What seems to be one of the strongest-held beliefs in online film speculation on Film Twitter and the likes is the long-standing rumor that writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson wrote, rewrote, or did a deep and uncredited pass on Martin Scorsese’s “Killers Of The Flower Moon” (which we named one of the Best Films Of 2023) Up until now, the rumors are just that, not confirmed, and no one of any authority has spoken about them; hence us never really covering the story.
READ MORE: Sight & Sound Names’ Killers Of The Flower Moon’ Its Top Film Of 2023
What seemed to trigger the rumors initially was the fact that six-time Academy Award-nominated writer Eric Roth (“The Insider,” “Munich”) was absolutely nowhere to be seen on the awards campaign trail for “Killers Of The Flower Moon.” The movie was nominated for ten Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director, but failed to earn an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay—perhaps because not a soul was campaigning for it and certainly not Roth.
That led to something of a whisper campaign, with many credible journalists repeating the rumor online but claiming it was just something they had heard, which has ended up being repeated often (online blogger Jeffrey Wells documented some of these claims).
Anyhow, that’s all a longwinded way of saying someone has finally put the rumor to someone involved in the film as ‘Flower Moon’ cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto was asked about it recently by Marc Maron on his WTF podcast.
And to be fair to Maron, Prieto teed it all up for him, explaining how ‘Flower Moon’ was radically changed and rethought in its rewriting process.
“The way we approached it was evolving constantly,” Prieto said of the movie and the script. “Because the script itself changed completely from when I started prepping, it was a script much more similar to the book it’s based on. And the book is focused on the FBI, and Tom White is the main character, Jesse Plemon’s [character]. So [Leonardo] DiCaprio was going to play that character, and Eric Roth wrote that script, and it was a great script, too, but it was very different. It was the story of Tom White and how he discovered who the bad guys were.”
Prieto went on to explain that Scorsese and DiCaprio eventually changed their minds. Dicaprio felt most compelled by the character of Ernest Burkhart, who he would eventually star as. They refashioned the story towards his character’s story of complicity in having the Osage indigenous people murdered, despite being married to one of them and loving her (Lily Gladstone’s character). “So, everything shifted, and Paramount decided, ‘we’re not making that movie,’” Prieto explained.
This gave Maron the perfect opportunity to ask about the radically altered script, who wrote it, and the Paul Thomas Anderson rumors.
“I’ve heard that rumor too,” Prieto said playfully, “But I don’t know.”
“You know,” Maron shot back playfully. “I don’t know,” he said as both men erupted into laughter. “Yeah, I don’t know,” he said again.
“But there were people involved in rejigging the story, and Scorsese was very deep into that and DiCaprio as well,” he allowed without naming any of the writers’ names.
Frankly, we’re not saying that Prieto’s comments confirm anything because they don’t—though the moment of laughter between them and what seems to be the silent looks they gave each other feel very curious. That said, Prieto himself suggests a radically different script by Eric Roth and then a wholly refashioned script written by…someone no one seems to mention. To be fair, Martin Scorsese has a writing credit on the film alongside Roth, too, and the filmmaker has dozens of co-writing credits on many of his movies, so maybe it’s just the director.
We may never ultimately know, and or no one may fess up, but it certainly wouldn’t be unheard of for a filmmaker or screenwriter to take an uncredited role on a screenplay as it’s a pretty common practice. Script doctors make a living out of uncredited rewrites, and names like Tony Gilroy and Scott Z. Burns are two of the most famous working in Hollywood today. Either way, listen to the conversation below (it’s around the one-hour and twenty-minute mark) and see what you think. These stories usually come to light, but it tends to be a few years after the fact, especially after awards season.
