friendly rival Scott Crossfield repeatedly break each other's speed records. They often visit the Happy Bottom Riding Club run by Pancho Barnes, who classifies the pilots at Edwards as either "prime" (such as Yeager and Crossfield) that fly the best equipment or newer "pudknockers" who only dream about it. Gordon "Gordo" Cooper, Virgil "Gus" Grissom and Donald "Deke" Slayton, captains of the United States Air Force, are among the "pudknockers" who hope to also prove that they have "the Right Stuff." The tests are no longer secret, as the military soon recognizes that it needs good publicity for funding. Cooper's wife, Trudy, and other wives are afraid of becoming widows but cannot change their husbands' ambitions and desire for success and fame.
In 1957, the launch of the Soviet Sputnik satellite alarms the United States government. Politicians such as Senator Lyndon B. Johnson and military leaders demand that NASA help America defeat the Soviets in the new Space Race. The search for the first Americans in space excludes Yeager because he lacks a college degree. Grueling physical and mental tests select the Mercury Seven astronauts, including John Glenn of the United States Marine Corps, Alan Shepard, Walter Schirra and Scott Carpenter of the United States Navy, as well as Cooper, Grissom and Slayton; they immediately become national heroes. Although many early NASA rockets explode during launch, the ambitious astronauts all hope to be the first in space as part of Project Mercury. Although engineers see the men as passengers, the pilots insist for the Mercury spacecraft to have a window, a hatch with explosive bolts, and pitch-yaw-roll controls. However, the Soviet Union beats them into space on April 12, 1961, with the launch of Vostok 1 carrying Yuri Gagarin. The seven astronauts are determined to match and to surpass the Soviets.
Shepard is the first American to reach space on the 15-minute sub-orbital flight of Mercury-Redstone 3 on May 5. After Grissom's similar flight of Mercury-Redstone 4 on July 21, the capsule's hatch blows open and quickly fills with water. Grissom escapes, but the spacecraft, overweight with seawater, sinks. Many criticize Grissom for possibly panicking and opening the hatch prematurely. Glenn becomes the first American to orbit the Earth on Mercury-Atlas 6 on February 20, 1962; he survives a possibly loose heat shield and receives a ticker-tape parade. He, his colleagues, and their families become celebrities, including a gigantic celebration in the Sam Houston Coliseum to announce the opening of the Manned Spacecraft Center in Houston, despite the fear of Glenn's wife, Annie, of public speaking because of a stutter.
Although test pilots at Edwards mock the Mercury program for sending "spam in a can" into space, they recognize that they are no longer the fastest men on Earth, and Yeager states that "it takes a special kind of man to volunteer for a suicide mission, especially when it's on national TV." While testing the new Lockheed NF-104A, Yeager attempts to set a new altitude record at the edge of space but is nearly killed in a high-speed ejection when his engine fails. Though seriously burned after reaching the ground, Yeager gathers up his parachute and walks to the ambulance, which proves his worth.
On May 15, 1963, Cooper has a successful launch on Mercury-Atlas 9, which ends the Mercury program. As the last American to fly into space alone, he "went higher, farther, and faster than any other American ... for a brief moment, Gordo Cooper became the greatest pilot anyone had ever seen."
Cast
The following appeared as themselves in archive footage: Ed Sullivan with Bill Dana (in character as José Jiménez); Yuri Gagarin and Nikita Khrushchev embracing at a review, joined by Georgi Malenkov, Nikolai Bulganin, Kliment Voroshilov, and Anastas Mikoyan; Lyndon B. Johnson; John F. Kennedy; Alan Shepard (in Kennedy footage); and James E. Webb, director of NASA during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations.
Production Development In 1979, independent producers Robert Chartoff and Irwin Winkler outbid Universal Pictures for the movie rights to Tom Wolfe's book, paying $350,000.Ansen, David and Katrine Ames. "A Movie with All 'The Right Stuff'." Newsweek, October 3, 1983, p. 38. They hired William Goldman to write the screenplay. Goldman wrote in his memoirs that his adaptation focused on the astronauts, and he entirely ignored Chuck Yeager.Goldman 2001, p. 254. Goldman was inspired to accept the job because he wanted to say something patriotic about America in the wake of the Iran hostage crisis. Winkler writes in his memoirs that he was disappointed that Goldman's adaptation ignored Yeager.
In June 1980, United Artists agreed to finance the film up to $20 million, and the producers began looking for a director. Michael Ritchie was originally attached but fell through; so did John Avildsen who, four years prior, had won an Oscar for his work under Winkler and Chartoff on the original Rocky. (The Right Stuff would have reunited Avildsen with both producers and also with a fourth Rocky veteran, composer Bill Conti.)Goldman 2001, p 257.
Ultimately, Chartoff and Winkler approached director Philip Kaufman, who agreed to make the film but did not like Goldman's script. Kaufman disliked the emphasis on patriotism and wanted Yeager put back in the film.Goldman 2001, p. 258. Eventually, Goldman quit the project in August 1980, and United Artists pulled out.
When Wolfe showed no interest in adapting his own book, Kaufman wrote a draft in eight weeks. His draft restored Yeager to the story, because "if you're tracing how the future began, the future in space travel, it began really with Yeager and the world of the test pilots. The astronauts descended from them."Wilford, John Noble. "'The Right Stuff': From Space to Screen." The New York Times, October 16, 1983. Retrieved: December 29, 2008.
After the financial failure of Heaven's Gate, the studio put The Right Stuff in turnaround. Then, The Ladd Company stepped in with an estimated $17 million.
Casting Actor Ed Harris auditioned twice in 1981 for the role of John Glenn. Originally, Kaufman wanted to use a troupe of contortionists to portray the press corps, but he settled on the improvisational comedy troupe Fratelli Bologna, known for its sponsorship of "St. Stupid's Day" in San Francisco.Williams, Christian. "A Story that Pledges Allegiance to Drama and Entertainment." Washington Post, October 20, 1983, A18. The director created a locust-like chatter to accompany the press corps whenever they appear, which was achieved through a sound combination of (among other things) motorized Nikon cameras and clicking beetles.
Professional American football player Anthony Muñoz has a minor role in the film as a hospital orderly named Gonzales; the soft-spoken Muñoz was asked to lip sync his lines, and a "deeper, gruffer voice" was dubbed over him in post-production.
Filming Most of the film was shot in and around San Francisco between March and October 1982, with additional filming continuing into January 1983. A waterfront warehouse there was transformed into a studio. Location shooting took place primarily at the abandoned Hamilton Air Force Base, north of San Francisco, which was converted into a sound stage for the numerous interior sets.Farmer 1984, p. 34. No location could substitute for the distinctive Edwards Air Force Base landscape and so the entire production crew moved to the Mojave Desert to shoot the opening sequences that framed the story of the test pilots at Muroc Army Air Field, later Edwards AFB.Farmer 1984, p. 41. Additional shooting took place in California City in early 1983. During the filming of a sequence portraying Chuck Yeager's ejection from an NF-104,Note that Yeager's ejection was from the highly-specialized NF-104 rocket jet, but the movie used a common unmodified F-104. stuntman Joseph Svec, a former Green Beret, was killed when he failed to open his parachute because he may have been unconscious from smoke.
In 1982, the scene of the wives of the astronauts watching the television broadcast was filmed on military housing in Novato, California.
Yeager was hired as a technical consultant on the film. He took the actors flying, studied the storyboards and special effects, and pointed out the errors. To prepare for their roles, Kaufman gave the actors playing the seven astronauts an extensive videotape collection to study.
The effort to make an authentic feature led to the use of many full-size aircraft, scale models and special effects to replicate the scenes at Edwards Air Force Base and Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.Farmer 1983, p. 47. Special visual effects supervisor Gary Gutierrez said the first special effects were too clean for the desired "dirty, funky, early NASA look." That made Gutierrez and his team start from scratch and employ unconventional techniques like going up a hill with model airplanes on wires and fog machines to create clouds or shooting model F-104s from a crossbow device and capturing their flight with up to four cameras. Avant-garde filmmaker Jordan Belson created the background of the Earth as seen from high-flying planes and from orbiting spacecraft.