THE NEWMAN TREATMENTS

Enter David Newman, Leslie Newman, and Robert Benton. The screenwriting team had impressive credits to their names, with successful projects under their belts like the Warren Beatty-Faye Dunaway hit "Bonnie and Clyde" and the Barbra Streisand-Ryan O'Neal comedy "What's Up, Doc?" David Newman and Robert Benton also had a connection to Superman, since they had authored the Broadway musical "It's a Bird, It's a Plane, It's Superman" in 1966 (they would also bring their Broadway musical to late-night television in the late 1970's, prior to the film's release).
The play's focus on camp humor brought an equally camp nature to their revision of the screenplay. But their revisions also brought a modern sensibility to the Superman legend, as well asa comic touch essential to the mythos. Their revisions permeated the development of their script and the final rewrite in July 1976 and April 1977.

David Newman and Robert Benton collaborated on the third (Their first) draft of the first Superman movie screenplay only before Benton departed to direct another project, so he Benton didn't contribute to Superman 2. So, enter Leslie Newman, David's wife. They worked on the next draft for BOTH films. They distilled Puzo's second script treatment, the 300-plus page draft from October 1975, into a more tightly-condensed 245-page script, divided into two parts, which would serve as the basis for the simultaneous production of "Superman" and "Superman II". The July 1976 draft of "Superman" bears Guy Hamilton's directorial credit on the opening page. It had been announced from the beginning by the Salkinds that "Superman" would be filmed as two separate productions with two separate scripts, thereby avoiding the legal problems that resulted from their "sequel" "The Four Musketeers".

The synopsis of the July 1976 script treatment of "Superman"


Even in this draft of the script many elements point toward what would become the final version of "Superman". But a number of elements were removed from this draft and not used in the final shooting script or the final version of the film. These differences make for a most unique, if not camp, approach to the Superman legend.
Included in this draft is a fourth member of Luthor's gang, a German architect only referred to as Albert. Frail in appearance, his intellect far exceeds his physical features. Albert was eventually deemed irrelevant to the story and removed from the final draft.
But many scenes point to the obvious camp nature of the script. As Ilya Salkind pointed out, "...it was still far too long. And there were certain campy features to the script that just didn't fit if we were going to play it a hundred percent straight." One such example comes early, on page 36-37 of the script. Instead of entering Luthor's hideaway through Grand Central Station, he goes to the restroom of the Plaza Hotel, sits down on toilet in the men's room, and pulls the flush and descends - toilet seat and all! - to the cavern below. Continuing into the next scene, we would have been introduced to a very different Lex Luthor, one more patterned after Woody Allen than the comic book character in the fact that this Luthor constantly ate Kleenex! Not a very imposing nature for a villain, not even for Superman.
In another scene ultimately removed from the final version, after Superman's first night in town, Clark and Lois discuss the evening's events, when he hears Luthor's threats on television. As Lois gets ready for work, she believes Clark is jealous over Superman and is willing to compete with him for Lois' hand. She re-enters the room and finds Clark standing in her living room dressed as Superman but still wearing his glasses. She laughs in embarrassment and assumes that Clark is willing to go this far to impress her to like him.

Another scene points to the times of the 1970's. As Superman patrols the skies of Metropolis, he spots a bald-headed man walking the streets and assumes the man to be Luthor. When Superman encounters the man, he turns out to be Telly Savalas (in a quick cameo as himself) and states, "Hey Superman, who loves ya, baby?" Had this scene been filmed, the audience would have collapsed into broad laughs and groans. Not a way to treat Superman seriously. Mercifully, this sickening scene was written out of the final draft.
The main encounter between Superman and Luthor also ends much differently. On page 113 of the script, Superman tosses Luthor into the pit of the "babies", implying that he killed Luthor. This would greatly contradict the fact that Luthor appears in the "Superman II" script treatments. This scene occurs just prior to Superman stopping the missiles from destroying California.

Still, two elements play out a most interesting discontinuity in time:
The progression of events is awry. In this draft of the script, Krypton is said to have exploded in 1938, and Kal-El is said to have arrived in 1948. However, during the Smallville scenes, Clark is a boy of six (rewritten in the final draft as a teenager of sixteen), during the 1950's! But Jonathan Kent is said to have died in 1943 (this error continues into the final shooting script).
Time is out of joint, indeed, as this odd continuity problem permeates all four drafts of the script. Yet it was wisely corrected in the final filmed version.
This version of the script also states that during Lois' interview, Superman is 35 years old (rewritten to age 30 in the final film), which would imply that the main story takes place in 1973. This is a nod to the comics continuity of the 1960's, as Superman was suggested to have been 35 years old (coincidentally, in current comics continuity, Clark Kent is 35 years old, as suggested by the "Newstime" one-shot special in 1993, and as the current stories are said to occur a year after
Superman's fatal battle against Doomsday).

But things dramatically changed. The production shifted from its base in Rome to Pinewood Studios in London in late 1976, and this change in production location resulted in the departure of Guy Hamilton from the project. Working frantically to cast key roles, including the leads of Superman/Clark Kent and Lois Lane, and looking to start production in early 1977, it seemed that without a proper rewrite and all elements coming together, "Superman" would remain grounded in its then-camp state.

Enter Richard Donner. The American-born director had just scored a major box-office success in directing that year's blockbuster "The Omen", when he was brought on board as the director of the "Superman" films. Upon modeling the Superman uniform for himself, he wasted no time in signing on as director. His influence would prove invaluable and lasting, and many people to this day credit Richard Donner for giving "Superman" his heart and humanity, as well as casting the perfect Superman in Christopher Reeve.

The first task Donner set to work on was overseeing the rewriting of the script. Having read the Puzo and the Newman-Benton drafts of the script, he initally turned the script down. Stated Donner, "I told them there were specific things in the script that had to be changed, and I would be willing to direct if I could rewrite the screenplay. Understandably, they were reluctant to talk about rewrites, since the script had already undergone several transformations. But I was adamant - I thought the script was getting too far away from Puzo's original concept, which was excellent - and so it looked as if that would be the end of it. However, we got back to each other, decided to meet in Paris, and agreed to bring Tom Mankiewicz in to do the revisions. So I accepted the Salkinds' offer and we were on our way."

PART 4 - The MANKIEWICZ' Touch