After filming “The Doors” Val Kilmer had to go to therapy just to get out of character – Video

There are some actors that are prepared to sacrifice their bodies, their social life, and their relationships with friends and relatives just to make their performances more convincing. One of them is Val Kilmer. He took method acting to the extreme while preparing for the role of Jim Morrison in Oliver Stone’s The Doors.

He wanted to make his performance as authentic as possible when he was cast to play the role of Jim Morrison in the film The Doors. For a start, he decided to learn 50 of Morrison’s songs. Kilmer allegedly spent many hours in the studio listening to Doors songs and learning in depth Morrison’s approach to each song.

publicity-photo-of-jim-morrison

The Doors is a biographical film about the band with the same name and in its focus is the life of their lead singer, Jim Morrison. It depicts 1960s rock and roll and the hippie lifestyle. And, of course, the controversial life of Jim Morrison up to his death at the age of 27. Although the film itself received mixed reviews, Kilmer’s performance was praised as one of the best performances of the year. Val Kilmer was chosen to play the part of the larger-than-life rock star of the 1960s, while Meg Ryan was cast as his life partner, Pamela Courson.

Val Kilmer admits he’d never been a real Doors fan but he still wanted to get the role. He had a meeting with Oliver Stone and he managed to impress him. Oliver Stone thought that the actor had the right look for the role.

The Doors logo, designed by an Elektra Records assistant, first appeared on their 1967 debut album.

Prior to the audition, Val Kilmer spent thousands of dollars to produce his own video, shot in his rented Laurel Canyon home with professional assistance in order to get the role. Oliver Stone wasn’t impressed with the video, but the producer Paul Rothchild found the home video more intriguing and he convinced Oliver Stone that Val was the right person for the role.

Prior to production, Val Kilmer lived just like Jim Morrison for a year, dressing in his clothes and listening to his music. He even copied the way he walked and behaved. The actor also spent hundreds of hours interrogating Paul Rothchild, a producer for the iconic rock band and a consultant on the film. Eventually, he knew more about Jim than anybody in the film crew.

Val Kilmer. Photo Credit

Val Kilmer was getting so obsessed with the role that, by the end of filming, he had everyone on set referring to him as “Jim,” all of the time.

When members of The Doors heard Kilmer singing their songs, they could not tell the difference between his voice and Morrison’s.

When he finished filming he had to go to therapy because it was hard for him to get out of the character. That is how far he went just to “get it right.”

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Jim Morrison’s father – Give up any idea of singing

When James Douglas Morrison had a “break on through on the other side” and became Jim Morison the frontman of “The Doors” it didn’t take long to became one of the most glorified and mystified singers of all time.

An army of fans adored him and the music he wrote, the popular press wrote of his controversial image in a gothic manner;  The Village Voice described him as  ” The first major male sex symbol since James Dean died, and Marlon Brando got a paunch”, others dubbed him “shaman-serpent king”, “leather tiger”,  and “America’s Oedipal nightingale.”

Promotional photo of The Doors in late 1966

In the mid-60s, The Doors, with their blend of dark psychedelic rock and blues, became one of the most popular rock bands in the United States. Even though  Morrison enjoyed immense fame and was critically acclaimed by the entire world,  there was one particular person who was not exactly a fan – his father.

George Stephen Morrison was a U.S  Navy rear admiral, naval aviator and the  commander of the U.S. naval forces in the Gulf of Tonkin during the Gulf of Tonkin Incident of August 1964.

Jim Morrison has been raised a military brat in a typical semi-nomadic existence. Rather than physical corporal punishment, James and his brother Andy were disciplined by the military tradition known as dressing down, which consisted of yelling and berating the children until they were completely out of tears and declared their faults.

As soon as Morrison graduated from UCLA he left home and never looked back, broke off most of the contact with his family and, by the time The Doors ascended to the top of the charts, he falsely claimed that most of his family was dead.

Captain Morrison and his son Jim on the bridge of the Bonhomme Richard in January 1964

Morrison cut off any communication with his family and in a manner of speaking “killed them” maybe because his father was never supportive of his career choice. One day, when an acquaintance of his father saw Jim on the cover of a record, he hastily brought it to Morrison family. When the young man played the record of the Doors’ self-titled debut, Admiral Morrison was more than indifferent to his son’s singing, and vowed to stop immediately what he saw as a disgrace.

He wrote a letter to his son, urging him “to give up any idea of singing or any connection with a music group because of what I consider to be a complete lack of talent in this direction” So, it was not a “fan letter” indeed.

Fortunately, this disapproval didn’t affect Jim Morrison, who continued  writing songs that even kids today listen to.

Ultimately, Morrison’s  father did regret his disdainful words and in a letter to the Florida Probation and Parole Commission District Office dated October 2, 1970, acknowledged that Jim shutting off his family was a result of an argument over his appraisal of his son’s musical talents. Admiral Morrison said in the letter that he could blame his son for being reluctant to initiate contact, but nonetheless he was proud of him.

Source: https://www.thevintagenews.com/2016/10/14/jim-morrisons-father-upon-hearing-the-first-doors-album-wrote-a-letter-to-his-son-give-up-any-idea-of-singing/

The Doors -full album,1967

The Doors is the self-titled debut album by the American rock band the Doors, released on January 4, 1967. The album features their breakthrough single “Light My Fire” and the lengthy song “The End” with its Oedipal spoken word section. The Doors credit the success of the album to being able to work the songs out night after night at the Whisky a Go Go and the London Fog nightclubs in West Hollywood, California.^{[citation needed]}

The Doors was not only one of the albums to have been most central to the progression of psychedelic rock, but is also one of the most acclaimed recordings in all of popular music. In 2012, it was ranked number 42 in Rolling Stone magazine’s 500 greatest albums of all time.

The original album has sold 20 million copies, and has been inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame; “Light My Fire” was also inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. It has been reissued several times on CD, including a 2007 remaster that became the Doors’ most successful studio album in commercial sales.

In 2015, the Library of Congress selected The Doors for inclusion in the National Recording Registry based on its cultural, artistic or historical significance.