Editing Coming Home (1978 film) (section)

== Production ==
''Coming Home'' was conceived by [[Jane Fonda]] as the first feature for her own production company, IPC Films (for the Indochina Peace Campaign), with her associate producer Bruce Gilbert, a friend from her protest days. Fonda wished to make a film about the [[Vietnam War]] inspired by her friendship with [[Ron Kovic]], a paraplegic Vietnam War veteran, whom she had met at an antiwar rally.<ref name="Chong2011">{{cite book|last=Chong|first=Sylvia Shin Huey|title=The Oriental Obscene: Violence and Racial Fantasies in the Vietnam Era|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=__L1EVYu35wC&pg=PT164|date=9 November 2011|publisher=Duke University Press|isbn=978-0-8223-4854-2|page=164}}</ref> At that time, Kovic had recently completed his autobiographical book ''[[Born on the Fourth of July]]'', which later became an Oscar-winning [[Born on the Fourth of July (film)|motion picture of the same name]] directed by [[Oliver Stone]], starring [[Tom Cruise]] as Kovic.

In 1972, Fonda hired [[Nancy Dowd]], a friend from her days in the feminist movement, to write a script about the consequences of the war as seen through the eyes of a military wife.<ref name="HillstromHillstrom1998">{{cite book|last1=Hillstrom|first1=Kevin|last2=Hillstrom|first2=Laurie Collier|title=The Vietnam Experience: A Concise Encyclopedia of American Literature, Songs, and Films|url=https://archive.org/details/vietnamexperienc0000hill|url-access=registration|date=1 January 1998|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|isbn=978-0-313-30183-4|page=[https://archive.org/details/vietnamexperienc0000hill/page/76 76]}}</ref> Originally, Dowd's story, tentatively titled ''Buffalo Ghosts'', focused on two women, volunteers at a veterans' hospital, who must come to grips with the emotional toll that the war takes on its casualties and their families. The project dragged on for years until Gilbert and producer [[Jerome Hellman]] took it. The screenplay was reshaped significantly by the circle of talent who eventually brought it to the screen: Fonda, Ashby, Wexler, Jon Voight, producer Hellman and screenwriters [[Waldo Salt]] and [[Robert C. Jones]]. They were united by their opposition to the Vietnam War and by their concern for the veterans who were returning to America and facing difficulties adapting to life back home. [[Rudy Wurlitzer]] contributed uncredited work to the script.<ref name="Dawson2009">{{cite book|last=Dawson|first=Nick|title=Being Hal Ashby: Life of a Hollywood Rebel|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nOQCqPz2_roC&pg=PT372|date=30 June 2009|publisher=University Press of Kentucky|isbn=978-0-8131-3919-7|page=372}}</ref>{{efn|Novelist [[George Davis (author)|George Davis]] sued the filmmakers in federal court, alleging they had infringed the copyright of his 1971 debut, a Vietnam War novel also called ''Coming Home''. In 1982 the case was decided in the defendants' favor, with the court finding that beyond the shared titles and the war as a backdrop to the story, the two had no [[substantial similarity]] a jury could reasonably be expected to find (Davis's novel, most significantly, takes place in Thailand where its three main characters, two of whom are black, are Air Force pilots).<ref>{{cite court|litigants=Davis v. United Artists, Inc.|vol=547|reporter=[[Federal Reporter|F.Supp.]]|opinion=722|court=[[United States District Court for the Southern District of New York|S.D.N.Y.]]|date=1982|url=https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=8500710173748597164}}</ref>}}

[[John Schlesinger]], who had worked with producers Hellman and Voight on ''[[Midnight Cowboy]]'', was originally named the director, but he left the project after feeling uncomfortable with the subject matter.<ref name="Medavoy2013">{{cite book|last=Medavoy|first=Mike|title=You're Only as Good as Your Next One: 100 Great Films, 100 Good Films, and 100 for Which I Should Be Shot|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GQe4nFeemPMC&pg=PA56|date=25 June 2013|publisher=Simon and Schuster|isbn=978-1-4391-1813-9|page=56}}</ref> The script was then passed to [[Michael Cimino]], who at the time was interested in making another film about Vietnam. He declined, however, as he felt it was "bad fiction", which imposed a political idea rather than the truth of the stories of returning veterans. According to Cimino, Fonda changed the original ending:
<blockquote>"What was shot was Jane's ending — she was a [[Pacifism|pacifist]] and had to find a way for guilt to kill the character. In the original ending, [[Bruce Dern]]'s character got himself a heavy [[machine gun]], in a moment of madness went into the [[Los Angeles|L.A.]] freeway, five lanes of traffic in both directions, and started shooting away, destroying everything in sight, an inferno. And she turned it into a [[Norman Maine]] complex, 'oh my God I'm so guilty for what I did in Vietnam that I'm going to kill myself by going in the sea'."<ref>{{cite magazine|last=Mourinha|first=Jorge|url=https://filmmakermagazine.com/99041-interview-michael-cimino-2005/#.Yy47CHbMLIU|title="I Never Knew How to Make a Film": Michael Cimino in 2005|magazine=[[Filmmaker (magazine)|Filmmaker]]|date=July 5, 2016|access-date=December 3, 2023}}</ref></blockquote>
[[Hal Ashby]] was next sent the script, who agreed to direct the film. Fonda was cast from the beginning as Sally Hyde, the housewife. A top box-office star was sought for the male lead to offset the grim nature of the story. [[Al Pacino]], [[Jack Nicholson]] and [[Sylvester Stallone]] were all offered the part, but declined.<ref name="Devine1999">{{cite book|last=Devine|first=Jeremy M.|title=Vietnam at 24 Frames a Second: A Critical and Thematic Analysis of Over 400 Films about the Vietnam War|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RIgkkakqBYoC&pg=PA148|year=1999|publisher=University of Texas Press|isbn=978-0-292-71601-8|page=148}}</ref> [[Jon Voight]] had been considered for the role of the husband, but after becoming involved with the film, he campaigned to play the paraplegic veteran. Voight had participated in the anti-war movement and was a friend of Fonda, who was instrumental in helping him land the role, even though he had fallen from popularity since his ''Midnight Cowboy'' heyday. Bruce Dern, long stereotyped in sadistic roles, was chosen as the husband. The screenplay was written and rewritten until the project could wait no longer. Jane Fonda, who just finished ''[[Julia (1977 film)|Julia]]'' (1977), was soon to star in [[Alan J. Pakula]]'s ''[[Comes a Horseman]]'' (1978). For director Ashby, this was his second film about the 1960s, in addition to his 1975 film ''[[Shampoo (film)|Shampoo]]''.

Ashby had cast singer-songwriter [[Guthrie Thomas]] to portray the role of Bill Munson after reviewing Thomas' screen test. Thomas joined his close friend Ashby and the entire cast at a restaurant by [[Malibu, California|Malibu Beach]] before the start of production. Thomas had been previously cast in a previous Ashby film, ''Bound for Glory'', starring [[David Carradine]]. Upon completion of the cast meeting, Thomas privately spoke with Ashby and told him, "Hal, I am a singer-songwriter as you know, and not an actor. In all fairness to you and this amazing cast, you need an extremely talented actor for this role and not a poor singer. I recommend either [[Robert Carradine|Bobby Carradine]] or [[Keith Carradine]]." Robert Carradine was cast and portrayed the role of Bill Munson.