Joe Eszterhas left Hollywood behind after tearing a legendary swath through the industry in the ‘80s and ‘90s writing iconic, sexy hit movies like “Flashdance,” “Jagged Edge,” Sliver,” “Jade” – and perhaps the most transgressive of them all, “Basic Instinct” starring Sharon Stone as mysterious serial killer Catherine Tramell, pursued by Michael Douglas, a detective in her thrall.
The movie launched 100 copycats, set the mold for the post-feminist femme fatale and made a boatload of money in release and forever-after in video and streaming.
But while Eszterhas has been holed up in his hometown of Cleveland, Ohio, living a post-Hollywood life of faith and family with his wife Naomi (also writing memoirs and such), apparently he’s not quite done. Last week he made a mega-deal to reboot “Basic Instinct” for Amazon-MGM, at a maximum fee of $4 million if the movie gets made.
WaxWord, who for better or worse has known the writer over many years, spoke to Eszterhas about his dip back into the world of sexy thrillers.
I’ve interviewed you so many times over the years about all kinds of things, the first time was in your house in Malibu when a new baby was born. And now here you are back with this incredible deal to write a reboot of “Basic Instinct.” So I really wanted to get on the horn with you and understand where did this come from? You’ve not really been in the business of writing thrillers for quite a long time.
Yeah, this is preposterous. The notion that you’re going to pay four million bucks to an 80-year-old f–k of a guy who lives in Cleveland for God’s sakes, right? You’re going to do all that? OK, so they did. Now, the only thing I can say in defense of all this is, for people who are concerned about my age, I’m a huge Mark Twain fan. And then I’m going to paraphrase Twain and say that the rumors about my cinematic impotence are exaggerated and ageist. And I have a co-writer who is a twisted little man who lives somewhere deep inside me – I won’t name where – who’s 29. He was born 29. He will die 29.
I love it. Yeah.
He wrote much of the first “Basic” and he tells me that he is quote “up to write this” and that he will give everyone a wild and cinematic ride. I was very happy to hear my twisted little man say that because it gives me some confidence that we will really do something together.
OK but enough about you. What about the movie?
I can’t talk very much about the storyline at this point because much of it isn’t formed yet. It begins in 2025. The Catherine Trammel character I will write and I hope Sharon [Stone] agrees to do the picture because I thought she was brilliant the first time out.
Yeah.
In my reboot she is not the star of the picture but she is the main co-star of the picture. It’s about the serial killers. It’s about copycats. There’s a demonic element to it that I think will be spooky.
I’ve really not told this story before. The character came when I was in college. I was 18 years old and I met a professor’s wife who was in her mid 30s and we had an affair, and she was beautiful and smart and really well read and outspoken and fiery and funny and totally open about her sexuality. After near the end of the year, she came to me and said we were done, and she broke my heart.
And the cop character — I was a police reporter and met a cop who’d been involved in three or four shootings. I liked him. We were drinking buddies, but I realized through the course of our relationship that he liked pulling the trigger.
Okay, so flash forward nearly 20 years. About four or five months of thinking about it, I went off to to Hawaii by myself, let the sun beat me up… That’s how it evolved and that’s how it became “Basic Instinct.” I don’t know how in the creative process you meet two people, they influence your life, you think about them and they get swirled around together somehow.
The woman with whom I had the affair when the movie came out sent me a note and she said, ‘I saw Basic Instinct I loved it, and then she added, ‘I think about you, too. Thank you.’
Oh, that’s really great. She got it. She saw herself.
Yeah, that’s how it came about.
When we were talking earlier you said the film will be anti-woke. In your mind what does that mean — “anti-woke”?
It means that dialogue-wise she will be open about her sexuality, character-wise she will be raunchy at times, funny, iconoclastic and all of those things.
So what are your thoughts generally about jumping back into a controversial topic and the environment that we’re in right now?
In terms of the woke culture, I think that there is a segment of the population that’s had it with woke culture. But then there’s also a huge segment that hasn’t. I don’t believe in woke and I don’t believe in being politically correct because I think it’s not the truth, and I like the truth spoken.
The absurdities come when a woman who is sexual and open about her sexuality, you know, the culture that that I grew up in would describe that woman as a nymphomaniac. If a man did the same thing he would be a stud. And then this moves into religion in my mind as well because there are some faiths — including the one that I officially belong to — that are totally sexist. Women aren’t allowed to be priests.
Well, why the hell not? You know, by what justice are they not allowed to be priests? They can be nuns, they can be assistants and all of that. Those things are wrong and in my mind there are things that should be changed even in terms of religion.
Let me talk to you about Trump because I think it relates to this. Yes I liked Trump and I like some of the things that Trump does, but I’m very concerned about the immigrant situation. I’m concerned about going after not just MS13 but immigrants who’ve been here 10 years illegally and then the whole campaign with that. The whole Epstein thing has blown up in the past couple of years. If I were a journalist — and I don’t understand why this hasn’t happened — I would ask the president at a press conference specifically if he went to that island and specifically if and when he went to that island, he had sexual relations with underage women. No one’s asked that question bluntly. And I think that question has to be asked because it it relates to everything about our president and who he is and all of that.
What’s your time frame getting a draft?
Three months. But I think it’ll be much less than that. I’m guessing it’ll be a month and a half or two months. At night, I wake up and I hear lines of dialogue.
I’m sorry. You’re talking about the guy inside.
Of course, he’s speaking in gibberish, part-Hungarian part-English. But I get it.
So, you think you’ll have a draft within a couple months?
Yes. Yes, I do. I used to be a Hungarian refugee kid, but I moved a centimeter. Now I’m a Cleveland guy.
Well, you know what? That’s one thing we share since, as you know, I come from Cleveland, too. And that goes pretty deep somewhere. So, thank you. God bless.
This interview was edited for length and clarity.
