Clive Barker

Bill Condon

Ian McKellen

In 1957, a handsome gardener named Clayton Boone is hired by James Whale, the director of Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein, and The Invisible Man. Boone is fascinated by his retired employer's tales of Old Hollywood, but also wary of his overt homosexuality. Whale slowly exposes Boone to a world he's never before seen, while staging a plot with the young man at its center—not a plot of seduction, but something darker. Gods and Monsters, the Academy Award®-winning screenplay by Bill Condon, is adapted from the novel Father of Frankenstein by Christopher Bram. The film, directed by Condon, stars Ian McKellen as Whale, Brendan Fraser as Boone, and Lynn Redgrave as Hanna, Whale's protective housekeeper. Gods and Monsters, produced by Regent Entertainment, was named Best Picture by the National Board of Review, was chosen by more than 100 newspapers and magazines as one of the Ten Best Films of 1998, and was nominated for three Academy® Awards. "Gods and Monsters is a picture that seems so very simple in its outline, yet it elicits from its audiences immensely complex feelings. That's a rare balance and extraordinarily difficult to achieve," writes Clive Barker in his foreword. And Ian McKellen writes in his introduction, "This is one of those rare screenplays that the actors felt no need to tamper with. The dialogue is full of invention but never straining for effect." This volume in the acclaimed Newmarket Shooting Script® series features Condon's screenplay, McKellen's introduction, Barker's foreword, a portfolio of stills by Anne Fishbein, and complete credits for the film.

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