THE MIDLANDS ESSENTIAL ENTERTAINMENT GUIDE

Bruce Joel Rubin (centre) with Stewart Clarke (Sam) and Rebecca Trehearn (Molly)
Bruce Joel Rubin
The creator of Ghost, in conversation...
When Bruce Joel Rubin’s Ghost first hit cinema screens in July 1990, the romantic fantasy about
the power of love became an overnight box office success, winning an Oscar for Best Original
Screenplay. After years of deliberation, Bruce finally gave the go-ahead for the movie to be
adapted into a stage musical, a touring version of which arrives in the region this month...
So Bruce, what provided the initial
inspiration for the movie Ghost?
I guess I was a creature of the ’60s, and the
psychedelic revolution made me very aware
of life, death and, I guess, different terms. So
I started to explore this idea that we exist
before we are born and that we exist even
after we’re dead. I believe there’s a
continuum at play. I wanted to explore that,
and talk about it in a mass-audience arena. I
don’t know why, but I was given the
opportunity to do that. Somewhere along the
way I wanted to do a movie about a ghost,
told from the side of the ghost. I thought it
would be an important story, but I didn’t
06 www.whatsonlive.co.uk
“
have a way in. I didn’t know how to tell that
story. Then, by chance, I was watching a
production of Hamlet, and in the second
scene the ghost of his father appears on the
parapet and says ‘avenge my death’. I knew
at that moment that that was the access
point, and that I wanted to tell that story in
twentieth century New York. It moved
forward from that.
Was it a difficult storyline to sell?
Nothing’s immediate. I pitched the idea for
about two years around Hollywood. What
happened - which was a really wonderful
gift - was that people’s eyes would glaze
I always think the last scene,
where Sam says ‘the love’s
inside you, take it with you’,
really delivers. The audience
always gets very emotional, and
I get very gratified by that
”
over. So I’d keep changing the story to make
it more interesting, and it kept getting better
and better. Finally, in about the last week of
pitching, I went to five different places.
Everyone I pitched to during that last week
wanted it, but it had taken two years.
And the rest, as they say, is history. So
when did the idea to adapt it for the stage
first come about?
People have talked to me about it over the
years, and I kept saying no, I had no
interest. I really had a fear, actually, that
they’d be singing these little tinkly songs
which, for me, is the case with many