To celebrate Alison Macor's lively biography of the screenwriter Warren Skaaren, we're highlighting the surprising impact and short life of one of Hollywood’s highest-paid writers. Although he rarely left Austin where he lived and worked, Skaaren wrote 1980s hit movies like Top Gun, Beverly Hills Cop II, Beetlejuice, and Batman. Rewrite Man: The Life and Career of Screenwriter Warren Skaaren addresses issues of film authorship that have become even more contested in the era of blockbuster filmmaking, especially with ongoing negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers and a possible strike by the Writer's Guild of America.
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Twelve Things You Didn’t Know About Screenwriter Warren Skaaren
By Alison Macor
Warren Skaaren was a bit like the fictional Zelig in Woody Allen’s movie of the same name. If something big—even historic—was happening, Skaaren probably was there, just behind the scenes. From his storied tenure as student body president at Rice University during the tumultuous 1960s to his seemingly “overnight” success as one of Hollywood’s go-to script doctors, Skaaren made the most of his short but memorable life. As fellow screenwriter Bill Broyles (Cast Away, Apollo 13) once said, “Warren was like a Wizard of Oz character able to do these magical things like suddenly showing up at the airport with Steve McQueen. He was moving in a world that none of us could even imagine. He just made things happen.”
He sold Hollywood on Texas. Twenty-five-year-old Skaaren, working in the Governor of Texas’s office, drafted a proposal for the state’s film commission. Governor Preston Smith appointed him as the first executive director of the Texas Film Commission in May 1971. Under Skaaren’s four-year tenure, he brought Hollywood films like The Getaway, The Sugarland Express, and Lovin’ Molly to shoot in Texas.
He masterminded the Coat and Tie Rebellion at Rice University. As student body president at Rice, Skaaren kept a campus-wide protest from turning ugly when he led students and faculty in a peaceful protest against the hiring of a controversial new university president. Nicknamed the Coat and Tie Rebellion because of its formally attired participants, this protest—and Skaaren’s efforts—resulted in the resignation of William Masterson just three days after he was hired to lead the university.
He saved Top Gun. A young Tom Cruise, hot off the success of Risky Business, was ready to bail on a film about hotshot fighter pilots at an elite training academy. Producing partners Jerry Bruckheimer and Don Simpson hired Skaaren over the phone after he wowed them with his treatment, which humanized Cruise’s character, Maverick, and ditched Maverick’s bimbo gymnast girlfriend in favor of a sexy rocket scientist. It was also Skaaren’s idea for Maverick to woo love interest Charlie (Kelly McGillis) by singing a duet of the Righteous Brothers’ classic “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling” with Maverick’s best friend Goose, played by Anthony Edwards. Cruise stayed on the picture, and its success would propel the actor into superstardom and cement his friendship with Skaaren.
