Still to this day, The Shining is thought of as one of the most spine-chilling and iconic horror movies within the past several decades. Its premise paints a creepy scene of a family cloistered in a shadow-filled hotel as torrential snow collects outside. Besides its horrifying internal centering around familial trauma, the other more external and ethereal elements following the Torrance family help to drive home its dreary messages. While the movie is one of the most powerful interpretations of author Stephen King’s heap of horror stories, the film’s internal fundamentals contain even darker goings-on than audiences might realize at first.
Shelley Duvall, whom audiences often remember in the role of Wendy Torrance, fell victim to some unfortunate and unnecessary experiences during the filmmaking process. Sadly, these took their toll on her serene yet continually bright identity. The several ways in which the making of The Shining negatively affected Shelley Duvall shouldn’t be forgotten in favor of the film’s popularity. What actually happened to the actress during that time?
The Overreach of Artistic Control
Director Stanley Kubrick’s films are creatively unique, with many becoming examples of iconic excellence within the universe of the film. Observed throughout his filmography, he breathes an individualistic and ultimately recognizable atmosphere into his work. The Shining is absolutely one of his most notable movies, but it’s also often criticized because of what Duvall experienced. The portrayal she provides shouldn’t be considered her greatest contribution to film because of the nightmarish time she had in real life, all in the name of art.
In an article from The Hollywood Reporter, writer Seth Abramovitch questioned if Duvall thought Kubrick to be “unusually cruel or abusive to her.” She responded, “He’s got that streak in him. He definitely has that. But I think mostly because people have been that way to him at some time in the past… He was very warm and friendly to me.”
According to the article and a People feature, the overly laborious filming schedule and shooting processes drug on for over a year at 56 weeks, hitting the Guinness World Record for most retakes for one scene with dialogue. That specific scene was none other than the infamous baseball bat scene. Kubrick is said to have demanded that many takes to unnerve and upset Duvall, which in turn would make the emotion in the scene realistic. It was real because the abuse was real.
Duvall’s Mental Health Suffered
Obviously, Duvall’s mental state began to worsen as a result of The Shining‘s extremely intense filming practices. The Hollywood Reporter quoted her process of getting into character and how her preparation led her to “listen to sad songs. Or you just think about something very sad in your life or how much you miss your family or friends. But after a while, your body rebels. It says: ‘Stop doing this to me. I don’t want to cry every day.’ And sometimes just that thought alone would make me cry.”
A New York Post article clarifies that Duvall spoke out in 2016 on Dr. Phil about the behavioral health problems that she was currently suffering, alluding to an ongoing battle that The Shining most likely did not help with. A SlashFilm article expands upon the severity of what Duvall went through during filming, writing, “To put a person in the position of feeling threatened and fearing for their life for 127 takes on a staircase is not legendary or the work of a perfectionist — it’s abuse, and we need to start calling it what it is.”
Multiple Negative Effects on Duvall
The issues that The Shining conjured up in Duvall were, unfortunately, more than just mental ones. SlashFilm cites that she was denied connection with others on set and that the negative effects grew more bodily as well. The article states that she started to lose her hair and was faced with an anxiety attack during filming. Her “hands were shredded raw from gripping the bat for such a prolonged period of time,” and “she left the set completely dehydrated” once she’d finished her encouraged “crying in pain, fear, and exhaustion.”
The filming clearly went far beyond any idea of what’s healthy for anyone, whether the pain she underwent was kick-started for the movie’s sake. Kubrick even went as far as to instruct the rest of the crew not to sympathize with Duvall during the filming. It was in this way that she was isolated from the most basic human needs of communication and understanding. Without a friend on the set, Duvall was given no choice but to suffer this abuse on screen, but from a perspective where the audience couldn’t see the abuse, just the great acting.
This is not much different than an abused woman covering bruises with makeup so that no one would suspect her abuser of such heinous acts. It should go without saying that refusing to maintain Duvall’s inherent dignity and her basic safety shouldn’t have been sacrificed just to create one of the most shocking horror films out there. The abuse by Kubrick was so severe that it allowed him to get the desired terrified and completely unraveled woman he needed to make The Shining believably real.
Following The Shining‘s 1980 release, Duvall acted until 2002. Her absence from on-screen acting for about 20 years will end this year. She’ll be welcomed back into the mainstream film world in The Forest Hills, another horror film. Given the public’s view of The Shining nowadays, it’s clear that the film is often held in high regard. But audiences shouldn’t discount the needless harm that Duvall faced — invoking that amount of hurt just for a job or storytelling is never worth it.
This story originally appeared on Movieweb
