“BRING BACK GERONIMO”: TWO ORIGINAL TYPEWRITTEN SCREENPLAY ROUGH DRAFTS OF WILLIAM GOLDMAN’S MR. HORN, WITH MANY HANDWRITTEN REVISIONS

GOLDMAN, William. Original Typed Screenplays for Mr. Horn. Two Complete Manuscripts with Handwritten Revisions. Los Angeles, circa 1978. Two original manuscripts, each leaf (measures 8-1/2 by 11 inches) in typescript with annotations in manuscript hand, some leaves with three-hole margin indentations; pp. 148 (& 22 leaves), pp. 152 (& 11 leaves); manila envelope (measures 10 by 13 inches) with printed label completed in typescript tipped to front, hand-lettered flap; cardboard box. Housed together in a custom clamshell box. $1600.

Two original screenplay drafts for Goldman’s 1979 western Mr. Horn, a film project intended for Robert Redford, co-star of Goldman’s Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969), ultimately premiering as a two-part television series starring David Carradine, containing two typewritten rough drafts with extensive revisions (respectively 170 and 163 loose pages), accompanied by a large envelope with the label of the prestigious Ziegler Ross Agency.

Novelist and Oscar-winning screenwriter William Goldman, whose Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969) redefined the Western, is especially regarded as a writer who “thinks in knockout lines” (Thomson, 354). The same exceptional talent for dialogue and action that crafted Butch Cassidy is clear in these two original typewritten rough drafts of Goldman’s screenplay for Mr. Horn— with many pages containing extensive handwritten revisions. Here Goldman tells the story of the legendary western scout, cowboy, hired killer and detective Tom Horn, whose ability to speak fluent Apache united him with Army scout Al Sieber in tracking Geronimo across the West, and ultimately brought Horn to the attention of the Pinkerton Detective Agency, which hired him in the 1890s to track bank robbers. Horn’s notoriety and his association with the Pinkerton’s would not have been lost on Goldman during his research for Butch Cassidy—so much so that Goldman originally intended this as a project for Redford. Mr. Horn ultimately reached the screen in a two-part 1979 television series starring David Carradine, Richard Widmark and Karen Black. These two original manuscripts of typescript (occasional leaves xeroxed), with extensive revisions, are accompanied by a large manila envelope showing a handprinted “Mr. Horn” (Orig. Rough Draft)” on flap, and containing a tipped-in printed label of the Los Angeles Ziegler Ross Agency that is completed in typescript: “Mr. Horn By William Goldman (Original rough draft).” The first typewritten manuscript of 148 loose leaves and its 22 inserted typed loose leaves of revision is joined by a second typewritten manuscript of 152 loose leaves with eleven inserted typed loose leaves of revision. See Lamar, 495.

Manuscript leaves fresh and clean with faint paperclip mark to one leaf; some edge-wear, closed tears to envelope flap. An exceptional manuscript in near-fine condition.