The influence of director William Friedkin on the film adaptation of William Peter Blatty’s novel The Exorcist is controversial and it is all on screen, allowing audience member to judge for themselves whether that influence was worth the controversial lengths to which the director was willing to go. Make no mistake: whether you fully buy into the “auteur theory” or accept all the gargantuan holes in it that make it so easily dismissed, William Friedkin was not the controlling author of this film. The auteur of this film, if it can be argued to exist at all, was the William Peter Blatty who not only wrote the novel, but adapted the screenplay and produced the film and is figure who finally overruled all others to choose Friedkin as director. That is why the posters read “William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist” despite being directed by the guy who won the Academy Award for Best Director less than two years earlier.
So, then where is the influence of the director and what is controversial about it? The literal touch of Friedkin’s hand on the final film is most notably manifested not so much in such typically director-ish techniques like editing or composition or camerawork or even tone or mood, but on the film’s acting. The Exorcist was Jason Miller’s first film with his previous acting experience limited to the stage. Which is where Friedkin saw him and was impressed enough to buy out the contract of Stacy Keach who had already been hired to play Father Karras. The set became something of a trial by fire for Miller who became the subject of several volatile directing techniques of Friedkin. One day, Friedkin ordered that a gun be fired off-camera in order to the reaction he wanted from Miller who in turn became incensed and informed Friedkin that he was an actor and therefore didn’t need such trickery to convey any emotion the director desired. Maybe so, but the scene in which Karras reacts with horror and revulsion at being hit in the face with the projectile vomiting of Regan that appears in the film is a blooper; the vomit was only supposed to hit his chest and only made it is high as his face by accident.
Both Ellen Burstyn and Linda Blair turn in quite physical performances as the result of demonic possession. This is partly due to acting ability, but also party due to Friedkin insisting they be attached to harnesses and yanked around quite robustly in those scenes where Regan is being controlled by the demon and slapping her mother around. William O’Malley’s only screen credit is for playing the priest who ministers the last rites to Father Karras as he lies dying at the bottom of the infamous steps. This limited career may possibly be due to William Friedkin suddenly slapping him hard across the face just before filming the take of that scene which made it into the final cut.
Everybody on the set during those scenes shot in Regan’s bedroom had to suffer at the hands of Friedkin’s technique. Once Regan becomes fully possessed, those scene were shot on a set refrigerated near to the freezing point in order to create the effect of steam coming from the mouths and to instigate a pervasive sense of the world inside that room being out of sync with normalcy. The lengths to which Friedkin went to get individual reactions as well as create entire tonal symphonies became legendary. Whether or not one considers those tactics to be a violation of employee rights or an expression of creative license remains up to each individual viewer. The three actors who received Oscar nominations have not been known to spend a lot of time complaining since production wrapped, however.
