Film Culture (1956)

AN ENCOUNTER WITH JOHN HUSTON Excerpts from a conversation between John Huston and Edouard Laurot HUSTON: Speaking about the philosophic content of Moby Dick—I am reminded of JeanPaul Sartre’s The Devil and God Almighty, which I read recently. He also deals in ultimates—that ultimate evil may in turn become ultimate good, for example. I feel that I’m saying what you are more familiar with, but it seems to me that one of the themes of the play is precisely the fact that there is an unpredictable interplay between Good and Evil and that therefore, no Manichaean distinction between them can be made—though in this country there is a tendency to oversimplify moral and political issues. LAUROT: There is no doubt about that. One of the main reasons for my having written the English version of The Devil and God Almighty was, precisely, my realization of how significant its ideas are for the modern world, and how important an American production of it would be. There haven’t been any plays on Broadway in the past few years that could compare with the scope of its thought and the power of its dramatic impact. HUSTON: I entirely agree with you. Aside from its purely theatrical qualities, it can be read as a sort of dramatic essay of ideas. I would risk saying that it’s his best play. Don’t you think so? LAUROT: Yes, insofar as Sartre’s expression through theatre goes, this play may be taken as his most advanced one. No other contemporary dramatist seems to have approached the dilemma of the modern intellectual with such boldness and perspicacity. Wasting for Godot, a play currently so popular with the Saturday Review type of intelligentsia, is at best a poetic prolegomenon to the problems affronted in The Devil and God Almighty by Goetz, the protagonist. For Goetz, of course, represents a type of the modern intellectual—at least the European intellectual—torn by an anguished conflict between his divided ethical, therefore political, allegiances. He describes a full circle of possibilities afforded by the modern world in his existential search for an ethic. But the play has a more universal meaning in that it presents both man’s craving for the Absolute and his rebellion against it. HUSTON: This is what I really meant when I said that the ultimates are oversimplified here. LAUROT: I’m very glad to hear this from you for, as you most certainly know, Existentialism, as a philosophy—as well as its personal and political implications—has been regrettably misinterpreted here—even in academic circles. And then—there are those popular conceptions that consider it either as an eccentric pose or as a gloomy philosophy of foredoom preaching moral anarchy and, therefore, an abstention from all responsibility. The whole of Sartre’s creation and activity, as well as the fact that he has announced as his new project a work on ethics, should be known to at least the intelligentsia of this country. That's why at present I am making plans for a stage production of The Devil and God Almighty. HUSTON: I'd very much like to see this play produced in New York. As a director, I’m also interested in it and have entertained thoughts of putting it on film. Sartre would be very strong medicine for Hollywood. They engage moral issues constantly, but on a superficial level. Here in New York, I believe he could meet with response; although when I staged Huis Clos, its depths escaped audiences and critics. Many thought it was a play about Lesbians. . . LAUROT: I have a feeling that if The Devil and God Almighty were to be filmed under your direction, it might not suffer from a reduction in significance. You seem to be one of the very few directors who attempt to retain the substance of an original they adapt—insofar as this is possible. HUSTON: You're very kind to think so. Sometimes, of course, one doesn’t have to follow the original literally to remain faithful to the spirit. For instance—take Moby Dick. So far I’ve encountered only one person that did not approve of what I had done with it—he is a rabid reverer of every line in Melville’s book—and, while I 1